Are ceiling speakers for home theater any good?

[flow]

I need to decide where to place the speakers for my home theater system (being pre-wired). Currently, the plan is to have all the speakers in the ceiling for aesthetics. Is this any good? Or should I have the wires pulled so that they come out of the wall.

Thanks for the advice.

[Worf101]

You can have ceiling mounts put in AND have speaker output jacks strategically placed along the walls. They usually come in white with a brass or gold red and black receptacle on each. If you're in the process of building and/or puttin in the walls you can easily have the wire run and the plates put in anywhere you think you MIGHT want some speakers put.

Da Worfster

[Zomby]

I used ceiling mounted speakers for my rears only. Floor speakers for my mains/center. I used SpeakerCraft CSR 8.1 and am very impressed with the sound. It took a good amount of set up of the audio levels in my receiver and playing with the directional tweeter to get the sound balanced between all speakers, but after all of it, it sounds great.

Zomby

[brian_tr]

A friend of mine has five Paradigm speakers mounted in his ceiling. They sound real good.

[poneal]

A coworker of mine has boston acoustic ceiling speakers for all speakers and I think it sounds very good. And you can't really even notice them unless you know where to look. So I think you will be fine with in ceiling speakers. My coworker said that he put a piece of plywood over the rafters in the attic to keep bugs, critters, and insulation out of that area where the speaker was placed.

[Sir Terrence the Terrible]

Ceiling speakers for hometheater is a huge mistake gentlemen. Our directional capabilities are very limited in the vertical plane. That is why man doesn't travel up and down. We hear excellently in the horizontal plane which is why we walk across the ground. Ceiling mounted speakers compromise imaging because of head related transfer distortions caused by the shape of our heads. This is why EVERY speaker designer and manufacturers recommends the tweeters at ear level. Have you ever tried to ascertain the direction of an airplane flying overhead? It is very difficult as it would be trying to hear a sound effect travel from channel to channel via ceiling mounted speakers.

Unless these speakers are reproducing background music, and are not intended for critical listening, I would recommend them. If they are to serve at the primary speakers in a hometheater setup, I would recommend againist such speakers.

[AVMASTER]

the only ceiling speakers for a home theater system should be directional, i.e pivoting drivers so that they may be aimed towards the seating area; and this is only if there is no other choice. We typically use Niles DS series or Speakercraft AIM series for the surrounds but rarely for all channels. If you don't won't to see speakers try in-walls or small sats mounted to the ceiling and angled downwards