Looking for some input/thoughts on speaker setup for a room with off-center and limited placement...

Hi,

With this current arrangement as seen on the photo I see no hope to get even a decent HT setup when it comes to speak about sound quality. Would you (or your better half) allow to move the sofa from the right side wall to the opposite side, because in that case you could build up your system on the right side wall. If affirmative, there will be tons of good advises from many knowledgable members. Just wait and see how many others will chime in.

In that case then best would be to forget the living room HT setup. Subwoofer in a corner will result in abnormal build up of uncontrollable boomy bass. We're talking about sound quality, not family matters, right? This is Da AVSForum!! Do you have a basement or an attic where you could setup your own mancave?

+1 – it’s a hopeless situation with the way the room is currently set up.

Regards,
Wayne A. Pflughaupt

I agree with the other posters who see no hope for the current setup.

I would recommend blocking off the little equipment nook with drywall and positioning the speakers across the newly flattened wall, starting with left front to the left of the fireplace.

If sound quality is important to you and you can't change the room enough, might I recommend some good Sennheiser wireless headphones?

that is when you need to use the microhpone to grab an impulse response file all the way down the wall, making certain the microphone tip is always touching the same space of air as the previous spot where you recorded an impulse response file.
then you just load 'em all up with the proper distance alignment.
you could do one line down the wall.. or you could the entire wall solid to get the entire wall removed.
is there a faster way to do it?
yes, infinite impulse response will charge up the room.. then you levy up the other side to zap it out and you keep the room there.
and then you have a sweep for the pressure level for all of the pressures.. that lets you put 18 inch woofers in the wall and let you lift up a nerf ball and hold it in the air.
you jst gotta hold the pressure down like a clamp no matter what music is playing.. that is the trick.
so if you walk into a room and it feels like a sudden change of pressure and the air is all fancy .. yep, you are gonna get the pressure put into you.


**edit**

and to help the other speaker, you need to find the ring of the room with the frequency sweep and twist the phase of the speaker at the loudest point to get the speaker to fill in the room.. that way you will get audio all the way to the door and beyond.
thanks to the impulse response files.. that other wall can virtually disappear.


**edit**

projection screen and replace the flower with a speaker is easier.

**edit**

if you wanted it bad enough, you would replace those windows with some new ones that have something inside the glass pane to block out the sun whenever you wanted.
that way the surface is nice and hard for the soundwaves to get calibrated.
the fireplace isnt going anywhere.. and the screen goes up and down, fits better with the couch, acoustics play better with those three walls, and you would be able to lay back and see without trying too hard (or if you did try hard, you would see more).

**edit**

yes.. make sure the edges of the microphone tips are touching or overlapping .
(and find some computers that will run a line of 'em.. and input the latency into the video to audio synchronization adjustment)
you dont need a bot net, but probably more than one computer.
shouldnt need it on more than one computer if you could dedicate parts of the cpu core to even an analog signal cut up into modulated pieces that help cut the latency down because the instances are divided.
Edited by anwaypasible - 11/29/12 at 7:40pm

The old fireplace problem. To work around my fireplace, I placed one main speaker on the other side of the fireplace. The center speaker is near the center of the two main speakers up front. My 3 front speakers are located on the floor, and they do not look bad at all.

Please forgive the perfectioniists in the group. We talk so much about what's ideal that we can forget that not everyone is in search of perfection... or values it like we do.

As Palmer notes, about the best you can do is try to align the L/R speakers with the walls, so the room is symetrically filled with sound, and try to get the CC as close to the screen (and the L/R speaker centerline) as you can. I'm thinking something very narrow would improve WAF. Modern AVRs with room correction routines like Audyssey will correct a lof of the resulting issues. Most folks will think it sounds fine, and discriminating ears will recognize that it's a living room first.

HAve fun,
Frank

PS If you do have to keep thing in the corner, consider a sound bar as a good compromise between cost and room impact when performance is already compromised.

Blocking off that equipment nook is another AVS recommendation that is very poor recommendation. Dumb.

In the old days one of the AVS pefectionistas told me to get rid of my fireplace. Dumber.

Seems like people have watched the movie Dumb and Dumber one time too many!

Where do you recommend that he place the TV after he blocks off that TV nook? I would keep the TV placed as far left in that nook as practical (depending on the new seating plan).

If you're interested in ancient concepts such as tact and diplomacy, you might want to experiment with"I disagree" ;-)

I never said that, and in fact I'd recommend keeping it. FWIW there's a fireplace in my AV room...

On the continuous wall that would result, closer to the viewers and closer to the center of the room.

I disagree!

lousy choices get lousy responses.

how dare a person spend $400 on a television panel when they should of gotten a projector for the same $400
it is that bloody spot on the table .. it is empty, and only one thing can fit there.
the same amount of money.
the different result for each product brought home creates triangles .. and those triangles grow out like tree branches.
at the tip of the triangle is, again, the same amount of money and one or the other.

perfect can exist .. and sometimes quick and easy is jst too small to see and stop for.

A bookshelf speaker on a stand or floor standing speakers are almost the same difference to me. Place a subwoofer out of the way in the right corner if possible.

Do you own any speakers at the moment? If not maybe look into surface wall mounted speakers just for evaluation purposes.

Here is an article about an out of production surface mounted speaker.

http://www.soundandvisionmag.com/article/nht-evolution-l5-home-theater-speaker-system

If you wish to go wall mounted, the current production NHT wall mounted speaker can be seen here:


http://www.nhthifi.com/Home-Theater-On-Wall-Speakers