Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Technical Questions Speaker Placement

I am in the process of finishing my basement and upgrading my surround sound system. I currently have a Yamaha HTR-5560 6.1 receiver with JBL sub, JBL center channel and 5 little JBL satelite speakers along with some old Infinity bookshelf speakers. I have decided to purchase the QS8's for rear surround but do not know where to place them. Can these be mounted to the ceiling? Is there a big different in sound compared to wall mount? The ceiling in my basement is only about 7'6" high.

You can see some pics of the basement here: http://showcase.netins.net/web/heesch/

I was thinking(ok my wife is making me) of installing a speaker over the sofa in between the beem and the duct work and I dont know where to put the other one. I dont know if this will sound good or not. I have heard that the QS8's are very forgiving in reguards to speaker placement.

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Hawk, welcome. You say "rear surround", but are you referring to side surrounds in a 5.1 setup or using the QS8s as back surrounds on the 6th channel of your 5560(or 6th and 7th channels of a new receiver)? For side surrounds they might possibly be mounted on the underside of the beam and widely separated, pointing downwards with the tweeters at the sides and midwoofers pointing front and back. For back surrounds you should find a position for them at least 5' behind the listening position so that there's room for the back surround effect to be experienced.

Here is a basic layout of the basement: http://showcase.netins.net/web/heesch/untitled.PNG (sorry I dont know how to make a link) I guess my main question is where do I put the speakers for 6.1? My wife does not want the speakers anywhere but the wall or ceiling if possible. If anyone has any ideas that would be great.

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Hawk, I take it from your reply that you're talking about using two QS8s as back surround speakers in a 6.1 setup. If so, they should be positioned at least 5' behind the listening position and separated by at least that much. The recommended height is about 3' above your ears, but this isn't critical. If a ceiling mount is necessary, it should work well, but I can't really tell from the pictures and diagram exactly what spots are good in relation to the couch.

You are right about using the QS8's as back surround. New pic is here: http://showcase.netins.net/web/heesch/New%20Image.PNG (still dont know how to post a link)

If you look at the picture would it be possible to place one QS8 on the wall to the left on the 2x4 frame? And the other one somewhere by the beam? The 2 QS8s would be far apart. The wall behind the sofa is about 12 feet.

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The area you indicate as QS8?? in the picture appears to be in front of, not behind the listening position? Since a wall mounting would also be acceptable, on the back wall 12' back, 6' up and separated about 12' would be logical.