Connecting 2 pairs of surround speakers

[Nexarone]

A typical 5.1 channel home theatre setup would consist of a pair of front
speakers, a centre, a pair of surrounds and a sub woofer. The surrounds are
usually placed at ear level on each side of the sitting position.

My home theatre has two rows of seats. I would like to place a pair of
surround on each side of each row of seats. Is this arrangement necessary?
If this is a good arrangement, can I simply connect the surrounds in
parallel? My concern is my amp might not have enough power to drive the
four surrounds.

My amp is a Yamaha DSP-A2. The spec for the surround output as lifted from
the manual is "100W + 100W (8ohm) RMS Output, Power, 0.02% THD, 20-20000
Hz". I have a pair of VAF DC-2 surrounds. Its spec is 20-80W (4ohm) RMS
Output, 48-20000 Hz. The extra pair of surround I have is PolkAudio M3,
20-100W (8ohm), 60-20000 Hz. I intend to use this as the second pair of
surrounds.

What are the alternative arrangements? Perhaps positioning a pair of
surrounds at the back of the room would suffix?


Thanks
Chong

[SA000584]

A typical 5.1 channel home theatre setup would consist of a pair of front
speakers, a centre, a pair of surrounds and a sub woofer. The surrounds are
usually placed at ear level on each side of the sitting position.

My home theatre has two rows of seats. I would like to place a pair of
surround on each side of each row of seats. Is this arrangement necessary?
If this is a good arrangement, can I simply connect the surrounds in
parallel? My concern is my amp might not have enough power to drive the
four surrounds.

My amp is a Yamaha DSP-A2. The spec for the surround output as lifted from
the manual is "100W + 100W (8ohm) RMS Output, Power, 0.02% THD, 20-20000
Hz". I have a pair of VAF DC-2 surrounds. Its spec is 20-80W (4ohm) RMS
Output, 48-20000 Hz. The extra pair of surround I have is PolkAudio M3,
20-100W (8ohm), 60-20000 Hz. I intend to use this as the second pair of
surrounds.

What are the alternative arrangements? Perhaps positioning a pair of
surrounds at the back of the room would suffix?

Thanks
Chong

Hi Chong

Companies provide different advice on where to position your surround speakers. Some manufacturers tell you to position the surround speakers half a metre higher than ear level and just behind the seating position. Others tell you to do what you have just described.

If you have only two rows in your home theatre I dont think you need the extra speakers. Place the one set of speakers pointing at your second row, you may want to experiement whether what height you place them at.

You may want to keep these second set of speakers for when you upgrade you receiver to one that is 7.1. This will allow you to place the extra speakers on the back wall of your home theatre.

BTW where were you thinking to connect these two speakers on your receiver?? If you connect these to the existing surround connections on your receiver you could risk blowing your receiver up, as you are using speakers with different impendence levels eg 8 and 4, which will increase the power output from your receiver. If you were going to use two sets of surround speakers connected to the same one speaker terminal on your receiver you would need to get speakers with an impedence of 16.

[Nexarone]

Hi SA000584,

> BTW where were you thinking to connect these two speakers on your
> receiver?? If you connect these to the existing surround connections on
> your receiver you could risk blowing your receiver up, as you are using
> speakers with different impendence levels eg 8 and 4, which will
> increase the power output from your receiver. If you were going to use
> two sets of surround speakers connected to the same one speaker
> terminal on your receiver you would need to get speakers with an
> impedence of 16.

I was thinking of a pair of surrounds per channel connected in parallel. I
will take your advise and stick with just a pair of speakers. Just aint
worth buying another 2 pairs of 16 ohm speakers or risk blowing up my
receiver. Your input is much appreciated.

Chong

[SA000584]

Another option would be to buy dipole surround speakers and sell your other speakers. This will diffuse the sound. George Lucas THX specification actually advises the use of dipole speakers as the sound of flybys etc are not supposed to be a localised sound from one direction, the sound should appear to come from every direction. Surround dipole speakers help this to be achieved.

Very nice receiver. I noticed that the receiver has 2 front effects channels, which are very rare. Receiver seems to good to upgrade it for a 7.1 receiver (2 side surround and 2 rear surround speakers), however you may consider it to get the most out of the speakers you already have.

May want to read article on dipole speakers
http://www.hometheatersound.com/features/cinemacynergy/cc_20030801.htm