I am stumped on how to place speakers for this “semi-open” plan.

[Sayge]

My goal to have a decent sounding TV and play music for this living/dining/kitchen area. I don’t have a huge budget. I am thinking a Sonos Arc, sub and some wall or ceiling satellites. Hopefully you can see that this TV could be viewed from more than one location depending on the activity. Since I can’t dictate a typical stereo or theatre sound stage - I am considering using single point stereo speakers that have stereo tweeters. Or is there a better way ? The ceiling in the dining/lounge and kitchen is 8’. The living room has a 15’ vaulted ceiling. The yellow stripe area is a 5’ wide light well/skylights that has a lattice at the 8’ ceiling level. The top edge if this image is the north wall, made of 3-2 panel sliding doors, so there is not much wall available to me on that surface. Many thanks to any or all who might share an idea or two.

 

[MalVeauX]

Hi,

So I would look at each listening position in each quadrant of that room and consider it in terms of your primary speakers. Basically get really efficient loud speakers so that you can enjoy them at whatever listening volume you want at the farthest point in the entire total room space. It's louder the closer you are, so you run them softer when you're near the TV and you will have to turn it up if you're farther away in the kitchen or something as the SPL drops as your distance increases. Two efficient towers would do this from a receiver or power amp no problem.

Or you could explore zoning and install some 2 channel sets in each quadrant via zone 2 on the receiver so that you can run source from your receiver to different areas of the room. And with that you could use zone 2 pre-amp out and just split the signal with y-cables and output to two other quadrants, like the kitchen and dining area, and in those areas, install active monitors (powered speakers) that receive the signal. Simple. Setup whatever you want at the TV for enjoying movies/music when sitting there with some typical loudspeakers (bookshelf or tower).

Very best,

 

[Eppie]

Ah, so many people ask for "decent sound" not realizing that it is totally subjective. For some people, a sound bar is fine. For hi-fi audio enthusiasts, it's not a consideration. A sound bar won't compete with an AVR (audio video receiver) and separate speakers and sub-woofer when it comes to sound quality, so it comes down to your goals and expectations. If that is a wall unit to hold the TV, you may not have space for an AVR and floor speakers. What you gain with the Sonos is a lot of convenience. You can stream to the Arc with the Sonos app or Apple Air Play for music so you just need a cable box or TV arial. The sub and satellites are wireless which eliminates speaker cable. For the 2 main seating positions in front of the TV, the atmos surround effects can be pretty good.

For that size space, the little Sonos sub is not going to give you the home theatre experience. It will provide the bass that the sound bar is lacking, but don't expect much deep bass outside of the living area (depending on placement). And with the open concept, varying ceiling heights and windows and glass doors, the room acoustics will be all over the place any way. For every day TV and background music you may find the Arc system is ok. Web site shows retail $1,856 for the Surround Set; less for just the bar and sub.

Next step up is an AVR with book shelf speakers, centre speaker and maybe satellites and sub-woofer. You can get a good AVR for $500 (Denon and Yamaha are popular) leaving almost $1,500 for speakers, if we use the Arc system as a starting point for budget. Others can recommend some decent speakers if that's something you would be interested in. That would improve music quality a lot, but involves careful planning of speaker placement and wiring. You can do the whole thing in one shot, or prewire where you want the speakers to go and get the mains and center to start and add the satellites and sub-woofer later if you want to build a better quality system in stages. Music streaming would require a smart TV, separate steaming device or a Roku or similar device plugged into the TV (might need a TV with one HDMI-ARC connection and an AVR with HDMI-ARC support). Other options there too but Sonos has a pretty good reputation for supporting various streaming services.

 

[Eppie]

Guess I should try and answer the question in the title. With separates, the centre is best right below the TV like with the sound bar, with the mains on either side. For music, you want the mains towards the outside, but seating positions may require them closer to the TV, since you have the couch / love-seat on the right side. Placing bookshelves inside cubies in a wall unit will detract from the sound but some people don't have a choice if the wall unit covers the entire wall. If that's a bench, try and get the tweeters at ear height when seated. Bookshelves on stands or floor-standers will sound better, but furniture will limit placement.

Bigger challenge will be surrounds if you want home theatre. Personally, I think a multi-speaker setup will be difficult to setup in an open concept like that. The left side-surround would be on the pantry wall and the right side-surround would not quite line up due to the window, but at least they are both in front of the main seats. The rear surrounds can go on the support wall but will be a little close to your seating position. You can have front height speakers on the TV wall close to the ceiling but the vaulted ceiling will likely rule out any ceiling speakers. That would allow for a 9.1 setup with a sub-woofer. If that's above your budget, you could eliminate the front height for 7.1 or just go mains, centre and rear-surround for 5.1. Leaving some surround channels unused also allows for the use of a Zone 2 or Zone 3 speaker connection in another room, as suggested above. Most Denons support that feature.

If you decide to go with the AVR, I recommend a competent installer perform the wiring. With the Sonos, MalveauX's suggestion of powered satellite speakers in other zones is a good one. Sonos may have units that pair up wirelessly with the Arc, but I have not researched that.

 

[Sayge]

Wow. Thanks to you both for the thoughtful and detailed responses. The shelf below the tv is about 2 ft. high and is a row of cabinets with sliding doors that sit on the floor. The furniture arrangement in the drawing is only a suggestion at this point. I need to research the details of these suggestions a bit further so that I can understand them fully. Yes, this is not a typical "Theater" per se. The total size is about 22' x 25'. I will report back - Thank you !