Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Home Theater Floor standing or in wall speakers?

Having trouble deciding what speakers to get. First here are pictures of the room, which is 17x11, although because of the door way into the kitcken roughly only 11x11 will be usable.




I plan on mounting a 65" above the fireplace and removing the drywall right under it so I can fit a VP150 some what flush with the wall. I will use QS8 on stands flanking a sofa or sectional. For the sub, either a EP500 or EP600 in the right coner, depends if I knock down the left wall and create a bar for the kitcken. As for the fronts, I can not decide. I like how the W22 in whall speakers would look, but am concerned about the sound quality. I would prefer to get the M60s, but will having them at such a low hieght compared to the TV comprise anything? Meaning will it sound like audio is coming from the wrong direction when watching movies?

I always recommend floor standing because of the (1) known acoustics before you consider the room, and (2) portability. But your setup looks perfect for the Axiom in/on-walls. Someone else had a similar setup and the final product really looked first class. I had decent results with in ceiling speakers (not axiom), but no comparison to on-wall boxes that replaced them.

I don't think you will find the audio strange. I have M80's on the floor (of course) and my VP150 hanging from the ceiling above my 65" Sharp LCD and it all blends together flawlessly without a hitch. The in-walls do look the tits though, I'll give them that. But having experimented with speaker placement quite a bit I would be a little hesitant on taking away the option of moving them around to get the most out of them.

Personally I like the freedom of placing a floor standing speaker where ever I want it as compared to having the speakers anchored into the wall where they will be permanently. But that's just me.

Floor standing and no TV above the fireplace. In-walls are a compromise and the TV up high will cause your neck to hurt. Leave the in-walls and fireplace TVs for the interior designers who don't have a clue about usability.

My folks have a plasma above the fireplace with no issues, of course, it is a gas fireplace with blower, does not harm the tv if you have a mantle.

Try to have the tweeters of the right/left/center as close as possible. Ideally, you want them at ear level when seated, that may not be possible in this situation. You don't want your center way high and your other speakers low, that will screw up the soundstage.

Really, why not? As I stated my center is hanging from my ceiling and I have never noticed anything screwy with my sound stage. Where I sit the tweets on my M80's are at ear level. My VP150 is aimed straight at my seating position, so all the sound waves are projected towards my ears. I guess it all sounds great since I sit in the sweet spot. But I've walked all over the room and I'm truely amazed by how great it all sounds no matter where I am in the room.

I found V1 of my HT was okay with my center channel up high and pointed down...aside from being off center ever so slightly

but once the speaker decided it was afraid of heights.....

I decided to move it below the screen and I found the performance much better....as well as the finish...wow they morphed to HG!

then I decided after a long time to finish the stand...

I still need to take new pics of the whole front set up. It's funny seeing the pics as the equipment rack continuously changes in each picture I've put off too long painting the inside of the rack black or adding something around or behind the equipment to make it look cleaner or flush...

Holy crap, the finish on those is astonishing!!! Question, where did you get those feet that stick out from the M60's? I love those!!! Not only do they add stability, but they look the tits as well!!!

Thanks for all the opinions guys. The fireplace is not going to stay that size, going to put a glass door insert in that only has about 2-3"s worth of trim and sheet rock right up to it. So that white boarder you see around the fireplace now will be roughly how large it is. This way I can move the TV and center speaker down. The center speaker will be perfectly at ear level, and the TV will really not be that high, the ceilings are only like 7' (old house).

I have given up on the in walls, and am now between M22 monitors or M60s. The monitors will def sound better than the in walls, and should still look decent mounted to the wall and angled towards the seating position. UGH decisions.

OK, given the choice between mounting free standing speakers on the wall and going with in-walls, I would go with in-walls. The in-walls at least are designed to be in-the wall. M22's are not.

You could check out the on-wall speakers Axiom makes.

Sorry, I have somewhat strong opinions on ceiling/wall speakers (and TV's/fireplaces). I feel if you are going to spend a small fortune on your gear, why handicap your movie experience to make it look 'pretty'.

Mounting the M22's on wall was mentioned by Allan in the past stating that it gave a nice increase in bass output without affecting the overall sound character...

Thanks, that's the HG Cherry....Vinyl. As for the stabilizers there's a thread here and a couple pics from the link...I linked to my update so you may want to start at the beginning of the thread.

Dave, I would not mount the M22s directly flat against the wall, I would use the brackets that axiom sells that allow you to angle them towards the listen position. I use them now for my bedroom, and I can't image the in-walls or on-walls sounding better than the bookshelves bracketed to the wall.

This is why I gave up on the in-wall or on-wall speakers. It's either mounted book shelves on large brackets that allow them to be angled in any direction or floor standing. The more I am reading however, I think I mine as well just go with the floor standing. Even though the top of the floor standing speakers would be about even with the bottom of the TV it should not ruin the sound stage. Maybe I should draw a rough diagram.

From what I know, M22s sound pretty darn good on Axiom's full metal brackets. I don't have those myself, but Peter uses his like that and reported better bass from it.

OKay here is a quick render of what the wall should like when I am finished. I did floor standing speakers not wall mounted M22s, it actually does not look that bad. Although the speakers will stick out a bit, guess they will just be furniture accents...lol.

Mike, I don't think you'll find that setup to be a problem at all...

I think it will look and sound great.

Who is they guy eying your speakers? I think you better watch him or he will have new M60's at his house when you are away.

That will look and sound awesome and is the way I would go.

In fact it looks similar to my room, but picture that my entry way is directly beside the left channel through the side wall. So you would basically walk straight into that left speaker every time you walked into the room. That's why I was forced to go with the W series, but would have gone with M60's or 80's if room configuration would have allowed. Let us know what you decide!

The speakers will take up a fair amount of space as they're 15" deep and you will need a few inches of space behind them as well. But like you said, they will be furniture accents....especially if you go for a set of Custom Wood Vassallo's or Custom Vinyl

I'm sure that with the dual-subs and AV rack that will eventually work their way in there, the floor standers will look right at home!

That looks like a great setup.

Is is my imagination or did you shelving from around the fireplace? What a clever way to stop your SO from forcing you to put bookhelf speakers in an enclosed space.

Thanks for all the positive encouragement guys! I think I am def going to go with the M60's. Also think the fire place is going to look great flush up against the wall with minimal trim.

HOWEVER, I am a little concerned about how far the center channel is going to be sticking out. The speaker is 7.5 inches wide, I will be putting a false wall up so the fireplace will sit flush, but the wall will only be 4" thick. I could make a cut out for the center speaker, but I still will have 3.5" stick out above the fireplace. Although I think it might be even with the TV anyway, you figure the thickness of the TV, plus wall mount, it will easily be over 4" from the wall, so the speaker will be even with it.

Just wish I could mount everything flush, but the chimney is preventing me, only have 4"s of depth with the false wall before hitting solid brick. Ah well, should still look good!

Rather than in-wall mount a VP150 why not use the W150 as the in wall portion looks to be on y 3.5 inches deep.

http://www.axiomaudio.com/wallspeakerw150_main.html

It looks like it has the same specs as the VP and it’s designed to be wall mounted. I think it will certainly look better sticking out of the wall than the VP150. Since the VP150 is already enclosed (no ports) I don’t think you would really be loosing anything by switching to the W150 which might actually sound better sticking out of the wall than the VP150 since that’s how it‘s designed to be mounted. Also looks like they‘re the same price.

I thought about that grunt, just worried about the sound difference. When I do finally order these speakers, I'll talk to axiom about it and see what they say.

At this point just need to figure out how much that VP150 is going to be sticking out, as the TV will be sticking out anyway, esp with the mounting hardware.

I think contacting Axiom is a good call. I almost never recommend in/on-wall speakers but in your case I think a dedicated W150 would work better. However, two considerations would be portability (if you plan to use it elsewhere on a stand at some point) and resale should you ever want to get rid of it the VP would probably be easier to sell.

Mike, in case it helps - my plasma is on a Sanus non-tilt wall mount and distance from wall to front of tv is 5 1/2" (I just measured) The tilt option would put the TV out further.

My W150 and 22's are ~4" deep from wall to front of grill.

Also when I was deciding on my purchase I had questions on VP vs W 150's - Alan assured me they sounded 'similarly well' as I believe he terms it . Of course, call Axiom and get the expert recommendations.

Cheers,

AS the VP series is not ported I can't imagine the sonic qualities changing much from the W series to the VP series.

Well its something to think about. Thanks for the measurements, I looked up the thickness of the TV (3.9" at its widest), and 2.5" for the tilting mount. So 6.4", however tilting the TV downward will less the bottom half of the TVs distance from the wall to around 4-5", which is exactly what the amount I am expecting the VP150 from sticking out.

My only concern now is the fireplace looking retarded flush against the wall, while the TV and center speaker protrude a few inches from the surface of the wall. Maybe I should build a simple mantle, or see how it looks first, can always build one afterwords.

I don't see anything wrong with that arrangement. In fact check out the picture of my set-up...



Compared to your sketch...



You'll notice there isn't a whole lot of difference between yours and my set up (remember those are M80's in my picture, which are 2 inches taller than the M60's in your sketch... oh and I don't have a creepy teenager eyeballing my equipment), except that my VP150 is hanging from the ceiling ABOVE the tv as many on here have warned against. But I'm blown away by the sound, I sincerely don't see any problem with having the center channel above the tv (which in both my case and yours allows us to place the tv a bit lower) as long as it's pointing towards the listener.

But take this advice with this grain of salt... for I've never tried the center channel below the tv. So for all I know if I ever did try it down there, there is the chance that I would find it sounded 1000 percent better and would forever warn all others away from ever hanging their center channel from the ceiling above their tv's!!!!

But if you hang it from the ceiling first without ever trying it below the tv like me, then you wind up finding out what Cypher realized in the 'Matrix'.... "ignorance is bliss"!!!

Thanks for the advice, didn't think about placing the speaker above the ceiling, I'll have to play around with the mounting location once I actually get the TV...lol. The sanus, came with extensions so it seems like it will be pretty flexible.

Had a contractor out to look at the fireplace today, looks like I will not be able to mount the sheet rock right over the brick like I wanted to. So opted to cover it up with a dark slate and silver door insert. I'll then build some columns and a mantle on top for the speaker. Add some trim and paint and it should look pretty decent.

Got some of my wiring in today from Monoprice, still waiting on all the wall plates from smarthome.com. Oh well I can at least run some of the wires this weekend. I should prob run it through conduit while I am at it. Wonder if home depot has it. Oh buddy of mine is also wiring up the alarm system for the house, busy day tomorrow!

Oh started a thread over at the AVS forums too, for some reason though the thread here is getting alot more attention :).

I had to read this twice to be sure i read it right.

Read twice, tit once.

Sorry, that's the Enlish in my blood (I have no Enlish in my blood) coming out!

Slow progress, but here is the wall all framed out.



Think I went a little over board with enforcing the wall...lol. Never got a chance to run the wires, got caught up ripping down the basement ceiling (sheet rock right to the studs). Works out cause I ordered more wiring, gonna run two cat5, HDMI, component, and USB to the TV, and 10/2 to all the speakers :).

Oh and fireplace materials should be in around two weeks. Slow and steady wins the race :).

Looks good, wish I could be there helping you. These are the kinds of projects I LOVE to do!!! I love to have a vision, and then see how close to that vision I can come. My HT closet project actually exceeded every expectation I ever had for it. I love it so much I can't ever see buying a new house and NOT doing the same thing in it!

That wood framing looks like cedar.
Must smell superb in that room.

Agreed! I helped my dad put in a fence in our back yard when I was younger (actually it was punishment for me getting into trouble), but smelling the stacks of cedar planks on our porch was quite amazing.

Cedar does smell good, but I'm not seeing cedar in that pic.

They're just pining for cedar.

Thanks would love to have some help from someone who actually enjoys theater. I keep arguing with my friends of family because they keep asking me why I need to do this, and why I have to do that....lol. Just wait till its all done and their begging to be at my house for every major sporting event...lol.




All pine

Ha, yeah just wait till next summer, you'll have 15 people asking you for advice on how you did this and that! Lol

My monitor has been set to a warm colour lately.
Is that pine stained apple red or is it just me?

Well got my Salmander A/V rack in from Amazon, box was in ruins and man they pack their items horribly. There is no packaging material protecting shelves from one another, everything was chipped or scratched up. Now I go to wait for the replacement...ugh!

Dude that sucks! Why is it that one can never get through an entire project without a snag or two to overcome? Is it part of the whole 'Eve taking a bit of the apple' thing that doomed us all to living in an imperfect world perhaps? I don't know, but in all my days I've never seen anyone's project go smooth from start to finish no matter how well planned out they did it!

But I suppose it adds to the satisfaction when everything is done, eh? Nothing like trials and tribulation to make you appreciate the finished product even more!

Yah, think I am just going to get the refund and pay a little extra to buy it at a B&M store, this way its easier to deal with the whole return process.

Never got around to running wiring this weekend. Decided to rip all the sheet rock down on all the exterior walls and put up real insulation instead of the spray in stuff. Still can't believe their was no insulation in the house...lol.

Oh well it will make it way easier to re-do the electrical service and run whatever else I need in the walls....this house is never gonna get done let alone my HT...haha.

Slow going on the HT project, decided to pretty much gut the whole house, took down a good 80% of all the sheet rock down including ceilings, gonna have to finish up the rest next week.

At least the electrician and HVAC guys will have an easier time now! I'll try and get some pictures up.

Quick update, house has been gutted to it's entirety. Nothing left but the shell. HVAC system for the first floor is complete and bran new electrical service has been installed. Now on the the family room theater!

New fireplace has been installed...



and here is a pick of the wall, with a paper cut out of the TV for measuring purposes....



Notice all the conduit going up from the basement to knee wall. Now I just need to run some conduit behind the TV and I can get started on all my wiring, including the houses network, TV, and phone lines.

In the meantime I might take advantage of emotiva's holiday sale and pick up their 5.1 amp. Still deciding if I want to place the QS8's on stands or install on the wall....suggestions?

Wall? I don't see no wall...

On wall would be just fine. No need for stands.

Lots of work in perspective!
If you can, put the QS8 on the wall at about 2-3' above hear level.