Question Speakers at ear height or ceiling aimed at ear?

[Meadowlark]

I am running my speaker wire in the office for surround sound. I don't know if I should run the wire to the seated ear height or if I should only run the wire to corners of the ceiling and then use speakers that mount onto the ceiling that you angle towards the listening area? If I do the wire down the walls I would then make a shelf or bracket to mount speakers on the exterior of the wall because I don't want to do recessed wall speakers on my exterior house walls due to insulation loss. So which type of speaker placement would benefit me better for gaming and watching movies?

 

[Member 581642]

For home cinema i would go for wall mounted, ceiling speakers are not always the best for movies even if they can be angled in. Also consider that with ceiling speakers you need to insulate the audio for rooms above and possibly fire as well

 

[Joe Fernand]

So many questions

Room/Room layout - is key to decent surround sound playback!

Office - other than sound studios the layout of very few 'offices' are optimised for Movie playback.

Loudspeakers - follow the Dolby guides, see Speaker Setup Guide

In-ceiling - are often a compromise plus you have to factor in local building regs (you may require Fire hoods) and noise containment (the folk above you may not like your choice of music/movies).

In-ceiling - don't use the corners, layout the speakers as per the Dobly guideline positions and use speakers designed to 'aim' the Mid and HF into the listening position.

Joe

 

[djt111]

Op is not on about in ceiling speakers

More like these in the photo:
http://www.mwhomewiring.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/2011-04-19-005.jpg

I don't think it would make too much diffrence with it being on the wall or ceiling as long as you use a good bracket to get them angled at the seating area.
You can Always manually adjust the volume if you find the rear volum low after setup

 

[Joe Fernand]

'Op is not on about in ceiling speakers' - missed that bit!

'If you follow the "rules" then all speakers should be at the same height' - for Surround Sound the Front LCR ought to be at ear height and the surrounds above ear height!

Joe