I have been lurking here for a few weeks, and now it's time to jump into the mix. I will ultimately become an Axiom customer, but first, I have to complete my basement construction project. Which leads me to this . . .

It's a large space that includes a 13x20 HT area. The room is open at the back, and mostly open to the left side. The front projection screen wall is notched in at both sides, one side creating a space for equipment facing into the adjacent hallway (keeping indicator lights out of view during movies).

Enough rambling - here is the top-down view:



And just to put things into perspective, here is a rough idea of what it would look like (colors are NOT final; please, no decorator advice):



There is another partial wall to the left where a QS8 will live.

Does anyone out there have a similar setup? I know that the M60s should be "out of the corners", but if the drivers are positioned outside the alcove, I believe that the foot or so behind the rear ports should be adequate.

Opinions/comments/advice please!

Just off the top of my head, i think a lovely shade of red would go well with...
oh, ya sorry, i forgot, no decor advice, got it.


That's a nice little layout.
Don't worry about the placement of the M60s. They have plenty of room as you have them. The sub might be a problem though with that crazy corner it sits in. I would recommend you do not put it firmly in any one place as of yet and instead, play around with its position in the room once the place is all together.

Randall, the M60 location should be okay. Consider an M22 or even a third M60(if the screen is set high enough)for the center speaker. Set the QS8s farther back, at least as far as the 15' second row.

I never thougt about the fact that a single M60 costs only $50 more than a VP150. That seems a little wierd to me. Considering how much better of a speaker the M60 is.

I've got the M60s etc... in a similar layout as the one you depict. IMO you should consider bringing them out from the media niche (I don't have that option) so that the right M60 would occupy the space your SVS is in your diagram.
It has been my experience that the niche adversely affects the soundstage of the M60s. When I had mine 4 feet out from the niche rear wall (for painting), and well clear of the niche side walls, they REALLY opened up.
Give it a try and I'll bet you hear the same thing.

Speaking of red, we saw some nice refurbed theater seats . . .

As anal as I am about thrashing out the design details BEFORE construction begins, I recognize that some things, most notably sub placement, cannot be absolutely determined in advance. The best I can do at this point is to identify candidate locations and try to keep my options open. In the end, the ears will decide.

An M60 in the center would probably sound spectacular, but would definitely be too tall. The screen should be placed such that the bottom one-third is below eye level. That only gives about two feet below the screen to play with.

An M22 would fit, but I don't see any benefit to using one over a VP150 (except saving a few $).

what program do you use to draw that 3d picture?

I knew someone would ask eventually. The entire basement floor plan was drawn with 3D Home Architect 4.0 published by Broderbund. There are other similar packages out there, and I won't turn this into a CAD review thread, but I will warn against buying the 3DHA 5.0 version. The real upgrade path from 3DHA 4.0 is here.

racer,
I have an even earlier version of that Broderbund software.
It was designed for win9x and since i upgraded to win2k 2 years ago, i've had alot of visual artifacts which of course, for a design program, it not a good thing.
Thanks for the links.