Positioning Front Speakers for Home Theater

[Hank]

I seem to remember from long ago (getting old) that for Hi Fi/Stereo the best location for front R/L speakers was a minimum of 12 feet of separation for best performance. Today I see pictures of Home Theater setups with what looks like R/L speakers immediately adjecent to the flat panel. Can anyone shed some light on the "rule of thumb" for front speaker location for Home theaters?

[L.J.]

http://www.audioholics.com/tweaks/speaker-setup-guidelines/

http://www.dolby.com/consumer/home_entertainment/roomlayout.html

You should find some good info from those 2 links.

[PeruvianSkies]

I seem to remember from long ago (getting old) that for Hi Fi/Stereo the best location for front R/L speakers was a minimum of 12 feet of separation for best performance. Today I see pictures of Home Theater setups with what looks like R/L speakers immediately adjecent to the flat panel. Can anyone shed some light on the "rule of thumb" for front speaker location for Home theaters?

Hank,

There are a few methods to certainly adhere to in some degree, but often times it comes down to what works best in your room and often times that also means compromising. Not all of us are able to have a customizable room and so we are left to work around what we have in front of us....space, dimensions, etc etc.

I have had to make certain compromises when positioning and while there are certain rules of thumb what I have found best is to try and keep the speakers roughly at the same plane in front of you with the left and right being spread out far enough that you are getting a good forward soundstage, there are no magic numbers necessarily, but typically about 4-6 feet from your center is sufficient. Again, some people might have to keep them closer because of room logistics and such. If you are able to toe them in that also helps, around 5-degrees. It also depends on how far back you are sitting. I have found that if my speakers are 8 feet apart from one another, than sitting 10 feet from them is just about right. Also, if you can help it you want the speakers to be away from walls to the sides and back (again sometimes this is hard to do). My HT speakers are 3 feet from the rear wall and 18 inches from the side walls, but that's the farthest I can bring them from the sides without having them too close to each other.

[pixelthis]

I seem to remember from long ago (getting old) that for Hi Fi/Stereo the best location for front R/L speakers was a minimum of 12 feet of separation for best performance. Today I see pictures of Home Theater setups with what looks like R/L speakers immediately adjecent to the flat panel. Can anyone shed some light on the "rule of thumb" for front speaker location for Home theaters?
8 feet is what I always heard.
There has to be some "toe in" but not much, I like to have my speakers pointed right at me,
but thats just me.
As for the pictures of flat panels, they look good, you show em to the wife so you can get a flat panel AT ALL:sad:

[GMichael]

Why not get a 12 foot wide flat panel screen?

Sorry, seemed like the right thing to say at the time.

I've always used the equilateral triangle method.
Try to have them the same distance away from each other as they are from where you sit.
But there's more to it than that. Check those links from LJ. They are very helpful.