Speakers for a 'great room' - 20X20X20 - 5.1/music?

focus on the large tower speakers for L & R and the largest center channel that will match the other front speakers. You will need "cone area" producing sound to attempt to fill a huge volume like you describe. Probably two 15" subwoofers (12" at the very least).

How far will the seating be from the media wall ? the 8' or 9' separation between the L & R towers may not be enough.

Ok, I'll give this a try.

In a room this size, your aim should be to duplicate a professional movie theater. You WILL want a projector + screen and appropriate room light control. These don't cost as much as you might think & the audio is also remarkably affordable for "pro" sound.

FRONT CHANNEL POSSIBILITIES:
Klipsch Heresy III - I have seen people with large theater designs on this forum use Klipsch Cornwall and the Heresy series is very similar. You will need to buy them separately (each) and are $800 each normally. I advised finding them at a much lower cost "used".
Here is a used one for $350 with only a cosmetic blemish:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Genuine-Klip...item3f102c219b

In a pinch, you can buy 2 sets of these affordable speakers for the LCR (but since they're sold in "pairs" you will have one left over as a back in case one of them dies off). Although they are listed as "surround" speakers, there is no reason why these can't work in a home theater for a large room as the "fronts". You can also consider these for use as surrounds although in your room, I would bet the smaller brother 8320 model will work just as well in as a "surround".
JBL 8340A THX $529
http://www.spectrumaudio.com/jbl-8340a.html



For surround speakers, I think you should go for a minimum of 2 sets of these for 7.1 surrounds (I think there might be room to run 8 of these (two for each channel to duplicate an "array" like you see in theaters.)
JBL 8320 THX (Surround) $247
http://www.spectrumaudio.com/jbl-8320.html



You might want 2 subwoofers, but one could do the trick in a corner.

Cerwin Vega Monster CVA-118 from Musician's Friend in the "gently used" section for $764

http://www.musiciansfriend.com/pro-a...RWXGB&ZYXSEM=0


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In closing, I think if you're not going to go "all the way" and buy acoustic treatment curtains, panels and some carpeting, then spending a bunch on gear and speakers isn't a great idea in a big room like this. Large rooms REQUIRE treatments to sound good, period. To do anything less is a crap job and you will be disappointed with the results.

I advise you to consult people on this forum who have designed large theaters on a budget for pointers and ideas. Designing a large theater is a challenge and although it can be done on a budget, each piece needs to be thought out. While my equipment links should give a start on thinking about possibilities, there are still more options out there. It took me a while to figure out the "affordable/budget" speaker options I linked in this post and they should be able to get the job done but I'm not the de-facto authority in this area. There is MUCH more planning to consider to do this right.