Speaker placement behind AT screens

I am very interested in the same questions that Steve has.

In addition, in the interest of conserving front to back space behind the AT screen, are there any on-wall speakers that might work well with a 140" wide 2:40 Scope screen in a 15' wide X 19' deep 9 1/2' high room?

Thank you

I think that he ment 12" from the front of the speaker to the back of the screen fabric

Steve - I'm not familiar with the Screen Excellence material, they say its proprietary, but they look to be woven fabrics similar to Phifer Sheerweave which is used by several boutique manufacturers. I have a SeymourAV screen and love it. Mine is retractable, but he does now offer a very nice fixed frame screen, as well. He also uses a proprietary weave in his fabric now although he started off using the standard 4500 fabric from Phifer like many others continue to use. The nice thing about the fabric is that it requires no EQ (unlike many perforated materials including Stewart's) and it has a negligible effect on frequency response or attenuation. You can place the speakers only inches away without any adverse affects. I don't recall what the recommended minimum distance is but mine drops down in front of my Elite RPTV and my center speaker is only about 3-4" behind the screen. I think the main concern is really air movement from any large drivers or ports that can cause the screen to move.

All screens have some compromises and perhaps the two most common to acoustically transparent fabrics are the texture and the low gain. The texture can occasionally be visible if you look for it but I find when I'm really involved in the program, I hardly ever notice it. I will say that using my RS1x on the CenterStage XD material I have the texture seems slightly more noticeable with SD material, but not hugely so. The XD material has a gain of ~1.2 but the RS1x has plenty of output at my throw (13') and size (104" diagonal.) Also a major concern is moire if you plan to go with an LCD. This will vary based on screen size and throw. If you go DLP or LcoS (DILA/SXRD) then its really not a concern due to the extremely close pixel spacing.

You can checkout the SeymourAV screens (hand made with care by Chris and his crew in Ames, IA) at his website. I also encourage you to head on over to the SeymourAV screens thread here in the forum. In addition to his great products, Chris's customer service is second to none.

My bad, deleted that comment from my post.

When I was setting up my HT, I called Atlantic Technology before ordering everything to see how far they recommended the screen be away from their in-wall speakers. There said there were no issues having a fixed AT screen mounted right in front of the speakers.

I'm not a major audiophile, but I've been very happy with my Seymour AV screen + Atlantic Technology in-walls right behind it.

Jay

I us a couple year old SMX AT screen (woven) and for all but the last two weeks had a set of floor standing speakers less than two inches from the material with no audible issues. My AT screen swings up so I can listen with or without the scree in place so I can and have compared. My processor has a room correction feature. I did try running it once without the screen and it did not seem to notice at all.

My screen is 130x55, center in in the center with the L/R just inside where the 16x9 image hits.

Probably more important on a woven screen than how far the screen is from the front of the speakers is how far your speakers need to be from the wall. My Studio v3 100's need about 18 inches behind them which puts my screen 42 inches off the wall.

check out my response in an earlier thread. Our materials have nothing to do with Pheifer.

www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=1195957

You can place the speakers anywhere from 1" to two feet away and the curves won't change appreciably.

Steve Horn, please send me a note in my AVS mailbox offline or write me here for samples and photos. John@stjohngroup.com

Good listening and viewing!
John

my setup includes seymour screen about 8" from klipsch kl-650 thx on wall speakers.

Depending on speaker and screen material .75" to 18"