# HTS in a room with 12 foot ceilings



## Tommy077 (May 15, 2010)

I have a house I am going to be wiring in the near future that is 22 ft long, 15ft 10 in wide and has 12 foot ceilings in it. The screen will be mounted over a fireplace in the center of the room at one end of the room. There is an opening into the Kitchen of roughly 10 ft to the right side of the room. The ceilings will be vaulted on both sides with a flat area in the center at the peak.

With a room setup like this, what would be the recommended placement of speakers? IE. in ceiling, in wall, or floor standing speakers


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## bambino (Feb 21, 2010)

Really big floor standers with lots of power to boot. As far as placement goes trial and error are all that can determine that.


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## MatrixDweller (Jul 24, 2007)

Floorstanders and/or bookshelf speakers mounted to the wall and/or on stands. I'm not a huge fan of in-wall although there are some pretty good brands out there. In-ceiling speakers are for department stores and elevator music.


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## JBL Fan (May 1, 2010)

A picture is worth a thousand words - even a crude hand drawn one. It's much easier to suggest things with a picture as reference.

I might suggest - a top view and then a seperate front wall (screen wall) view.


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## bpape (Sep 14, 2006)

I would agree to avoid in-wall or in-ceiling if at all possible - or unless you're willing to spend some pretty serious coin on speakers. There are some good ones out there - just not cheap.

Whether you need full range or monitors will largely depend on whether or not you are going to use a sub and if you have ENOUGH sub to fill that large area properly. I'm a huge proponent of cutting mains/surrounds off at 80Hz and letting the sub address below that. This is for several reasons, including best frequency response and no cancellations between mains and subs. That said, if you can't get enough sub in the room to get a good 'feel', then it may be an option to run the L and R channel full range to help a little. It's a tradeoff though.

Bryan


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## Tommy077 (May 15, 2010)

Well, since my scanner is broke, I figured I would take pics of the floor plan and post them this way. This should give a picture of what the room will look like to an extent.

Thanks for all help and suggestions. I still don't know what their budget is as I have not actually gotten that far with them for the HTS. I do know that they ended up spending about $10K more on the foundation of the house than they had wanted, but they need to get that right for sure. His bonus will come in August, so maybe it will be big enough for him to go all out for the system, but I will get all the wiring in place for an earth shaking system in the future.








I hope this comes through good enough.


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## bpape (Sep 14, 2006)

Unfortunately, that room has 'problem' written all over it.

- Lack of symmetry left to right in the front of the room due to the opening into what I assume is a breakfast area.

- Door/window flanking the fireplace which will limit speaker placement - inwall or not.

- Hardwood floors that are going to require a large area rug to help tame things, not to mention increasing the requirements for treatment.

- Large space with openings to 2 other rooms will make pressurizing the room difficult for the sub. Couple this with obvious limitations on sub placement and it's going to be problematic.

Something that could potentially work would be the KEF powered drop down speakers. They recess into the ceiling when not in use and drop down when needed. I'm guessing due to the ceiling that you're going to have to go into the angled portions. The window and door flanking the fireplace are going to preclude proper height for in-walls in the front flanking the TV.

Bryan


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## Tommy077 (May 15, 2010)

Yeah Bryan, I knew it wasn't going to be easy, but then again, they may not want the serious kind of theater room that those of us here would want. More than anything, they are going to want something that will give them somewhat of a surround sound experience without going into the full blown theater room experience. I figured it would be more of an in ceiling type of setup since there are not real good places to set anything in either the walls or the floors. 

Without having met with them for any ideas on the HTS yet, I would assume that a sofa will be set center of the room behind the ceiling fan facing the fireplace. Of course, like I said, I haven't met with them on the furniture layout yet, so that could change. At best, I know what will be provided is something that will make more of a noise for them instead of a true theater experience. I am thinking that if they have something that will vibrate the floors a little and have some volume that will be understandable, they will be happy. If they want more, then I can try to talk them into adding a theater room in the future. Without having asked them yet, I am thinking their budget will be in the $2500-$3500 range for equipment and speakers though. Hopefully sometime this week I will be able to meet with them and find out a true number for it.

Thanks for the help on this one.


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## Dennis Erskine (May 29, 2010)

This wouldn't be called serious, obviously; however, the bigger fear would be the sound and picture would have so many problems (dialogue for one) that eventually the HT aspect of the room would fall into disuse. I'd also look at removing that fan.


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