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Do Speakers Need To Be Placed Away From Walls For Best Sound?

Howard Rodgers |

Speaker Placement

People ask us if our speakers need to be on stands or if they can be wall mounted or placed on shelves. Traditionally in stereo systems, it is usually better to place the speakers away from the wall on stands. This allows them to have depth and image better. If you're setting up a home theater system, but plan on doing a lot of stereo listening with just 2 speakers, it is probably best to set your left and right speakers away from the way.

However, if most of your listening will be done with your 5.1 system, it is OK to mount the front speakers close or on the wall. This is because your surround speakers will provide ambient sound, which seems to pull the sound out of the front speakers and place it in the room around you creating a 3 dimensional environment. Then, it becomes less important for the front speakers to have the depth of image since sound is now all around you.

The particular wall mounts we offer give the user the choice of mounting the speaker close to the wall or spacing it away from the wall using the included extension bar.The back and surround speakers can be wall-mounted or placed on stands, whichever is more convenient.

Our owner's manual has a section on speaker placement for 5.1 and 7.1 systems. We'd be happy to email you a copy. Feel free to ask for one. If you're not sure about where to place your speakers, we'd be happy to help you if you'd give us a call. Many of our customers email photos of their room, which helps us give you the best possible advice.