Should I go with in wall speakers for my HT, or should i build indented in wall platform to hold my bookshelf speakers in my 7.1 system?

i don't want to show all my 7.1 speakers for design reasons so i wondering if it was worth the effort to build indented platforms to hold bookshelf speakers without showing too much speaker. i keep hearing that in wall pale in comparison to regular speakers. is that genreally true?

i'm building the room from scratch so i'm trying to do whatevers best for sound quality.

Many trade-offs indeed.
Recessing a speaker in a "nook" can have many acoustic problems - think cupping your hands around your mouth making a horn for your voice - same thing with the recessed speaker.

Additionally the nearness of the speaker to the wall boundary will cause a distinct shift in the timbre of the response and require boundary compensation.

Proper in-wall speakers will have neither of those problems. On the other hand, many here utilize the AT ( acoustically transparent) wall construct for hiding the speakers and mitigating some of the aforementioned problems.

Is there any reason you can't use columns and faux walls to hide your speakers? Unless you go with really good in wall then you will get better sound from free standing speakers and they should NOT be recessed into walls or enclosed in solid enclosures of any type. you can build columns or shelves that are open and covered with AT fabric.

Building nooks for speakers that are not intended to be in-wall mounted is not generally a good idea. You're in effect changing the size of the front baffle to the entire wall width. The xover is designed with a specific baffle size in mind so you end up changing the voicing of the speakers - and not usually for the better.

If you can't do open columns and must have them hidden, then get something that's designed to be put in a wall.

Bryan

when i say recessed, i mean the speaker front grill would be flush with the wall. is that ok.

the front grill of the speaker would not be recessed, i can even have it stick out 1 inch or so.

please advise.

also is ok to have a different speaker brand for surrounds or is it that much better to have same brand speaker for entire 7 surround setup. thanks for your help. angelo

That sounds like recessed to me. If you *do* this then make sure you don't have rear ported speakers. But as advised go with an open column, don't put them in a shelf type thing and cage them in. Otherwise you'll have to buy a *shudder* bose system with adaptive sound correction. Have you visited their home theater? They do this trick with the box over the speaker sounds like crap and then the system corrects and it sounds well it sound better if you like the bose sound. Think of your speaker like a musical instrument. Would a violin sound good in a wall?

No it is not OK That would in fact be recessed and would be bad.
and it is best to have the same speakers all around but you at least want them all to be timbre matched.
If you must recess as you say then use in walls designed to be IN WALL.

I wrestled with the same question. There are a bunch of factors to consider such as room size, performance and budget.

I opted to go with dedicated In-walls. They give the theater a totally clean look as they are concealed by GOM covered acoustic panels (with holes cut out for the speakers). I'll post some pics in a week or so once the side and rear wall panels are installed.

If you choose to go with In-walls, try and audition them (preferably in a HT environment)before buying. I decided on James Loudspeaker in order to get the kind of performance I was looking for.

I think that it wouldnt be terrible to go with the nook idea if you were using sealed or front ported speakers and you placed the speaker at the very front of the opening.

I think that it wouldnt be terrible to go with the nook idea if you were using sealed or front ported speakers and you placed the speaker at the very front of the opening.

While front ported speakers might eliminate one problem with a cavity, the fact that sound radiates 360deg from a speaker is the killer. With a free standing speaker there is a combination of the sound coming from the front of the speaker directly to you, combined with the sound radiating in all directions from the speaker reflecting off the various wall and other surfaces. You interfer with this if you put the speaker in a box.

Speakers are not like headphones (unless you get very close to them)

It always amazes me that somehow threads that haven't been updated in two years can be resurrected by a post that adds nothing new to the debate.

It always amazes me that somehow threads that haven't been updated in two years can be resurrected by a post that adds nothing new to the debate.

Must be the result of a search and failing to read the date of the last post.

I replied to a post only hours before mine, but I wouldn't have if I had noticed the one preceeding it was from 07. I just saw the 6-13.

My bad.

I replied to a post only hours before mine, but I wouldn't have if I had noticed the one preceeding it was from 07. I just saw the 6-13.

My bad.

Yeah Allen, I wasn't referring to you.