Placing In-Ceiling Speakers vs Ceiling Mounted Era 300s for Surrounds

Welcome!

The Era 300’s can only officially be mounted on a wall either on the side or rear of the seating area. By official I mean there is no approve ceiling application for mounting.

The other option is to use Era 300 stands on either side of seating area.

Also, in-ceiling speakers do not provide Dolby Atmos as do the Era 300’s.

Edit: Nice diagram but it’s difficult to determine where the TV is placed in reference to the seating area and walls. Sometimes a less detailed diagram is better. We just need a crude representation of walls and TV placement 😊

Thanks! I know there’s no official Sonos ceiling mount for the 300s but I did see that they now support upside down mounting in software so was hoping that that might make it a decent possibility. Ideally for aesthetics the In-Ceiling speakers would be better of course but I’m just curious on if anyone knows how they might sound with the modified placement of the left speaker (or bringing both speakers in equally).

Unfortunately floor stands aren’t an option so I’m limited to the ceiling.

Edit: updated the diagram to include the TV and rough couch placement! The diagram was the one from our electrician so it was what I easily had haha. Hope it’s a bit more clear now but can try and make a simpler one

I've never been impressed with ceiling speakers for other than background music. As surrounds the placement is suboptimal and you get no Atmos, something I really like.

Maybe in-wall speakers, still no Atmos but maybe a better position for surrounds.

If stands are not possible then the ceiling or wall mounted 300s would be my choice. I have two 300 Pairs well positioned and one very poorly positioned, all sound a lot better playing stereo than ceiling ones. The Atmos, even on the worst positioned ones is great to not-bad. Couldn't fit them in our TV room so we use 100s as surrounds, good but a BIG step down in surround and Atmos sound.

On a small screen so can't say much a out the drawing.

That definitely helps. Yeah I was really hoping for the 8” speakers as I thought those might be adequate enough but have been worried about the sound from the 6” - especially without perfect symmetrical placement or having them be too close to each other

Hearing horses running onto the rear of the sound stage, overhead is odd, helicopters there are fine. I'd find that first bit a lot more aggravation than slightly weak sound from the 6 inchers or minor placement issues.

You could add a two six inch ones to each channel. Three if you use the Sonos/Sonance ones.

Full Trueplay (supported Apple device required) might mitigate the placement issue.

Yeah I was definitely going to do the Sonos/Sonance speakers and TruePlay them if I went with the in-ceilings. When you say add two six inch to each channel what do you mean exactly? Can’t quite picture what you’re describing 

Yeah… ​@Stanley_4 what are you suggesting here? The mention of “three” has me confused as we are talking about surrounds.

The Amp can drive two conventional 8 Ohm speakers or three of the Sonos ones on each channel. You simply wire them in parallel on each channel. You get more sound (air moving) from the increased cone area, but a less precise sonic image, really not something ceiling speakers are good at anyway.

The trade is that in going with multiple speakers you'll not be driving the speakers as hard, keeping them in their optimum sound quality range instead of maxing out cone movement.

Bigger, well big enough, is better but multiple ssmaller are better than over-driven single small ones.

​@harperpeck 

Looking at your new diagram 😊 I see what you mean about the speakers being asymmetrical in placement. However if you don’t plan on re-arranging furniture (which is also a downside to in ceiling speakers) you could bring the in-ceiling speakers closer to the ends of the couch and 1 foot behind which could give you a better surround effect.

Yeah I considered that but I think we’ll also likely have some chairs around the right side and also something just mentally feels weird to me to not have the speakers centered around the TV even though I probably could get a bit of better sound by centering them around the couch positions. But furniture will likely move around so I think the safest bet is to center the soundstage around the center of the TV.

I guess at this point I really just need to decide if I should go with the in-ceilings having either the left one misaligned or pull the right one in to match - or ceiling mount Era 300s in my original spots (or really anywhere that would work best since electric isn’t installed yet)