I need a bit of advice on where to mount my surround speakers in the new house because I have a window in the middle of one of the walls where I'd ideally want the speaker to hang.

Here's a crappy pick of the wall:


There's not much room above the window and in front of the window places the speaker a good ways in front of the couch. Behind the window places the speaker pretty far to the rear. Additionally, I'm going to add two M22's to the back rear and that would seem to be a lot of speaker weighted to the rear of the room.

The QS8's as my surrounds have 5.25" speakers that fire directly up and down which is why I'm hesitant about placing them above the window.

Anyone have any thoughts?

As you know, Joshua, the most common recommendation is directly opposite and about 3 feet above ear level. My first thought is that if you had at least 3-4" ceiling clearance when mounted above the window that this would be satisfactory. My second thought would be that, especially in view of the rear surrounds to come, placement at the forward edge of the window would fit in well.

I agree with you that above the window is not ideal placement of the QS8. They would be too high from your listening position and too close to the ceiling. Such combination could possibly not deliver to you the optimum sound from QS8's. If they are placed behind your listening position you may only need one M22 for rear center to catch the 6.1 effect. You may not even need one with that placement. But if you have decided that you really want a dual rear, then the only alternative is to place the QS8's a little bit forward from the listening position which is before the window.

I am also thinking of adding M22's for rear. Please let us know how it works out.

That was my thinking as well, but the forward placement puts them at about 38 degrees, which is a little forward but probably not a big deal for QS8's.

The other problem is that the brackets are going to be a bitch to mount...

Hello Semi_on,

Placement at the forward edge of the window would be too far forward, in my opinion. I'd rather you try them at the rear upper edge of the window, even if that brings the top-mounted woofer close to the ceiling. Is there any way you could do a temporary trial with a couple of stepladders to support the side surrounds at or near that height?

If there's too much bias towards the rear, you can always adjust the levels of the M22ti's on the back wall. They don't contribute nearly as much to the overall surround field as the side surround channels.

Regards,

How many inches of wall are above that window? I'll tell you about my QS8 mount when I find out that measurement.

I keep meaning to measure and post that, but I keep forgetting. Hopefully, tonight I can post that measurement.

Thanks all.

It's just shy of 14". Would that be enough it the QS8's were kept close to the top of the window?

Yes.

That's plenty of room. Mine don't have that much clearance and they sound fine. Message me if you have any installation questions. I had to hang three QS8's.

It's 14" to the top of the window. I'd rather not hang the speaker over the window for aesthetic reasons which means the bottom edge of the speaker must be flush with the top of the window. The remaining room above the speaker would then be 5.75". Is that sufficient?

That is just fine in my opinion. I have the exact same setup for my left surround.