Video Asylum

Posted by DougBlackburn on February 06, 2001 at 18:08:50:

In Reply to: Surround Speaker Placement - Novice Question posted by Craig on February 06, 2001 at 17:21:47:

You don't want the surround speakers close together behind you... you would lose 90% of the coolness of surround sound with them in that location. You want them 1-2 feet above your head when you are seated and you want them either directly to the left and right of the listeners or up to 3 feet behind the listeners, but still to the far left and right (still 1-2 feet above the listener's heads). Dolby Digital places different sounds in the left rear and right rear. When they put the SAME sounds in the left and right rear, if you have the speakers placed properly it sounds like the source of the sound is behind you. And with properly setup surround speakers you can still have specific sounds coming from the left rear and right rear. If you put the speakers close together behind you, all the far left and far right sounds will seem like they are behind you instead of far left or far right.

With the setup firing out of a corner, you may have to put the surround speakers on stands to get them in the right place and aimed appropriately. Some speakers are supposed to be aimed at the listeners and some speakers are supposed to be aimed slightly away from the listeners... look at the Owner's Manual for the speakers to see if there is an instruction about this. If there isn't, you'll have to try both ways and see which one sounds more realistic.

If you have to mount these speakers on the wall, they are going to be aimed all wrong for home theater if you are on a diagonal and it doesn't matter whether they are ahead of you firing towards the space behind you or behind you and firing forward at a 45 degree angle... I don't know of any speakers where you should be that far off center.