Heights or in-ceiling speakers for Atmos?

[Trebdp83]

Sounds like a plan, get your dad some beers and get those speakers mounted.

 

[Sawtaytoes]

We've spent 2 nights on it so far and got 5 of 8 speaker mounts up and all the conduit placed with no speaker wires. It seems ridiculous until you realize all the little things we needed to do like finding joists.

I ended up having to move the whole theater over 3" just to make it work with the joists.

Then, we also have an even number of joists, so both center height (CH) and center top (TS) channels needed another piece of wood.

---

What really messed me up are these two INCORRECT pictures in the manual:

As you can see, they incorrectly placed the top middle speakers either in front of or behind the listening area.

Super confusing.

After talking to dealer, looking at Dolby Atmos specs, and reading through other parts of the manual on speaker installation, I came to the conclusion that all 3 top middle need to be pointing directly down at you from above:

Now I have to move the entire middle row 6-24" back depending on my seating area.

 

[Wardog555]

If only you read the Dolby atmos guidelines in the first place and not any manufacturers manual. Then there will be no confusion at all.

 

[Sawtaytoes]

If only you read the Dolby atmos guidelines in the first place and not any manufacturers manual. Then there will be no confusion at all.

No reason to blame anyone here. I'm not an expert in speaker placement, so it's easy to do it wrong when the manufacturer tells me incorrectly.

Also, Dolby didn't have 4 heights and 2 ceiling listed, so I looked at the docs for 4 heights and 4 ceiling.

 

[ReverendSlim]

Also, Dolby didn't have 4 heights and 2 ceiling listed, so I looked at the docs for 4 heights and 4 ceiling.

They actually have it both ways on their website. See: https://www.dolby.com/about/support/guide/speaker-setup-guides/7.1.6-mounted-overhead-speakers-setup-guide/

 

[Sawtaytoes]

Yep, it's there. I missed it because the picture doesn't show rear heights. Dolby needs to fix that.

Regardless, this isn't a "duh, you should've known better" situation. What a horrible way to treat someone.

I'm a regular Joe consumer, and there's absolutely no way I would've known to look at Dolby's site for speaker placement over the manual that came with pre-pro.

 

[Trebdp83]

Just do your best. Even when you have the optimal speaker configuration info, you may have to compromise it for a room than is far less than optimal. Throw in accommodating to different speaker configurations and things can get really messy.

 

[isolar8001]

Yep, it's there. I missed it because the picture doesn't show rear heights. Dolby needs to fix that.
View attachment 62050
Regardless, this isn't a "duh, you should've known better" situation. What a horrible way to treat someone.

I'm a regular Joe consumer, and there's absolutely no way I would've known to look at Dolby's site for speaker placement over the manual that came with pre-pro.

Dolby needs to show what that setup looks like after the cat has knocked all that crap over...

 

[Wardog555]

Have a read up on the Dolby atmos studio guidelines and they will have all the information you need.
It's more detailed than those simple one page diagrams.
Remember, placement is based on angles from the main listening position.
If doing 6 atmos the placement world be 45, 90, 135 degrees elevation from ear level or thereabouts. (Side view)
For the spacing it's 45-55 degrees elevation from ear level (back view)

I trust this is helpful

Salesforce

dolby.my.salesforce.com

 

[Sawtaytoes]

I got everything mounted. I notice very little change. It's surprising how good the Atmos toppers are compared to ceiling- and height-mounted speakers.

I bought some Auro3D demo discs and ripped them tonight. The audio is DTS-HD and DTS, but no Auro3D. I'm not sure what's going on. Starting a different thread on that here because I wanted to use it to test my heights:

Auro3D discs are in DTS?

I bought both Auro3D demo discs from their website, and ripped them using MakeMKV tonight. Using both the NVIDIA SHIELD and my Windows PC, these demo disc files all play as DTS-HD or DTS. I went ahead and looked the MKV file's container data, and none of them have Auro3D tracks. What's going...

forums.audioholics.com

 

[cpp]

Atmos or DTS:X or IMAX Enhanced, where should I be putting my height channels?

Currently, they're speaker-mounted (bouncy-house), but I plan to mount them up high, just not in the ceiling. Ever since hearing that the Audioholics folks (Gene, etc) have them in the ceiling, I've been having doubts.

I read a Sound & Vision article on Dolby Pro Logic IIz (which has heights), and he said: "I'd describe the sound as taller, not higher". Not sure if it's a Dolby Pro Logic IIz issue, but I want height sounds to sound like they're coming from above my head, not that I have taller front and rear speakers.

Is it gonna be an issue mounting them up high on my 9' walls rather than above my head?

my ceilings are 13ft in our area so its not happening. .

 

[Sawtaytoes]

Update on my mounted speakers.

The Monolith 8250X kept shutting off channels randomly even before I mounted it, but it was worse. I tried multiple things, but the unit kept overheating without two 140mm Noctua fans pushing air through the back top.

I picked up a Marantz AMP 10 instead, and it's night and day probably because it doesn't randomly shut off.

At first, it went into over-protection, but I found two 90-degree connectors almost touching on one of the mounted speakers. After separating them, I haven't had issues since.

Now, I can hear a difference between mounted and bouncy-house.

 

[Trebdp83]

See how easy it is to implement spatial audio in your home?

 

[Sawtaytoes]

Yeah, hahaha, I know!

I get why Dolby did bouncy-house speakers, but it'd make more sense if builders would cut holes in the ceilings of new homes (with covers) so you can put in whatever speakers you want with ease.

Honestly, that'd let you put anything up there; new lights, HDMI, etc. There could be any number of reasons you might want to be able to access those areas.

In Kansas City, we have basements. Unfinished basements and open ceilings allow us to route cables wherever we need throughout the house. This is how I wired my entire place for Ethernet. It was a lot simpler than mounting speakers since you donj't have to worry about exact wire-placement.

 

[ZenLunatic]

Dolby Atmos doesn't have a spec for 2 sets of height channels. They prefer in-ceiling, bouncy-house, or a mix of both for x.x.4 speakers.

But there are specs for x.x.6 where 4 are heights and 2 are tops:
View attachment 61939

And the only x.x.8 channel mode listed has 2 sets of heights and 2 sets of tops:
View attachment 61940

At this point, I'll mount my speakers high and let there be a phantom top. It's possible, just not ideal, but still better than bouncy-house. Gotta make things work for the room you've got.

---

But... I just bought another set of the same height speakers which I'll try to mount on the ceiling.

In my room, the biggest issue is getting wires through there. I have 4 can lights near where I'd want my speakers. I could use those holes to fish stuff through, but my dad (who helps me with this stuff) isn't keen on touching anything in the ceiling right now.

I can always mount them on the ceiling and run visible wires, but my wife will probably complain. The only other way to get top-mounted speakers is going through the 2nd floor floorboard which requires pulling up the carpet and running wires through those joists.

you can install wire raceways which really helps to hide the wires and make it look much cleaner and finished looking.

 

[Paul McNeil]

Well, my two cents.

I have a 15 foot high ceiling (my home theater is in the school house room, of an old German house/school), and have four Atmos speakers. These are small Martin Logans, mounted at the junction of the wall/ceiling, and the tweeters are on the bottom end and are aimed directly at the seating area.

The Atmos sound effects are very good. I can't imagine, in my setting with the high ceilings that 'bouncy' could compete. Maybe in ceiling could, but that would not be possible, in my room (I would have to cut holes in the wooden ceiling, and run wires, OH MY GOD).

Anyway, in my situation, I think wall mounted Atmos speakers work well, and I'm not alone for sure. The sound is certainly coming from 'above' and it is directed precisely at the listening position.

 

[Oddball]

The only choice to get best results is between on walls/on ceilings or in-ceilings. Bouncy Atmos is pretty much a gamble and even if it calculated well is not at its best.

In ceilings will have limited angles based on your current MLP and less flexibility to move them if required. And you will generally need to pay a significant premium for good in-ceiling speakers compared to a good bookshelf speaker that you could wall or ceiling mount and if you use flexible mounts with vertical/horizontal alignment, they could accommodate different MLP if needed (aka you get bigger display and move things around).

I would rather spend more on good bookshelves and mounts that put anything priceless in my ceiling. If I need to move them, that would be an exercise that would be too epic. My wall mounted 4 Atmos bookshelves are not the best, but they are pretty good and could not be happier with them and how they perform. Their in room F3 is around 60hz so they blend extremely well at conservative 80hz crossover. Their mounts are quite flexible, so could accommodate a variety of MLPs in the room.

 

[Sawtaytoes]

you can install wire raceways which really helps to hide the wires and make it look much cleaner and finished looking.

I have wire raceways already. It cleaned up a lot especially because the white matches the white on my ceiling. I mean, I have black speakers mounted to the ceiling, so the raceway doesn't really show up unless you're looking for it.

I actually got the wire raceways to hold the wires, not to make it clean, but it ended up looking really clean too.