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Ceiling Based Dolby Atmos - You did it, was it worth it?


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I’m moving my sound and vision to a 3.5x5.4x2.7m dedicated room later in the year and now find myself pondering the worth of upping my system from 5.1 to 5.1.4.

 

I haven’t heard an Atmos system before but do hold the sound of a system in higher regard to the vision for immersing yourself into a film or concert. But I’ve always been happy with 5.1 so wonder if it’s really worth it?

 

if you have gone to all the trouble:

- Was it honestly worth it?

- Was it the game changer you convinced yourself it would be in the beginning?

Or:

Could you happily go back to 5.1 and not miss a lot?

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I went from 5.1 to 7.2.4. My current room is 4.3 x 5.3 x 2.7. The rear surrounds didn't add a lot, but on movies with overhead effects the Atmos speakers really do create a more realistic experience.

 

However, many movies with Atmos soundtracks don't have a whole lot of overhead effects and are therefore much less noticeable.

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one of best things done with my system ... its not just with atmos tracks.. infact i find really helpful for upmixing with either dolby surround or DTS-X neural X  or auro3D auromatic

 

setup well you end up sitting in a bubble of sound with sounds steering around the sound stage. indeed very much worth it and would do again without hesitation

 

fitting speakers was actually less work than i expected ...however adding speakers later can say is a pain... so get in he speakers you want in the one go...since making the hole and fitting the speakers is the easy bit its the cable runs take time and effort and whether running cables for 2 or 4 or 6 takes the same time :)

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Thanks @Quark and @betty boop, coming from a couple of surround sound veterans definitely makes me think it’s worth the effort.

 

rightly or wrongly I thought Atmos was going to be the 3D of the audio world where it just disappeared into insignificance, but it doesn’t appear to be showing any signs of slowing down.

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13 minutes ago, SGS said:

Absolutely worth it. Went from 5.1 to 5.1.4. I love the 3d effect for the sound.

Future plans of going 5.2.4 and maybe 7.2.4.

Thanks, I’d be going 5.2.4 but the issue I have is nowhere to put the rear speakers apart from either ceiling speakers or above windows on the wall angling down. Not ideal and I wonder if the Atmos affect will be compromised if the rears and Atmos effect speakers are all high?

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9 minutes ago, Hi-Fi Whipped said:

Thanks @Quark and @betty boop, coming from a couple of surround sound veterans definitely makes me think it’s worth the effort.

 

rightly or wrongly I thought Atmos was going to be the 3D of the audio world where it just disappeared into insignificance, but it doesn’t appear to be showing any signs of slowing down.

hi hifi, mine went in some years ago now and i just added 1 more speaker ! its definitely going from strength to strength. very much worth it :) 

 

7 minutes ago, Hi-Fi Whipped said:

Thanks, I’d be going 5.2.4 but the issue I have is nowhere to put the rear speakers apart from either ceiling speakers or above windows on the wall angling down. Not ideal and I wonder if the Atmos affect will be compromised if the rears and Atmos effect speakers are all high?

definitely helps to have a height differential (~900mm +_ between the bed surrounds and heights ...otherwise if all at same height ... the height speakers wouldn't be heights if make sense :)

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15 minutes ago, Hi-Fi Whipped said:

Thanks, I’d be going 5.2.4 but the issue I have is nowhere to put the rear speakers apart from either ceiling speakers or above windows on the wall angling down. Not ideal and I wonder if the Atmos affect will be compromised if the rears and Atmos effect speakers are all high?


Can you mount some rears on stands?  As Al said, you definitely want clearance between your rear heights and rear surrounds to be effective.

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29 minutes ago, Hi-Fi Whipped said:

Thanks, I’d be going 5.2.4 but the issue I have is nowhere to put the rear speakers apart from either ceiling speakers or above windows on the wall angling down. Not ideal and I wonder if the Atmos affect will be compromised if the rears and Atmos effect speakers are all high?

 

My surrounds and rear surrounds are too high on the wall too, so not ideal - there's always compromises when you have to work with an existing room.

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Guest niterida

Having the surrounds and heights on the ceiling (or high up on the wall) is the same as having your L &  R speaker on the same side of the screen.

In other words you need separation between ear level and height level speakers or it just isn't going to work.

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40 minutes ago, Quark said:

 

My surrounds and rear surrounds are too high on the wall too, so not ideal - there's always compromises when you have to work with an existing room.


Yep, very true.  My side surrounds are in the middle of the room because of the location of a window.  Not ideal, but we do what we can with what we have.

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51 minutes ago, Kaynin said:


Can you mount some rears on stands?  As Al said, you definitely want clearance between your rear heights and rear surrounds to be effective.

Possibly but one corner is sliding doors that make the corner open which will be used to go in and out but not all the time.

 

So speakers on stands would need to be moved on the occasions I do want to use the door but certainly doable if I can get the cables down the wall.

 

Sounds like it would be a waste of time doing Atmos if the rears were high also so will definitely need to consider that  but very glad I asked.

 

im using bipole directional fx ceiling speakers atm and for what they are it works ok, sound does come from behind the listening position on occasions but again a compromise.

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43 minutes ago, Quark said:

 

My surrounds and rear surrounds are too high on the wall too, so not ideal - there's always compromises when you have to work with an existing room.

Yes very true! I’m gaining a projector in this room and will be building a sub frame to the front wall with an acoustically transparent screen that will house 3 LCR speakers like Krix Megaphonix for the front stage so it will be 90% there, just the rears won’t be ideal!

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Guest niterida

If you must have the surrounds up high you can then just go .2 Atmos and have the heights slightly in front of directly above you and you will still get height effects. You just won't have height sounds panning from front to back

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I'm just waiting for installation of my 4 ceiling speakers but I can tell you that bringing my side surrounds down from near ceiling height (they were angled down towards the MLP) has improved my listening experience. 

 

The picture below shows the difference between the old and new positions. The new position is just behind and a fraction above ear height from the MLP, 

 

1377213751_Rightsurroundoldandnewspeakers.thumb.jpg.a84e47342aee5e0072dc93c64276c299.jpg

 

As stated by Quark and others, existing rooms often involve compromises.

I wasn't able to bring my rear surround speaks down to the same height as the side surrounds. The rears came only lowered maybe 50cm as there was furniture and other features in the way. 

 

Edited by kiwimeat
grammar
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1 hour ago, Hi-Fi Whipped said:

Possibly but one corner is sliding doors that make the corner open which will be used to go in and out but not all the time.

 

So speakers on stands would need to be moved on the occasions I do want to use the door but certainly doable if I can get the cables down the wall.

 

Sounds like it would be a waste of time doing Atmos if the rears were high also so will definitely need to consider that  but very glad I asked.

 

im using bipole directional fx ceiling speakers atm and for what they are it works ok, sound does come from behind the listening position on occasions but again a compromise.

If positioning of 2 rear speakers is challenged by the room, have you considered only having one rear surround? 
One centred rear speaker could also create more space between the rear height speakers. 

 

It is not something I had thought of for a sometime, but setting up my new Marantz one of the prompts was how many rear speakers did I have, including the options None, 1, or 2. 

2 hours ago, Hi-Fi Whipped said:

Thanks @Quark and @betty boop, coming from a couple of surround sound veterans definitely makes me think it’s worth the effort.

 

rightly or wrongly I thought Atmos was going to be the 3D of the audio world where it just disappeared into insignificance, but it doesn’t appear to be showing any signs of slowing down.

I'm grateful to both of these forum members for their contributions in my own thread. 

 

I was very much a doubter too, I should be able to let you know how my own first hand experience of full Atmos at home in a couple of weeks. 

Edited by kiwimeat
grammar
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am same , I couldn't totally lower my rears due to a cavity door ! I still lowered them off the sewing as much as i could. definitely makes a difference :) absolutely every room has compromise I have plenty in mine too. but we can but make the best of things :) 

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18 minutes ago, kiwimeat said:

If positioning of 2 rear speakers is challenged by the room, have you considered only having one rear surround? 
One centred rear speaker could also create more space between the rear height speakers. 

 

It is not something I had thought of for a sometime, but setting up my new Marantz one of the prompts was how many rear speakers did I have, including the options None, 1, or 2. 

Hi Aaron, for some reason I have, because I’ve got a centred wall behind the listening position, jad also crossed my mind as that having both channel launched in the centre pointing out towards the side walls may also work to some degree??

 

it’s all a compromise but just a matter of which would give the best result I guess.

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2 hours ago, Bunno77 said:

@Hi-Fi Whipped What unit are you looking at to give you Atmos?

I’ve just finally purchased my first Elektra HD2 7 ch power amp and I would love a Dirac based processor but the $$$ will probably foil that unless I go with an AVR as pre which if it’s a 9ch has the benefit of powering the .4 speakers.

 

But I also think a Marantz Av77xx processor will be high on the list as I’m a sucker for a warmer sound, then just grab a cheap emotiva amp to do the .4


I’m keeping 2ch of the Elektra free to power my 2ch stereo side of things so I don’t have to worry about the whole ht bypass thing which atm it is doing a very nice job of.

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7 minutes ago, Hi-Fi Whipped said:

I’ve just finally purchased my first Elektra HD2 7 ch power amp and I would love a Dirac based processor but the $$$ will probably foil that unless I go with an AVR as pre which if it’s a 9ch has the benefit of powering the .4 speakers.

 

But I also think a Marantz Av77xx processor will be high on the list as I’m a sucker for a warmer sound, then just grab a cheap emotiva amp to do the .4


I’m keeping 2ch of the Elektra free to power my 2ch stereo side of things so I don’t have to worry about the whole ht bypass thing which atm it is doing a very nice job of.

Please have a long and varied listen before you buy. 

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1 hour ago, petetherock said:

7.2.4 user here

very satisfied and you can see my setup in my signature 

however if funds do not permit or WAF is low it’s ok to ‘just’ have 5.1 too. 

Don’t worry and just enjoy ? 

yeh Pete first world problems here, thx 

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1 hour ago, Hi-Fi Whipped said:

@kiwimeat been thinking about the single rear speaker option and thinking it would surely only work in a 7.1 setup if you mono the rears to make it 6.1 like the good old days??

I'll advise against it..

either go for 5.1 or go full hog and get 7.1.4 

The rear back has a lot less info, and now more resources are being devoted to the Atmos channels as it becomes more 'sexy'...

If I only had enough coin for a limited number of channels, I'll go 5.1 or  5.2.4

 

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