Yet another speaker placement question (1 Viewer)

[Brian_PJ]

Hi,

I just moved into a condo, and the living room area is set up very differently than my old apartment. My apartment was perfect in that the back sofa was about 10 feet from the tv and faced it head on (with a futon to the side).

Now my room is set up so the TV is in a corner, and the entertainment stands jut out at 90 degree angles from either side. Then the 2 sofas complete a square. I hope I explained that well.

The problem is, there is no 'center' seat now. I have the surround speakers on stands behind the sofas, but you innevitably sit real close to one of them when you sit down, thus that speaker overwhelms your listening experience.

Does anyone have any helpful hints on setting up a system in this environment? I will be getting a sofa table soon, and this I will be setting up the 6th (rear center) speaker soon. Hopefully that will help a little (though it won't do a thing for 5.1 discs liks SACDs).

Any ideas?

 

[Johnny_M]

did you calibrate your speakers? i had a simliar problem at my old place, but if you balance the speakers properly you can turn down the speakers closest to you and turn up the ones furthest, but you need an spl meter to make sure its right.

can you post a pic of the room? or a diagram of the room? people may be able to suggest alternat arrangements if we can see what your working with.

Johnny

 

[Brian_PJ]

I tried drawing up a quick picture of the layout, with the important rooms in grey. This is my "5-minute" artistic skills at work mind you.


I would say the square that the sofa completes is maybe 10x10 or 12x12 feet.


edit: ok, so I can't post URLs yet because I am a new member. I will cut the url up below:

dreamt.
org/
spinfrog/
livingroom/
layout.jpg

 

[Johnny_M]

your right, tough angle to work with without ditching the dining room table. how high do your speaker stands go? the higher you mount them the less "in your face" they will sound. me personally, i would probably ceiling mount and have them face eachother. ive also heard of people pointing the surrounds up toward the ceiling, or even backwards to bounce the sounds off the back walls. remember, you want a sound field back there you dont need to have them pointed at your ears like with the fronts.

anybody else have some ideas?


Johnny

 

[Cam McFarland]

Maybe get rid of the loveseat for now & place the sofa
at same angle & facing TV. I know, its pretty crappy, but would be better from a listening standpoint.

 

[Nick Breckon]

This sort of resembles our living room as it used to be, with either of the rear speakers being right behind you. Our solution was to simply redesign the entire room around the TV/home theater, because frankly that was what we were using the room for more than anything else. Now people are impressed with our theater enough not to mind that when they sit down to talk, they have to rotate in their seats to see eachother.

 

[Chu Gai]

Consider the following thread which has links to several papers by Floyd Toole. One of them, I forget which, talks about rooms such as yours. They're a good read.

 

[Brian_PJ]

Thank you everyone for your replies. I think I might try wall mounts, and then angle the speakers inward a little and towards the center of the entertainment area. I'll let you know how it goes!