[murphy2112]

I recently upgraded my 5.1 system to include Goldenear all the way around, and getting my 5.1 sounding a whole lot better than what I had before. My next step is to try to get to 7.1, with the ultimate goal of 7.1.4 when I decide to take the plunge down that path later on. Here's the trouble: my room is an "L" shape and I don't have a good place for the rear surround. So I've take a 3 minute video and requesting all you brilliant minds out there for suggestions. WAF is a big deal here. For those who just want the raw data (sans video), here's the room specs:

Basement home theater dimensions:
13' wide
12'-31.5' deep
6'8" tall
Front wall 2.5' flat each side from wall, then bay window is 2' in angled 3.5' deep and 5' across (about a 3' depth)

And here is the video:

Thanks in advance for your suggestions.

 

[Selden Ball]

It's going to be a compromise, no matter what you do.

The rear surround channels are independent from one another (stereo) so they'll sound better with more separation. (That's why it's called 7.1 instead of 6.1, which was provided for a very brief while on some DVDs.)

I'd suggest putting the right-side speaker on the pillar and the left on the wall where you're currently storing the ping-pong table. Maybe store the table against the rear wall next to the desk? I'd also suggest mounting some storage shelving so the toys (sometimes) won't be getting in the way of moving things around

 

[murphy2112]

The rear surround channels are independent from one another (stereo) so they'll sound better with more separation. (That's why it's called 7.1 instead of 6.1, which was provided for a very brief while on some DVDs.)

Thanks - I didn't know that

I'd suggest putting the right-side speaker on the pillar and the left on the wall where you're currently storing the ping-pong table. Maybe store the table against the rear wall next to the desk? I'd also suggest mounting some storage shelving so the toys (sometimes) won't be getting in the way of moving things around

That's a good idea. I can do a mount on the left side and remove it when playing ping-pong. By the way, the ping pong table is usually stored in the back room and not this room, so that's not going to be a problem.

What do you think about putting the speakers all the way on the back wall? That's nearly 32' away, so I would guess that I'd need to go up quite a few dB of volume for movies, but I plan on having enough power to do that. The other benefit would be when I play music at parties for 7-channel stereo - filing the whole room, at lower volumes. What are the downsides of doing it back there? Maybe I should just get a pair of speakers and and experiment

 

[Selden Ball]

If you can get some inexpensive "throw away" speakers for testing, that seems reasonable.

One of the things that receivers do is adjust the timing of the sounds going to the various speakers, delaying the sound in the close-by speakers so it arrives at the main listening position at the same time as the sound from the most distant speakers. Unfortunately, there is a maximum distance that can be specified manually or automatically detected by the calibration software. 32' might be too far.

 

[murphy2112]

Update:

I ended up finding a good spot for the rear surrounds. It turns out that 32’ is the total length of the room, but 21’ is the distance from the couch to the rear surround. Since my AVR limit is 30’, so I’m good there. I believe this is used for delay. To normalize volume across all speakers, I used an SPL meter and white noise generator on the AVR to increase the rears +5db and +7db (left and right, respectively). The reason for the difference is because there is a load bearing pole and ceiling soffit partially in the way, but also, the left rear is mounted almost flush to a small 18” horizontal wall where the staircase is (see pics). So that causes the speaker volume to be increased and becomes more directional due to reflection.

Despite the limitations noted, I was quite surprised on how well this layout ended up working out during testing and during certain movies with 6.1+ content. My AVR can really only do 6.1 (DTS-ES-Matrix and DTS-ES-DISCRETE, and some other 7 channel modes such as Harman Kardon’s own logic), but only a few movies have true 7.1 content anyway. I’m hoping this changes over time with Atmos, DTS-X, Auro, and the ability to up-convert 5.1 content to more speakers later on when the converters come out.

The biggest gain for me though was with 7-channel stereo. The entire basement is now filled with good sound when I play music, and it just sounds so much better when I’m not critically listening to 2-channel at my desk, playing with the kids, etc.

I still have to find a way to run the wires through the walls or ceiling, but my 12AWG wire, even at 50’ per speaker, seems up to the task, since my Ohm-meter doesn’t even register the increase in impedance when compared to a short wire.

 

[morphemes]

 

[murphy2112]

morphemes, that diagram looks like it was created in Google SketchUp? In any event, it answers another question I had, which was "how far from the walls should the ceiling speakers be," and that answers that, so thank you.