# need help w/basic basement ht layout



## bersh (Mar 20, 2010)

Newbie here - first post. I'm in the middle of finishing the basement, and I'm looking for some advice for laying out basic home theater. I don't have a lot of space to work with, but on the flip side I'm not looking to do anything overly elaborate either. Just want to mount a flatscreen and wire up a 5.1 surround system. Due to the space limitations I'm looking to use in-wall speakers.

The walls are still open at this point, and I've run/pulled, rerun, pulled, drilled holes, and scratched my head for the last week and I'm now at the point of totally over analyzing it. I have two major considerations. The first is that the wife isn't sure how she wants to lay the room out, so I have to build it for two main layouts - facing the 11' wall, and facing either the 12.5' wall, or the shorter 8' wall. Due to the layout of the basement, I'm pretty much stuck with using this space. The ceiling is still open at this point, if that matters. Also, the ceiling height is ~ 9 ft.

I'm open to any suggestions.


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## bersh (Mar 20, 2010)

Here are a couple basic floor plan layout images. The second image is blank if anyone wants to draw suggestions on it.

Thanks.


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## bpape (Sep 14, 2006)

If you really must stay in this area, Facing the 12.5' wall is not symmetric but at least you have some room to play with beside the speakers. The drawback is that to get decent bass response, your seating will be in the main walkway. You'd be considerably out of left to right symmetry though.

Facing the top of your drawing would give you more space behind you and maybe a bit better symmetry from the walls standpoint but you're going to be shifted due to the stairs, can't treat the front corners, potentially cramped speaker layout, etc. 

Either can be made to work. They're both tradeoffs.

Bryan


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## bersh (Mar 20, 2010)

bpape said:


> If you really must stay in this area, Facing the 12.5' wall is not symmetric but at least you have some room to play with beside the speakers. The drawback is that to get decent bass response, your seating will be in the main walkway. You'd be considerably out of left to right symmetry though.
> 
> Facing the top of your drawing would give you more space behind you and maybe a bit better symmetry from the walls standpoint but you're going to be shifted due to the stairs, can't treat the front corners, potentially cramped speaker layout, etc.
> 
> ...


Thanks for the info. My initial plan was to face the top of the drawing, as it gives more space behind and although not ideal would allow me to run wire to ceiling speakers on the other side (or even in) the soffit I'm building to hide the beam. My plan was/is to mount the speakers along the left and right walls and to run wire for speakers on the top wall as well for center, L, and R (though this may never be used). This will hopefully cover the bases if we decide to face in any of the three possible directions.


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## lsiberian (Mar 24, 2009)

If you haven't already bought the TV I'd suggest you consider a projector(Sanyo PLV-z60 or a Panasonic 4000). All you need is a white wall. you can even paint a screen with Black Widow. Greater immersion and you have plenty of light control with a basement.


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## bersh (Mar 20, 2010)

lsiberian said:


> If you haven't already bought the TV I'd suggest you consider a projector(Sanyo PLV-z60 or a Panasonic 4000). All you need is a white wall. you can even paint a screen with Black Widow. Greater immersion and you have plenty of light control with a basement.


Thanks for the suggestion. A projector is in the future, but for now I'm going to start with the flat screen. I've got the wire runs started to accommodate the projector, and that will project to the top wall in my sketch. All of the wiring I've done on that 11' wall is going to be hidden by drywall for now, but everything is there for speakers if need be.


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