Speakers And Room Size

[Sybaris]

Is there a table or method for figuring the optimum speaker characteristics by room size? My HT room will be 17'X15'. Don't want to get too large of speakers and it be overpowered or wasted wattage, don't want to get too small of speakers and it be wimpy.

thanks

[superchad]

First I would say post a budget, and what you like in speakers (small,large, stand mount or floor model and so on) unless I missed that.

You could get may speakers of various size in your room from smaller bookshelf or monitor speakers to large box full range models and perhaps even Planar or Electrostatic options but there are things people need to know before any valid help can be given, Many times people will suggest Mini monitors in a smaller room, yours is not small but certainly not large, Placing a mid sized full or near full range speaker is certainly the route I would take for mains and center.
It is my semi-educated opinion that people will judge a speaker as too large far more often than is really needed, it all boils down to what you want out of your system, the rooms accoustics and the all important issue of you and your wife/partners wishes as far as what looks good. My room is 14X24 and I have very large speakers but I play large scale Classical, Heavy Metal and Rock in a music first Theater application so a monitor wont work for me plus I can place my speakers 4 feet from backwall and 3 from side walls with no wife issues, many folks cant do that for various reasons so size is not a big issue for guys like me but many speakers are really just a monitor stacked on a sub enclosure giving you the best of both worlds as moniotrs have strengths that larger coffin speakers cant match........there is no one size fits all solution.....but hopefully the more info you provide the more help folks can offer

[salvasol]

I agree with Superchad ...

You also need to tell if this will be for HT only; or will you use it for music too???

Are you planning on getting a Sub, or Do you have one already???

What system do you have 5.1, 6.1 or 7.1 ???

Are you planning to use the same receiver (What model???) or getting a new one???

Budget is very important ... Do you want to spend $300, $2,000, $ 10,000 ???

Any brand in particular???

What do yo expect to get from speakers??? ... I started with an Infinity TSS750 (very small speakers, sound good but frequency response is 120Hz to 20Khz; usually your crossover is set at 80Hz which I couldn't do it with this speakers), currently I'm using JBL Stadiums and Polk M10 which work better than the TSS750 ...

[Sybaris]

Thanks for the suggestions.

1. I plan on making the speaker set-up as minimally intrusive as possible, nothing on the floor or protruding. The wall where the TV will go is actually one side of an empty walk-in closet so I have plenty of space to run cable/wires, inset the TV, mains, center and sub(s). I will have to build bulkheads about 1.5'X1.5' square along the length of the two side walls where the walls meet the ceiling. There's an A/C vent recently put in and to make it symetrical the bulkheads are necessary. The bulkheads can house side and rear speakers. The back wall opens out to a hot tub and since those doors are glass I'll probably build another bulkhead that will house remote controlled blinds and a rear center channel speaker.

2. The room will be for HT only

3. I've always been partial to Klipsch. Got an old pair of Forte's and they are as sweet today as they were 20 years ago new.

4. I don't have any components for HT. I studied a lot of brands some years ago and was drawn to Denons products. I recently looked at their site and I don't recognize anything anymore but they did have this A/V Receiver selector and for the variables I input it spit out the AVR-2308CI and AVR-888 as being compatible for my needs. Just to mention, I don't need multi-zone or networking. My TV however will be 1080p plasma. I also have a lot of DVDs so would upscaling be a feature to look for or maybe let the DVD player do the upscaling (if possible)?

5. Budget: Well, I can't hear a cricket fart so I'm not real concerned about audiophile level of quality. I'd like to see what I could do with 5k.

thanks

[tonyvdb]

There really is no set rule for how big or how much wattage speakers need to be for a certain room size.
The more important thing is get the best your budget will allow. Paring up a good receiver and speakers is always a good choice. There are bookshelves that sound just as good as some towers but thy will cost more. Generally staying away from speakers that are not solid meaning they don't weigh much and the cabinets are flimsy is a good rule just for starters.
There are so many different receivers out there that its hard to say what is good and what is junk but generally the low priced ones for all the brands will have lower build quality and performance. I know that there will be someone on here that will disagree with this but stay away from Sony receivers with the exception of the ES line. Yamaha has some nice receivers once you get into the $400 and above range as do Denon, Onkyo, and Pioneer.
Speaker manufactures like Polk, B&W, Martian Logan, Mission, SVS, and so many more that others will be sure to mention have some great choices. Wattage is a relatively meaningless term because it totaly depends on how the company does the rating as there is no real standard. The more important thing to consider is frequency response at a certain db level and the efficiency of the speaker its self plus its all about what YOU like, let your own ears make the decision.

For 5k you can get into some nice stuff. just for example,
Onkyo TX SR875 for $1100
Panasonic DMP BD30kBluRay DVD player Also a great SD DVD player. $500
SVS MTS-01 speaker System including sub

[salvasol]

Take a look at this threads ... I like what they did to hide the speakers behind/inside the stage; Do you know what I mean??? ... you can do the same since you will be building a bulkhead where your TV will be installed,


http://www.hometheatershack.com/foru...ld-thread.html

http://www.hometheatershack.com/foru...on-thread.html

http://www.hometheatershack.com/foru...e-theatre.html

[superchad]

Sybaris wrote:

Thanks for the suggestions.

1. I plan on making the speaker set-up as minimally intrusive as possible, nothing on the floor or protruding. The wall where the TV will go is actually one side of an empty walk-in closet so I have plenty of space to run cable/wires, inset the TV, mains, center and sub(s). I will have to build bulkheads about 1.5'X1.5' square along the length of the two side walls where the walls meet the ceiling. There's an A/C vent recently put in and to make it symetrical the bulkheads are necessary. The bulkheads can house side and rear speakers. The back wall opens out to a hot tub and since those doors are glass I'll probably build another bulkhead that will house remote controlled blinds and a rear center channel speaker.


thanks

Man sorry to say but in your first paragraph you are already off to a potentially bad start and a more expensive one to get correct while wall speakers and easy to hide models can work the are difficult and almost always a huge compromise i sound re-production. For surrounds this can be easier to make workable but for mains and center I would really make sure you know how to do this or have ability to pay to get it right, ofcourse this all depends on what you expect or demand the sound to be.
Klipsch makes some pretty good speakers for HT as they are generally very efficient (something you want to really pay attention to and strive for so a reciever can easily drive them and as far as Denon you cant go wrong.
..cheers