On-wall speaker pairing with in-ceiling surrounds suggestions

[kujain]

Hi,

I am not able to get some info on this situation and would love to hear opinions of fellow cocooners!

For a large master bedroom surround sound setup (20' x 20'), I am planning to use in-ceiling polk speakers (rc80i) as rear surounds.
The TV is mounted on a tiled wall, and I have to select FR, FL and CEN speakers that will be mounted ON it. Due to some reasons I cannot work in in-wall here.

Are there any polk speakers that can be paired and matched comfortably with the in-ceiling rear surrounds? I was considering the RC7/8 series for the front and center as these are great sounding and looking and perfect for wall mounts near the TV.

Please let me know...

Thanks!

 

[Neurorad]

I don't think 'timbre matching' is a big issue, for surrounds.

If you're happy with Polk in general, call Polk tech support, for their recs.

Let us know what you decide. I need some fronts and center myself.

 

[Neurorad]

I'm looking at the Polk OWM5 for front L-R. I'll look at a center and surrounds (and sw) after I upgrade to an AVR for this TV location.

 

[pete_c]

I have a hodgepodge mix in my family room with external center (Bose), FL, FR (JBL), RL, RR (Russound external), subwoofer and in ceiling Polk speakers 6 feet across the ceiling from the RL and RR speakers and they sound nice to me. This was done with the family room redo taking the sound from 5.1 to 7.1 (walls, ceiling, fireplace, floor putting the family room out of commission for about 3 months or so).

I also redid the base infrastructure separate electrical circuits, adding more connectivity near the LCD (network, audio, RG6, HDMI, etc).

Mounting the center rear sound speakers to the walls wouldn't have looked nice to me. That's me though.

 

[drvnbysound]

I have helped a number of people with practically the same setup (having the rear surrounds ceiling mounted) and they have all been very happy with the results. The first time I did it I had my concerns, but it actually works out pretty well.

We have a conference room at work with a full 5.1 system that I was asked to setup. The room has concrete walls that are then covered with carpeted plywood panels. Because of this, I wasnt able to run any wiring into the walls, and ended up doing all of the speakers in the drop-ceiling. I got speakers that were angled toward the standard seating position for the fronts and center, and standard downward facing ones for the rear. We have watched a few movies in there and it also sounds really well. That said, while it's not ideal, I am not opposed to ceiling mounting any theater speakers.

 

[gizzmo]

My preference is not toy go with in ceiling but I do admit that it is the only way sometimes. Regarding the rear surround in a 5.1 setup I like the rear speakers firing from the side slightly behind the listener and about 2 feet above the ear of a seated ear position. My wife said that I was not going to place the speakers there. By the time she returned from the store they were there and wired. They have been there ever since.

 

[pete_c]

My media/family room is divided a bit. The footprint in front of the LCD is rectangular in shape. The addition space from the viewing area wouldn't really blend in relating to the speaker placements. I guess many folks still do this and just adjust the sound footprint such that it fits for the viewing "audience". That said I kind of made a drawing and used distances such that the rear left and right sat in "virtual" corners and the center (rear) left and right channels went to the ceiling instead of the far walls (which probably wouldn't have looked that bad anyways). I also tried various center front speaker options and decided that I liked the small Bose footprint/sound over the others that I tried. Relating to the subwoofer (15" powered) I went from the front of the room to the rear of the room hidden a bit moving the audio / adding 120VAC power to the location I wanted to place it. You don't really know where the bass comes from so its easier to hid the subwoofer that way anyways.

I've also noticed the age thing kick in. Many years ago remember looking for those studio quality speakers, Thorens turntable platters, Nakamichi Cassette decks, etc and etc. Really though; the ears have a limited range of what they can hear or percieve (frequency, compression, harmonics et al) and most of today's audio equipment is well beyond that ("what the human ear can really hear") scope these days.

I do recall a discussion in the 1980's with an audiofile / high end audio store lab owner relating to the harmonics and balance of music played back on an LP album versus lack of such on a CD album and how much better the music quality was on an LP album versus a CD. Guess it was an antiquity hard sell.

 

[tmbrown97]

Have you considered a soundbar? I just picked up a nice one for my master bedroom and it sounds amazing. By nature it's missing a little bit of the lower mid sounds but most people don't notice that. I paired it with a nice subwoofer and it rocks the whole house.

 

[gizzmo]

A soundbar can be a great solution to a difficult room. I have a saying "three things that screw up a surround sound layout, the decorator, a fireplace, and a corner mount TV. That said, I really like the Polk sound bar. I haven't tried the Snap AV but everything I get from them is spot on.

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