I'm in the process of putting together a home theater room in my basement. It is 15'w x 18'L x 9'h. There are 1' tall by 2' wide soffits that run the length of the room. And on the left side near the back it a double door for ingress/egress. I will have a 7.1 surround sound system with in-wall mounted speakers. I have looked up speaker placement guide lines and understand the general rule for placement of the speakers for a 7.1 system. I can put the front surround, center and rear speakers at ear level, no problem. However, because of the double door placement, I won't be able to put the side surround speakers at ear level and directly beside of or slightly behind the listener as recommended. My only choices are at ear level in the middle of the room forward of the listeners, in the soffit directly in line with the listener, but the speakers would be above the listener where they could either be pointing down or pointing into the center of the room with the same orientation as the other speakers. So if I have made myself clear, can you give me your opinion as to which of the 3 choices would most likely be the best. Thank you in advance.
your best bet is to get a set of bi/dipole speakers. they are made so that you get perfect surround in the middle of a room. helps with the ambience factor. i have a denon 7.1 receiver, and i am running all 7 channels, but my speakers r set up so that its all in the rear. i can do 9 speakers, and when i actually have the room, i will likely put the 3rd set in about the middle of the room as well. the great thing about surround with 7.1 is its verstile no matter how you set it up. just so long as you decide to use the back channels for actual dolby ex and dts/es playback. which is how i watch all my movies. good luck, let me know how it goes.
Thank you for you feedback. I have already started to look up bi/dipole speakes, however if I don't go that way which of the ways that I mentioned would you suggest. thanks again
Well, if your gonna try doin ur second set of surrounds at another location, try having them elevated. elevated surrounds combined in a 7.1 set up actually sound really good. but its better if you can keep them mid to rear location, otherwise evrything blends in with your front and center speakers. Centralized surrounds work well too, I tried it a few yrs back and was impressed at the result. If possible, could you maybe enclose some pix of your basement set up so i can get an idea of what it is your going for. ttyl.