I'm doing some remodeling and have an 18' x 24' x 7' 10" room (~430 square feet; ~3500 cubic feet) I may turn into a multi-purpose home theater (i.e., there will be shelves along one wall, maybe a table somewhere - it's not going to be SOLELY a home theater, but it will be a major function). There are limits to what I can do, but I have a lot of flexibility.
I can provide a simple drawing if that would help. The room is "almost sealed" in that there is one 3' hallway out the back that has no door (could add one). I've been thinking about the following approach:
- Using an acoustically transparent ~2.39 screen about 3' out from one of the shorter walls (a brick one)
- 3 speakers behind said screen, then 4 more around the room for 7 channels
- Two or four subs - tbd - cable will probably be in room
- 4 or 6 speakers in the ceiling - now would be the easiest time to install them - this cabling would be in the ceiling
- One row of 3-4 seats. While I could add a second it would hurt the multi-purpose aspect of the room and would not be frequently used, so I'm inclined to go with 1 and allow for moving some furniture and non-dedicated seating on those rare occasions I want 2 rows.
My main questions are:
- What might be overlooking in this sketch of a plan? I've got existing equipment so I'm accounting for projector placement and throw distance, light control (complete control), etc. But I encountered a lot of little surprises when planning and executing my last setup, so I'd like to learn from the experience of others here.
- Do I have "room" for 6 ceiling atmos speakers? I know a lot of people say 4 is plenty. But I already have the speakers lying around, and now is the time to do what I'm going to do - there will be no changes for some years after this, if I proceed. If I'm not going to regret 6, it's not going to cost me anything more to do 6. But if 6 is going to result in bad positioning or outcomes, then it'd be better for me to abandon that now.
- I've no idea what, if anything, to do about "blacking" the area around the screen. I've found the light reflection from the screen to the ceiling and room distracting in the past, and would love to address that somewhat. But it'd be a hard sell to get black carpet and ceiling paint in a semi-dedicated room. Seeking options and advice.
Ask any questions - where I don't know the answer is somewhere I can learn. Tell me any story of what you learned doing yours - worst case scenario, I'm already familiar with the issue and we just educate others.
Thanks for any input you can provide as I start to think through this and build out a more detailed plan.
