Presence Speakers (1 Viewer)

Hello all!


I am just beginning to setup my home theater room. I will attach some pictures of the space, but it will be a dual purpose theater/TV/Gaming room.


I purchased a Yamaha Aventage receiver (I know some are not big Yamaha fans, but I have been running the same Yamaha on various other setups for 10 years flawlessly- so I like them) and a SVS PB-10 Sub as my old crappy AR box finally died in our recent move.


The room is 20x20 semi-loft with a 15x30 balcony off the back.

I have some reasonably nice Polk Euro 10 floor standing speakers, a good Polk Center, and bi/di-pole Polk surrounds (all with matched tweets)




A couple of questions


1) Most important question- My Yamaha supports front Presence speakers, and I will be adding back speakers to move from 5.1 to 7.1. I am already pushing the WAF (Wife Acceptance Factor) with all the floor speakers and sub, so I need to go ceiling mount for the rears and presence speakers if possible. Are the front presence speakers critical or worthwhile, and if so, do I need to spend a bunch of money on them or should any decent ceiling speaker work? I know the back speakers are worthwhile, but same question here- how important is the quality?


2) I will post some pictures, but any thoughts on how to make this more of a "Theater" feel without totally transforming it into a single purpose theater room?



Thanks in advance for any ideas and your expertise!!!

Welcome to Home Theater Forum Dan. Nice setup. I haven't played with Yamaha for a few years, so I'm rusty on the presence speakers. Several years ago they had them as part of their own sound modes, and if I remember correctly back then they recommended that they be closer to the floor. If its just a Yamaha thing I don't think I would invest in those channels, especially since you are already pushing up against the WAF. On the other hand if your receiver supports Dolby PLIIz or Audyssey DSX, then you could do either front height or width channels and that might be worth it. Looking at your rear wall, in ceiling speakers would probably work best for the back channels.


You have a lot of reflective surfaces in the room: hardwood floors, windows, wood shutters, wood cabinets, etc. Letting your wife help with picking an area run for the front of the room might improve sound quality, and would probably be a better investment than rear channels in improving the sound. As to making it more theater like? That is a matter of your wifes taste . You have the three theater chairs, but maybe painting the walls a bit of a darker color and/or putting up a framed movie poster or two would give it a bit more of that theater feeling while still keeping it multi-purpose.