Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Home Theater Advice for new house needed

Hello everyone.
Unfortunately I am going through a divorce and will have to move. I will get to take all the AV though with me.
The house I am moving to (which I own and was using as a rental) has limited options for AV placement. Basically it can be in a spare bedroom (10.5 x 10.5) that has been converetd to a sitting room, or in the great room.

The great room has a fireplace. With the layout, the only reasonable location is above the fireplace. The room is basically rectangular and 3280 cu ft. (as looking at the fireplace - 19.5 side to side, 16.83 front to back, 10ft high).

I am concerned this placement might be too high, but would like your thoughts. Viewing would be from about 6-9 feet.

In the pic, you will see where the mirror is above the fireplace. The display would go there, leaving 3 inches from the display edge to each side of the vertical mantels, and about 9 inches above the display to the ceiling.

To offer some scale the white/blue striped trim pieces are 9 inches in width. The display is a 46" lcd.

Your thoughts?

My thoughts were if using this location, to locate AVR/disc players, etc equipment to the left of the fireplace against the wall. I could run the wiring inside the trim pieces. The sub would be located out of the picture to the right.

I would forego a center for right now. Thoughts are to purchase a W150 and locate it in/on the horizontal trim piece.

That leads to the thought of also replacing my towers with W22s. located in/on the vertical trim pieces.

Some thoughts I had on that were:
With the room size, would this be enough? I tend to listen loud at times, and power would be a Pio Elite AVR at 140Wx7.

Would there be a negative effect if I mounted the W22s upside down (tweeter on bottom). Thought here is the L/R tweeter would be lower, and closer to on axis with the center (located under the display) as well as phyiscally taken up space more in the middle of the height of the display.

Does any of this make sense? I hope so.

I look forward to your thoughts.

Mark

I see the happy face next to your name. Is that accurate or have you just not updated it? I'm not sure whether to be happy for you or sad for you.

Mark, so the bottom of the TV screen would be at roughly 7' in that arrangement, and yes, the upward viewing angle would be a bit severe. Is the fireplace really going to be used, or can the TV instead be placed on a stand in front of it, more or less at eye level? If so, the tower speakers could then be placed so as to give an adequate separation of 7' or so.

Pmbuko, I have not updated the icon.

John, the bottom of the display would be at 4'9". (The floor to bottom of the trim is 4'. The trim is 9 inches wide).
That would place the visual center of the display at just under 6'.

If W22s were mounted in the vertical trim pieces, the separation would be about 5'5" ctc.

The fireplace would be seldom used. I had also though of building a false front to face it off, and put the TV in front.

I do think the fireplace will earn some additional points though as we come close to winter and I possibly begin to date again.

Okay, I was trying to judge from your description of the ceiling as 10' and the top of the screen being about 9" below the ceiling.

I'm in a hotel room right now that has a plasma mounted on the wall at that height. My 1st impression when I walked in the room was that is was way too high. I just moved a chair about 8ft away from the screen and I can tell you that it is a very uncomfortable viewing angle. You have to tilt your head back to watch. The angle is severe...

Well I did some trig on this.

As I watch currently lying on the floor, I was able to determine that I normally view the display at an upwards 15.4463* angle.

I am having some measurements double checked, but with what I have here:

Over the fireplace will result in an upwards 14.8757* to 19.4976* angle (depending upon seating location).

In the spare room, it would result in an upwards 4.4672* to 7.1250* angle (depending upon seating location).

Thoughts?
I am not keen on blocking the fireplace. While the spare room could work, seating in there would only be for 3. Not to mention tile floors, so acoustic treatments would be needed.





Other options for the great room.
To the left adjacent wall.
This would require removing a lighting fixture and doing without a dining table (would have to eat in the kitchen area. Also the ceiling is slanted so you would not have a parallel line with the top of the display.



The wall opposite.
This is a big wall. Issue then becomes seating. Seating with the backs to the fireplace does not seem to be a good idea.
I could see about having seating run perpendicular to that wall, but that doesn't feel good either.

Sorry, sorry to hear about the divorce....

As for the smaller room, acoustically you do not want the length, height, and width, to be within 5% of each other. So if you have options, I would use the great room.

Bump

Any additional thoughts?

Mark, I'm a little puzzled by the contrast between the precise numbers you gave in your follow-up posts and the "10ft high" number that you gave in your first. If the ceiling is in fact about 10', then the top of the screen would be at about 9' and the bottom at about 7'. As Steve also pointed out, the viewing angle in this scenario would cause strain over time, so I'd again suggest the placement in front of the fireplace.

Hi Mark,

I just got done doing a test with the bottom of my DLP sitting at 4’7” with my seating at 7’10”. I would not recommend this to anyone without reclining seats. And even with reclining seats I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone who may have equilibrium problems.

With the TV mounted at 4’7” I found that when sitting reclined with the TV angled down at the seating it was more comfortable than having the center of the TV at or just above eye level when sitting either straight or reclined. Sitting up straight and looking up caused to much strain with extended viewing (an hour or more). When I angled the TV toward the seating the view was more natural but looking up at that angle was still straining when sitting upright.

Another issue that my father noticed (but didn’t bother me) was that when reclining and looking up at the TV angled down at him he felt nauseated because of the disconnect between the TV’s viewing angle compared to what “feels natural.” Might be something one would get use to.

I think your idea of putting it in the corner might be your best bet but I do have a couple of hair-brained suggestions.

First have you considered getting a projector and pull down screen. Doubt you could use the fireplace and the screen at the same time but you could still put the TV above the fireplace for casual viewing. Always something you could try later if you do put the TV above the fireplace.

Crazier idea is to build a vertical sliding carriage (like a target carriage at a rifle range) with counterweights allowing the TV to slide up and down in front of the fireplace. Ok I said it was crazy.

You could build a riser for the seating area to decrease the viewing angle if the TV is above the fireplace. You could also make it so there is a pit in front of the fire place.

Or you could just use the corner.

If you do put the TV above the fireplace I would seriously consider getting a wall mount that allows you to pull it out and tilt it down at the seating. One that also allows it to swing from side to side would let you better view the TV from other parts of the room.

Cheers,

Dean

My zwei pfennig:

o Conventional wisdom is that since higher frequencies are more directional / localizable, it's best to have tweeters roughly at ear level.

o Given the date factor, I'd nix the small spare room idea. If you led her in there to watch, she might consciously or sub-consciously feel like you were leading her to a bedroom. I may be out of my vulcan mind here but I found when suddenly dating basically for the first time in my late 38's that women (in their 30's at least) tend to be a bit suspicious and sometimes work overtime to find a reason to discount a guy. In other words, the living room is a more "safe" setting.

o Having gone through a divorce myself (MAN I wish I'd gotten away $ooner) I know you're not looking to spend money right now, which is one strike against the projector idea. Another is that front projector setups pretty much need a dark room, which may not be possible here, and which might come off as "fussy" to a date.

o I wince every time I see a thin panel TV mounted above a fireplace. In your case, you don't want you or especially a future date to get a sore neck and be uncomfortable.

o Another idea might be to put the TV in the corner where the dartboard is, at a 45º angle. Sure, you'll loose a few ft^2, but you could gain some flexibility in furniture. You could for example put an L-shaped sectional square with the walls with the inner angle facing the TV. You'd have fine spots for watching both the TV and still have a decent view of the fireplace on date nights if you can in fact use it down there. This would block part of the window, though.

o If the fireplace isn't so important, I'd honestly lose the mirror above it, and place the TV square in front of it.

o Placing it on the mirror wall (what's with all the mirrors?) might not be so bad an idea as you think. You wouldn't need to remove the light fixture -- just get a caribeener and hike up the chain. I did this in my old place and it worked just fine -- the ceiling slanted the same way too, though it was distinctly higher. If your room is 19.5' deep in that direction, I'd think you'd have plenty of room to place your dinette table *behind* the couch, though you don't show a photo of that fourth wall.

John,

I think my 9 inches from the top was an incorrect measurement.

Dean

Thank you.
Projector is a no go.
I do like the carriage idea. May look into that a little more.
Not sure on the riser.
I may look to a corner. Problem is there are only 2 possible corners, and one is occupied by my grand piano.

I already have a dual cantilever articulating wall mount that should handle the need. Can tilt, pan and articulate from 6 inches to 28 inches. Omnimount UCL-XL

Thank you Anthony,

I am going to look at the idea of the corner.

Not able to put the dining set behind couch as it is in direct line with the front door and opening to the kitchen.

Yeah, lots of mirrors. Some will come down for sure. Then again I can not complain, I own this house pretty much free and clear. It is (was) a rental unit I have.

mapatton,

I wouldn't throw out the projector idea yet. You can get a pretty good 720p projector for about $1000 or a good 1080p one for about $2500. Just check out audioholics.com for some reviews. The nice thing about a projector is that you could use a pull-down screen in front of the fireplace so that you don't have such a severe viewing angle. But, you couldn't use the fireplace when you are watching the projector though.

I just recently replaced my 32" crt with a 50" plasma. I am using the same stand and I did with the crt. The angle on my neck with the crt was slightly below level and I thought was very comfortable. The angle on my neck with the plasma is slightly above level. This was a huge adjustment for my neck. It took about a month or so to get used to it and I still would prefer to have the angle on my neck slightly below level. I just don't want to spend the money on a stand right now. The angle you are considering is so severe I wouldn't even think of it as an option.

- Nick

bump for more thoughts
as the viewing angle is about what I have now, thinking above the fp
Thought about some hockey pucks under the front legs of seating LOL

You could try using these under the feet of a TV stand.

http://www.ezmoves.com/

Then when you want to use the fire place just slide the TV to the side.

The audio wouldn’t follow the picture if you wanted to use the fireplace and the TV at the same time.

Dean

Another possibility is that you could build a DIY TV stand that fits in front of the fireplace but leaves it unobstructed. That would let you drop the TV down maybe a couple of feet (hard to tell from the picture).

Here are some examples of electric fireplace entertainment centers to give you and idea of what I am talking about.

http://www.nextag.com/electric-fireplace-with-entertainment-center/search-html

Big question is if you could do this within fire code.

Sorry for the double post but I missed the edit deadline.

Cheers,
Dean