Speaker Placement Help

[nirmal1988]

Hi Folks,

 

I am a newbie to HT systems and this is my first post here, so apologies if this sounds stupid/ is a repeated post.

 

I have a small lounge room 3 x 4.5 x 2.6, where am setting up my basic home theatre.

I always wanted to have an Atmos set up, but as my room is small, I am having issues placing my rear right speaker.
I am following the Dolby guide to place my speakers (https://www.dolby.com/siteassets/about/support/guide/setup-guides/5.1.2-overhead-speaker-placement/sell-sheet-5.1.2-mounted.pdf), as per this, the rear speakers should be between 110-120 degrees from the center listening position,  at ear height.

The problem I am having is that, I have my door in that exact same angle on the right side.  If I want to wall mount, the best I can manage is either 90 degrees or 160 degrees from the center listening position (160 from center position would be 180 degrees for some one sitting on the right end of the couch).

 The work around I can think of is to have this speaker on a stand and only move it to the desired angle when HT is in use.

I don't want to move the couch forward a lot (to create the angle and get away from the door) as the room is small and our current viewing distance is around 3-3.5m (from screen).

The rear speakers are Yamaha NS 333 bookshelves.

 

Any advise on the speaker placement/work around would be welcome.

 

Thank you

[nirmal1988]

I have posted the same topic in Room Acoustics, Construction and Design.
However, I am not able to delete it from here

[Guest niterida]

got drawings or pics of the room ?

[nirmal1988]

20 hours ago, niterida said:

got drawings or pics of the room ?

Hi niterida 

 

I have tried to manage a drawing of my room.

See the pic.
The red box with R.R is where my door is and as per the dolby guide, that is where the speaker should ideally be.

The X marks are the nearest possible positions (90 and 160 mentioned in my first post).

 

Thanks

 

[Guest niterida]

Ok firstly the naming - those "rear" speakers are just Surrounds. Rears are only in 7.1 systems.

Move your couch forward 0.5m to be at 1/3 room length - this gives the best sound especially in the bass.

Then place your Right Surround at the X mark on the long wall and your Left in the corresponding spot on the other wall obviously.

Done

Oh and centre your couch sideways as well

[nirmal1988]

1 hour ago, niterida said:

firstly the naming - those "rear" speakers are just Surrounds

Sorry!

1 hour ago, niterida said:

place your Right Surround at the X mark on the long wall

At ear height, is that right ?

 

1 hour ago, niterida said:

Oh and centre your couch sideways as well

[Guest niterida]

5 minutes ago, nirmal1988 said:

At ear height, is that right ?

Yes - or slightly higher if you have to get clear line from speaker to your ears.

[nirmal1988]

[nirmal1988]

So, I have been thinking about the door, and now I am planning of converting the door to a Sliding one, so that it does not take up much of the space.

And also planning to get couple of individual recliners and have them like a second row - something like as shown in the image. 

Does the placement of surround speakers make sense in this setting ?

 

[SGS]

Centre couch 1 and 2, put 3 on a riser if needed and follow what niterida said above about moving seating forward.

[nirmal1988]

12 hours ago, SGS said:

Centre couch 1 and 2, put 3 on a riser if needed and follow what niterida said above about moving seating forward.

 

Thanks for the response.

Do you mean to centre Couch 2 & 3 and raise 1 ?

niterida suggested to have the couch 1/3rd of the room when there was only 1 row.

Now with 2 rows - should couches on the second row be at 1/3rd of the room ?

[SGS]

3 hours ago, nirmal1988 said:

 

Thanks for the response.

Do you mean to centre Couch 2 & 3 and raise 1 ?

niterida suggested to have the couch 1/3rd of the room when there was only 1 row.

Now with 2 rows - should couches on the second row be at 1/3rd of the room ?

Sorry, got that wrong. Yes, centre the front couches and bring them forward. Also best not to have rear couch against wall, 2/3rds would work well if it fits that way.

Is there a reason for extra seating? No point having more than you need.

[nirmal1988]

1 hour ago, SGS said:

Sorry, got that wrong. Yes, centre the front couches and bring them forward. Also best not to have rear couch against wall, 2/3rds would work well if it fits that way.

Is there a reason for extra seating? No point having more than you need

 

I may not have the couch 2 & 3 immediately, but I would want to future proof and position the speakers as I would be wall mounting them.

[Guest niterida]

You have 2 options :

 

1. Set the room up for one row and ignore the acoustics of the 2nd row

2. Set the room up for 2 rows.

 

Option 1 is cheap and easy, option 2 is going to be expensive and more difficult.

 

For 2 rows you ideally need a  pair of surrounds for both rows (or a single pair of bipole surrounds) and a pair of rear surrounds. Then you have to fit them all in to your small room.

 

Personally I would just have the couch and build a small bar/counter top for directly behind the couch and use bar stools for the cheap seats. Unless you expect to use more seating fairly often then your drawing (with the 2 single seats moved in to the middle as suggested) would be as good as it gets without investing more money, but the sound on the rear couch will be terrible.

Edited December 8, 2020 by niterida

[nirmal1988]

8 minutes ago, niterida said:

You have 2 options :

 

1. Set the room up for one row and ignore the acoustics of the 2nd row

2. Set the room up for 2 rows.

 

Option 1 is cheap and easy, option 2 is going to be expensive and more difficult.

 

For 2 rows you ideally need a  pair of surrounds for both rows (or a single pair of bipole surrounds) and a pair of rear surrounds. Then you have to fit them all in to your small room.

 

Personally I would just have the couch and build a small bar/counter top for directly behind the couch and use bar stools for the cheap seats. Unless you expect to use more seating fairly often then your drawing would be as good as it gets without investing more money, but the sound on the rear couch will be terrible.

Thanks Niterida, I will probably stick with 1 row for now.

[bazzle]

I had a similar problem in one room. I just mounted sides higher . This allowed speaker to be mounted on wall above door impingement.

[nirmal1988]

5 hours ago, bazzle said:

I had a similar problem in one room. I just mounted sides higher . This allowed speaker to be mounted on wall above door impingement.

Sadly, I have high doors and I don't have enough space to mount my bookshelf in the space between door and ceiling.  And I want to have an Atmos set up, so having a surround speaker mounted that high and then having a height speaker might not work together.

Edited December 18, 2020 by nirmal1988

[nirmal1988]

On 08/12/2020 at 11:15 AM, niterida said:

For 2 rows you ideally need a  pair of surrounds for both rows (or a single pair of bipole surrounds) and a pair of rear surrounds. Then you have to fit them all in to your small room.

Hello Niterida,

Back again on same thread

 

I am thinking of the possibility of having 2 rows ( 1 raised) and having a pair of bipole speakers for my surrounds.
I was reading through forums and what I could make out is having a bipole speaker instead of monopole for surrounds wouldn't hurt even in an Atmos set up, in the rooms where the surrounds are very close to aisle listeners, which would be my case as well. 

Will having a bipole (from facing) in between 2 rows do the trick ?,

or should i have a dipole in this scenario. (i haven't fully digested the concept of dipole/bipole yet)

 

And on connecting bipole speakers to receiver - should i just connect them to a single channel or do i need 2 channels (like in bi-amp)?

 

I am planning on having a 5.1.2 set up, so why did you suggest having a pair of rear surrounds ?

 

Thanks

[Guest niterida]

If you are planning 2 rows then you can use a bipole (don't even think about dipoles they are something completely different). See attached drawing showing how a bipole works. It is basically just 2 speakers sending out the same signal but in different directions. You can see how both couches are now in the range of each speaker, with a big gap directly in the middle (it is this gap that affects there ability to used with just one row if they are placed to the side of that row). So If you set your room up with just one row for now, just make sure you put the bipole in the right spot for both rows and it will be in the right spot for just one row.

Note my drawing is not to scale for couch placement.

[nirmal1988]

Thanks Niterida.

How about the wiring of bipole speakers, is it  1 channel from receiver to 1 bipole speaker? 

[nirmal1988]

And can you suggest some bipoles ? 

[Guest niterida]

On 20/12/2020 at 9:22 AM, nirmal1988 said:

Thanks Niterida.

How about the wiring of bipole speakers, is it  1 channel from receiver to 1 bipole speaker? 

Yes

On 20/12/2020 at 9:33 AM, nirmal1988 said:

And can you suggest some bipoles ? 

Yes - I have 2 sets of Wharfedales for sale

[nirmal1988]

16 hours ago, niterida said:

Yes

Yes - I have 2 sets of Wharfedales for sale

Can I know the model number? 
I was been thinking about Monitor Audio Bronze FX after reading some forum threads.

 

[Guest niterida]

7 hours ago, nirmal1988 said:

Can I know the model number? 
I was been thinking about Monitor Audio Bronze FX after reading some forum threads.

 

See pics.

Large ones (Diamond DFS - first 2 pics) are 300h x 400w x 200d whdn mounted on wall.

Small ones are 270x270x150

PM me an offer - I can post them for around $20-30 deoending on exactly where you are.

 

[nirmal1988]

Thanks Niterida.

I will DM, once I decide.