Help with Speaker placement? (diagram included)

Hello.

I'm trying to implement my first AVR and (maybe...) surround sound system, but need some advice on what is the best-case scenario for my particular room constraints.

I am limited to a "corner" tv location, and for a number of reasons, and my furniture layout is fixed, for the purposes of this discussion.

Some compromises that I just will have to live with:

1. Front speaker spacing
Because of the window and brick fireplace, my "TV corner" is limited to a fixed distance of about 5'-0" across at a 45d; without obscuring the window or FP. This yields a Front (floor-standing) Speaker spacing of about 4'0" center-to-center. I know that this is far from ideal, but I've racked my brain over this many times, and even with just a 2.1 setup, there's no good answer.

2. Surround Speaker placement
Because of the corner room and "L"-shaped seating arrangement, my surrounds are not likely going to be beside or especially behind any of the seating positions.
I've shown a few potential locations for the surrounds on the attached diagram. None are especially great.

So given my "constraints" , I have some questions that I hope the members of this forum can help me with:

1. With my front speakers so close together, with a center channel speaker (placed on open-shelf below TV) still be beneficial to add? I'm wondering if a center channel will just become redundant with a placement like this?

2. Because of the corner configuration, and the resulting surround placement options, will they be worth adding? Or will their positions compete with the front too much? Should I just concentrate on the front, and forget the surrounds?

3. Would this layout benefit from a 6.1 setup, with a rear speaker positioned in the back-wall of the room? (see note on diagram)

So, what do you all think? Is 2.1, 3.1, 4.1 (no center), 5.1, or 6.1 best for this room? I would really appreciate your opinions.

Thank you.

Can anyone offer some advice?
I would really appreciate it.

Thanks.

Thanks for the reply.

Yes, I think that I will try surrounds, and see how it goes.

I've got some matching bookshelf speakers from the same manufacturer/series as my front mains, and will try them on stands in the positions shown on the attached diagram.

The first go-around will be a 4.1 trial, as I have no center channel speaker at the moment.

The right surround will likely be positioned closer to the couch, as you've suggested, because that will allow the side-porch door to be partially open (in Summer)

I doubt that I'd ever go for 7.1, but might consider a single rear speaker for 6.1; if the 4.1 and 5.1 surround experiments perform well. Running wire won't be a problem, as the level below is a basement with un-finished ceiling.

Because this is a Living Room that is masquerading as a HT room, I don't want to clutter up the room with too many speakers. If it were a dedicated HT room, I would love to do a 7.1 setup properly.

Speaking of "clutter": I was wondering if you all had opinions about locating front-firing subs inside the base of the TV console/media cabinet? If the front-panel of the area of the floor-mounted sub had speaker cloth, it should perform reasonably well, wouldn't it? My Sub (Mirage LF-100) is actually front-firing and front-ported, so its probably going to perform better in a 5-sided enclosure, than back-ported and/or down-firing Subs, correct? I've seen some high-end media furniture (example: BDI Novia 8426) that design for in-cabinet Sub placement, which gave me the idea. Is this ok to do, because of the low-frequency from a sub is less affected by the enclosure, as compared to high frequency tweeter sound which is much more "directional"? I know that corner room placeent of a sub can sometimes result in "boom-y" bass. What affect does an enclosure have, I wonder?

Thanks for the advice.

@barryecohen: no, over the fireplace mount is not feasible for two reasons: 1). My current TV is a behemoth Sony 30HS420 CRT 2). The FP mantle is 5'0"-5'2" high and would leave the mounting height for the TV too high for my "comfortable viewing" tastes.

I do realize that with this corner setup I must concede compromises, and that there is likely to be no identifiable "sweet spot" for optimal audio. (The corner setup *does* allow for lots of seating options with good viewing angle, though...) I am hoping that the collective knowledge of this group can help me arrive at the best solution possible given the less than ideal constraints.

Thanks.

yes, this was my initial hesitation to try surround in the first place. I think that it's still worth a trial, because the "side" speakers will, at least, widen the sound stage, if not envelope it...


I think that I'll start with getting the R/L surrounds hooked-up, and then go from there.


yes, me too. Hence this post. :-\\

I am really intrigued by it, but don't want to layout the $$$'s for little or no gain/benefit, either. Not knowing how hard-fast the Dolby examples for layout really are, I figured I get some opinions here, from some folks with some experience.


Thanks for confirming my suspicions.
I'm playing 2.1 audio now, and the dialogue is pretty discernible. Wasn't sure if adding a Center would really improve things appreciably.

I used to have the locations of my sub and left-front (LF) speaker switched, for 2ch. music listening (which sounded great on the couch near the table...) and with that setup anyone sitting on the loveseat couldn't hear movie dialogue very well at all. Moving the LF speaker beside the tv has improved that immensely, but also retracted my music soundstage quite negatively. It's a harsh trade-off.


Yes, I'm trying to be smart/cautious.
Thanks for your help!

Just had another thought: Do you think that maybe I could 1.) eliminate the L/R Front speakers and 2.) add a Center speaker and 3.) use the front-most L/R Surround positions in the diagram as L/R Front and 4.) set the AVR to 3.1 ??? That would certainly widen the front soundstage at least. (but would it be too wide?....) And maybe forget about "surround" in this awkward corner layout. Or maybe the layout described above, with a single rear surround for an un-orthodox 4.1?

Just trying to think creatively, here.

Yes, I think it's worthy of consideration, anyway.
I was just playing around with my surrounds on stands in these locations, and it looks like my Front L/R "spread" would be about 11'-12', which is about equal to my (preferred) viewing distance from the TV; *but*... because of the corner geometry, they are pushed almost 3' (~25% of the Viewing Distance...) in front of the center speaker and tv screen. Is that normally a problem - to have the L/R mains located so far in front of the Center Speaker/TV plane? I'm also concerned about any "soundstage" being weak/broken with L/R Mains this far apart relative to the seating distance. (speaker angle relative to the 45d "view line" would be ~35d...) Is that a valid concern? I suppose there's only one way to find out for sure - try it and hear for myself.


Yes, This layout certainly did occur to me; but I rejected it for a few reasons: 1.) My Wife would hate it 2.) The sofa gets positioned off-center from the window, and I generally don't like to to orient the room away from an outside view (we have pretty nice scenery out that window..) 3.) Although the sofa becomes ideal for audio and viewing, the orientation of the loveseat becomes very much less so. 4.) I think the back-side of the table located right at the door/entrance to/from the Foyer would be "weird".

But thank you for suggesting it. Just another set of constraints stemming from the "Living Room as HT" problem.

@agb2529: thanks for posting this. In my case, I don't think that I want to have wall mounted speakers, up high; but I do appreciate your creativity!

Here's a few more layout attachments, showing the direction that I think that I'm heading.

4.1 or 5.1?
With my speaker stands arriving today, I've got my surrounds placed where shown on the diagram, and they look great and seem like they should perform reasonably well from there. (still awaiting my AVR to arrive, so I can't say for sure...) I think trying a single-mono rear speaker on a 28" stand in a 6.1 setup (with no front center speaker, so 5.1 actually?) might be worth considering, too? It looks like that should really help formulate an "envelope" of sound about the seating area, and maybe help compensate for the R/L surrounds being a bit more forward than what is typically optimal. We shall see...

or 3.1?
This layout is worth trying for comparison, I think. The Front Mains might be spread so far that proper blending will be lost, though. Also, being so far forward of the center, I can't say if that is going to be a problem.

I plan to test these scenarios in the coming week, and then I'll report back my findings if anyone is interested.

Thanks to those who have contributed to this thread.