# New Home Speaker Layout Help



## mikeleach09 (Jan 26, 2016)

Hello everyone. I'm brand new to the forum as I found you all recently while searching for layout tips for the in-ceiling speakers I'm having put into our new house. It is currently under construction and I'm needing some help to figure out where the place the speakers. It's getting pre-wired for 5.1 but in the first floor I'm wanting to lay out the speakers for general listening to music as background so I'm looking for an even spread of the sound. 

I've uploaded a floor plan with some furniture to give an idea of how the house will be laid out. I've spotted some speakers and colored them: Red = Zone 1, Green = Zone 2 to give an idea of what I was thinking. 

A couple of questions

1) what is the best layout for that area to achieve even sound coverage. 
2) If I'm getting it wired for 5.1 I should get 6 total spots to place speakers. Does that room need all 6? 
3) Any recommendations for types of speakers? Should I use stereo input speakers or can I get away with mono input and use pairs to pay the left and right channels? 

I appreciate any and all advice that you all can bestow on me!


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## Tonto (Jun 30, 2007)

Welcome aboard Mike, glad to have you with us.

1st off, we kinda need to know where the TV is located. The front right/left & center will be above that. The rear right/left will be on the opposite wall behind the rear seats. Most 5.1 mixes will feature the 3 front speakers mainly & you will want that sound focused around the TV. Zone 2 is usually stereo, so a general spacing of the speakers on a center axis through the room will be perfect.

The .1 is the sub channel. You can get in wall subs if you want that in the ceiling also. If not, they will need to wire the sub outlet on a wall, close to the floor, as furniture will allow for its placement.


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## Todd Anderson (Jul 24, 2009)

^^^^ agree with the above. Need to know the TV location. Also need to know a budget for speakers and receiver. 

I'd have to say... initially, I'd shoot for 5 speakers placed in the couch/tv area and then create a second zone with two speakers in your kitchen...


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## mikeleach09 (Jan 26, 2016)

Thank you for the replys. We actually don't plan to have a TV in this space as we have a location on the second floor that we will use as a TV room. My plan is to use the speakers on the first floor to just play music for general listening and entertaining. So I'm trying to figure out the best places to put the speakers for even coverage of the house. 

Since the kitchen and the living space are the same i want to avoid hot spots.


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## Tonto (Jun 30, 2007)

Gotcha, sorry for the assumption. But your best bet is still to mount each pair of speakers, evenly spaced on a center axis in each room that you want to hear music in. I would stand in the center of the assumed listening area of each room, then look up at the ceiling & call that point the center of the axis. That will give you best dispersion.


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## Gregr (Nov 2, 2010)

First, you've been given some great thoughts about how to set up imaging and sound stage in the preferred listening area. totally possible using only two speakers and if you want to expand the sound stage using more speakers is a logical solution/path. However, speaker placement is critical for even broadening sound stage and especially imaging of musical instruments.in a given seating area. 

If I were setting up your listening area I would use a 2.1 channel for 1-2 people sitting closely and up to 5.1 for groups in your living/seating area. I would buy a small 2-3 channel amp for the kitchen using the same music source zone2 out option. I would use a dipole speaker in the center of the kitchen with L/R as indicated with red dots in your diagram. Again, these speakers pre/processed thru zone 2 processing and a line level out to the kitchen amp. 

To my mind this is manageable and a potentially satisfying option 

Regards and Happy Listening


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