Rear Surround Speaker Placement: Help select one of two possible locations (1 Viewer)

I’m putting together my first surround sound system and I need some advice with my rear speaker placement.

I'm installing four rear speakers as part of a 7.1 surround system. For the left and right "rear" speakers I will be installing two Polk RC55i in-ceiling speakers. I figured that I would put those several feet behind the primary seating position.

But I’m having trouble picking locations for my left and right "side" rear speakers.

Because of the configuration of my family room, I have only two workable locations for my wall mounted speakers. This are Polk f/x300i bipole/dipoles. I am unable to mount them directly to the left and right of the primary seating position so I’m forced to mount them in one of the following two positions:

2 feet forward of the primary seating position

or

5 feet aft of the primary seating position

Which location would be better?

Thanks!

Bob

(I'll post this over at the avs forum also.)

Just as a follow-up, I'm leaning toward the "5 foot Aft" location.

I'm thinking that having the rear surrounds *forward* of my primary listening position would produce odd effects. For example, it might be strange if a sound that's supposed to come from behind actually comes from the other direction.

But I'm still open to suggestions on this.

Bob

Aft is usually preferable, especially with dipoles. Do you have two rows of seating? If so, it makes even more sense.




Stew

Thanks Stew,

I have just a single row of seating.

I think I'll give the aft location a shot. I'll report back aft once I get eveything set up.

Bob

If you are going to be putting them behind you, I recommend switching to the Bipole setting.

Dipole works best on the sides where you can create the nullzone.

Thanks Eric,

I'll keep that in mind. I'm new to the dipole/bipole topic.

Bob

OK, I decided to place the surrounds 5 ft aft of my primary listening position.

Should I then place my rear, in-ceiling, surrounds at the same "5 ft aft" distance from the screen? Or should I place them further back?

I don't know if this is a factor, but I'll be driving these speakers with a Denon 3801 receiver. I can adjust the speaker output levels and I can change the delay times with this receiver.

Any suggestions or comments are welcome as I'm getting close to cutting drywall.

Bob