I have a 5.1 surround sound set up that I havent really tweaked yet. I was watching a movie last night and it sounded like all the audio was coming from the front of the room. The only time I heard any of the rear speakers was when music was being played or during a scene that involved a lot of shooting and stuff being blown up. Now with that said, I can adjust each speaker I believe up to +5db I believe. It may be more though.
My front speakers are on stands and my center speaker is located below my Plasma screen. The subwoofer is in a corner that is also in the front of the room.
My 2 rear surround speakers are positioned facing each other with my couch in the middle.
I had thought about placing the rear speakers behind the couch so it would sound like I was right in the middle of the action so to speak.
I guess my overall question is how loud should the rear speakers be compared to the rest of the system? Should they be the same as the others?
Different movies will likely utilize the surrounds to varying degrees. *Generally*, the front plane WILL carry more of the signal than the rear plane, during movies. If you can buy or borrow a sound level meter, that would be a good start. Your receiver probably has a built in test tone (pink noise generator) that you can use in conjunction with the sound meter to fine tune each individual channel, and hopefully achieve equal output levels. If you want to go even a step beyond that, there are a few discs floating around out there that have multiple test tones at specific frequencies.