Sonance architectural

Understood. I’m just agreeing with the others that these speakers will sound, I suspect, wildly different installed than when you ‘test’ them on a bench. Unfair, IMHO, to judge them before they’re installed. 

Hi

Below is a link to an article I posted. You may find it interesting.  Your installation may require a “speaker box enclosure” judging from the picture submitted. 🤔 FYI, your situation is the perfect time to engage a professional installer.

If the speaker requirement is that they sound good on your bench, buy finished, enclosed speakers that will test good on your bench, then figure out a way to place them in the ceiling. Note that this scheme will not support SONOS Trueplay.

Unless you can negotiate an exception to the laws of physics, a raw speaker driver playing on a counter will not have any significant bass.

Again I suggest that you read about speaker enclosure design. In the first few paragraphs the article will show why your test scheme is having issues with bass.

With that open area I’d sure go with a speaker basket, first for better sound and second to reduce the sound leaking into other spaces that share the open area.

Do you have a link to this article?

Search for “speaker enclosure design”. There are many, some will be scary technical. Pick one that is at your comfort level. The main takeaway should be that an unmounted woofer delivers very little bass.

thank you