RoboKlipsch

Ported has only one downside which is that it is a larger box. If you read through say 30pages of svs's own forums eventually that would be the conclusion. properly integrated the pb is more capable. google the tests from Audioholics theres a big bump in performance ported.

Here was that chart. Note that there are angles shown here, that is really a critical starting point for setup. You can see why the couch needs to be forward. There is no way to have side surrounds where the surrounds are horizontal to your ears (or a little behind)...and have back surrounds. The back surrounds are denoting angles that should be used in order to optimize them....these angles are critical for that "sweep" we all seek out. Given the angles, they are a starting point, and because of your room limitations and other aesthetics you want, you won't follow this exactly, but give it a shot. Looking at the diagram and your setup, you may very well have those angles for the back surrounds correct. Mine are much further behind my couch (about 9 feet), so the angle comes out different in my room. You're on the track to awesomeness, take your time, don't get frustrated, if it gets annoying just stop for a day or so and do something else. The RP speakers are truly magnificent. You will be blown away and thrilled with what they do versus the Bose and Polk Inwalls. If you look back up at YOUTHMAN's photo of the back of his theater, he has 4 RS62s setup for surround duty. Yours will look something like his when complete. We haven't even discussed subwoofers, have we?

Congrats on getting the surrounds. Use the diagram that was provided earlier as a basic setup tutorial (Dolby's site, home theater, shows a 7.1 setup if you don't see it). The back surrounds likely need to be closer together. If you get some more speaker wire, you can lengthen those wires coming from the wall to move them wherever you want. I know it's a pain, we all have gone through this to get the setup we want. So you've noticed SOME improvement but not a lot. I would expect exactly that. The side surrounds at the ceiling is what is really killing it now. The back surrounds should be closer together (I think) but that's not likely the big problem. The Bose are too high up to give you the "sweeping" sound you want. Buy some cheap wire if you don't have it, and pull those bose off the wall, and add some wire and try out spots just above ear height. It will be night and day imo. Remember, you'll have the option to wall mount them all, or even use stands if you prefer or find that a location off the wall is a bit better. I think on the wall will work well for all of them. Speaker position/room layout Treatment to the first reflections Then final calibration You've got your awesome equipment on order, you just need to work on the setup The cheapest acoustic panels I have found made by pros came from -- http://www.mixmasteracoustics.com They are inexpensive, don't charge for delivery, and usually have a $25 off coupon for a first purchase. Acoustimac is another excellent source, as is GIK acoustics. If you want to build your own, I have other ideas for you. But for your first couple panels it makes sense to buy them and see what they should look, feel like etc. Acoustic treatment is a whole subject requiring a lot of discussion but the basic gist is, you need panels where reflections are strong. This tends to be from the front L, C and R speakers. So someone takes a mirror....yes a hand mirror, and holds it on the left wall roughly half-way between the central listening position, and the speaker itself. The mirror is moved until at the seated position, you "see" that speaker in the mirror. The mirror is at the reflection point for that speaker at that seat. You do this for the L, C and R speakers, and then note where they are on the walls. You can often cover all 3 speakers on the side with one 2x4 (foot) panel. Sometimes it takes 2 per side. You would do the same for the right side. Yes, you need a helper for this, you can't hold the mirror and sit at the same time. I use a light of some sort on the speaker to help make finding it easier in the mirror. The typical first reflection problem points are on the side walls, from the front speakers. In some rooms, in some setups, you need panels elsewhere. Because of how close you may sit to the back wall, panels on the back wall may help absorb reflections that are close (that back wall) and thereby reduce the "noise" and improve the clarity of all the speakers. So again a bit of legwork to discover what you may need is critical here. From that info you can see why finding the proper seating position and speaker position needs to be done first, then absorption can be done based upon the layout. it doesn't hurt to buy a few panels as you will definitely use them, but what color, what size, how many, are all easy to discern but take some work. I would recommend 4" panels if in the room there will only be a few, you cannot have too much 4" absorption (you can, but that's a ton of panels). 2" panels are a bit cheaper and will also work. The difference is how low it absorbs. At 2" panels, it goes down to roughly 250hz and a bit lower but the abosrption is low down below 250. a 4" panel will get you closer to 100hz, with a bit under that too. It's gonna work and work well. It is a bit frustrating moving things around I know, but it WILL work. Keep tweaking, as much as you can stand to listen and tweak the positions. They will dial in and quickly you'll say -- "THAT'S IT!" because it either sounds incredible, or you simply cannot improve it. Since you are going with on-walls, you'll have the ability to fine tune their position and even change it, as you modify your room. it's like so many things, you know a little bit about something, then you decide to look into making it better, and discover a whole world of acoustics, physics and a hobby that can suck up your free time even moreso than football

Well there are tradeoffs. On wall gives you a lot more flexibility especially when you aren't exactly sure where they should go. You can move them, you can toe them in, you can tile them up and down. That flexibility is nice. Also, mounting them is easy, typically putting them on a shelf or stand, or mounting using a bracket or keyhole mount. In wall looks a lot better, and gives you back that space where it sticks out say, a foot from the wall. So in your case, if you really don't want to move that couch forward say 3 feet, in walls for the backs is beneficial. BUT, you'll want to be sure you put them in the right spots...right height, right position left and right on the wall. Surrounds are important speakers. But they are not as important as the front speakers or center. You could keep using your polks, and they would likely work fine as long as their sensitivity isn't so low that they can't be calibrated with the fronts i.e., if those in walls have a sensitivity of say 85db, that might be an issue. At 90 or more, they are fine. Either way you want to test out positions. You put the speakers on boxes or a ladder or platform and try different heights and positions until they are right. The standards are a good starting point, but in every room you must test or you are risking a hit/miss situation where you may not like the result. Don't stress about it you can even use your existing in walls. If you are willing to move them it will produce big dividends. If you want different back surrounds that's fine too, whether in wall or on wall. What do you want? That's the question.

Timbre match on surrounds wont be an issue within klipsch. Its more a preference. If you are willing to replace the inwalls and move them then you wont have to compromise at all. In wall would be better but may limit your ability to toe and angle them which may be needed....or....test enough beforehand and go in wall again. Its very easy to find the right spots. I used a stack of boxes and moved them around to test....added removed a box to see it will be obvious.

B3 and a2 mock up. i think look ideal. But testing is required to be sure. It can be perfect or off totally depends on the room.

The bose should be unmounted and tested lower down. Ive used bose and surethey are not Klipsch. But rhey can keep up for testing purposes. Use the bose to find position then buy the rps and its golden. Rear surrounds are ok...in wall precludes tilting them down but rears will be ok like this. The sides will be amazing with them lower and the couch forward. I liked Insidious a lot good scares classic style

A2 b2 are roughly the spots for sides imo your mock ups make more sense now...and that position may work well too

Ok wait....are the in walls the back surrounds? If so this is gonna work out great. I was confused looking at the pictures

I would experiment with moving the couch forward and listening. 1 foot may not be enough. Establish where u need the seats to be then the rest will fall in line. What in wall surrounds do you have now? My first test position would be couch forward enough that the side surrounds are about 6inches to a foot behind my ears. Mock up looks great and is a good spot. Needs to be above your ears so it doesnt blast someone right in line with it. Bose is too high BUT when you move forward i bet they begin to come into play. Get the bose sounding right position wise then replace with rps or rbs Wait a false door...youre Batman? Arent u. Do i see a cape in there

my goal would be 7.1 and nothing less. i would not order anything i cant return until im sure what i want heres the gist. move that couch forward until it is parallel to or slightly in front of the side surrounds. try that. i would expect the improvement to be so big you wont even want to bother will exact back surround placement. your layout for 7.1 is almost spot on already. its the listening position that causes everything to be off 6 we are talking $0 ti fix this cool

thats fine...if u determine that there is a solution or a compromise that will still be close if not the same pretend for a moment u are single and have nobody ever coming over. find the spots then figure how to work it out in reality...but start by knowing what u really want layoutwise

i could walk you through it easily. first step is placement....decide where u can fit the surrounds and couch and optimize that first. trust me try some different positions you will get a huge smile on your face as u find better spots. the couch is more important here than the surrounds but both are important. a few panels will then vastly improve dialog and clarity. then calibration to dial it all in....1 2 3 ur done.

This is that height and couch being close to the wall. for testing purposes i would ignore how the room looks for a few days while testing couch and speaker positions. i myself put the surrounds on boxes and vary the height and position forward and back and honestly in a few hours you can find "the" spot or spots for them. then you decide how and if you can reallymake that work. Guessing will not get you to surround nirvana

at places along the side walls that absorb the reflections off the walls to make the sound much clearer

If i offered to ship 2 acoustic panels to every Klipsch member in the color they prefer for free and if they dont like them return them. ...i think 98% would keep them. They are that important.

Too close only if the l and r fronts cant both reach you directly....otherwise its ok. Sitting on a bean bag lowers you down even further re surrounds. Try them on stands or boxes to hear the differences. Transformers or even better....Gravitys first 20min is a great test of surround positioning. It is so pinpoint in surround it will tell u right away if the setup works well. Twister demos the surround sweep nicely too.

Tilting towards ears does help. Too high and you notice their location vs having a sweeping sound effect....also midbass can get bloated there....but it works.

JA is correct, really there are 2 easy ways to resolve this imo -- 1) You should have some acoustic panels at the first reflection points. That will solve this issue - period You are getting reflections off the walls and there's no real way to make them go away except to reduce them below a threshold where you hear them. Panels do just that. One panel on the left, one on the right, hopefully placed such that they can cover the L C and R positions. 2) Autocalibration programs read the room and then try and adjust the sound for them. Audyssey, YPAO, Trinnov DRC and so forth all are technologies that will do this. It's not the same as #1, but works well enough it often solves exactly what you don't like without having to add panels. The speakers themselves are fine, the issue, as always, is the room they are in. Great that you asked the question because it would be easy to think you need different speakers, and that IS a solution but not a good one. Instead, you want to tame those highs. Think of it this way. The speaker is doing everything right. But when that tweeter bounces off the wall, it is reflecting back and adding to the volume you hear from the tweeters. By reducing that reflection, you reduce the tweeter volume, and bring things back where they should be. 3) Toeing in the speakers more can sometimes help. Since they are reflecting off walls, toeing them in can reduce those reflections some. 3 ideas to help. It is not the speakers!

Two comments -- 1) Near ceiling placement is problematic for several reasons, but the gist is, you should mount them much lower than you are showing. I know at first it seems like it may screw up the room, but it won't. They can be blended into the furnishings on the wall but lower...preferably from just above ear height to no more than a couple feet above ear height...and preferably at least a foo from the ceiling. This is not even as important as -- 2) the couch at the back wall needs to come forward. Everything...the fronts, the surrounds, the bass, the calibration, will be tremendously improved with the couch 2 feet off the back wall. 1 foot is OK, 3 feet is better, but on that back wall will cause enough problems you won't get what you hope for out of it. LOL that's a ghostbusters pack on the wall, isn't it?

if in good shape the rs62s would be worth that alone...gl

Cool don't upgrade for that price difference, the 440C will be awesome. Crossover just means....where do the speakers trade off duties with each other? When does the subwoofer stop playing and give up the job to the main speakers? 120hz. The room is the limiting factor in almost every home setup, the room makes the speakers sound really bad, unless care is taken. Lots of people try and upgrade their speakers because their rooms sound bad. The subwoofer is free to roam around the room and make the low end sound as good as possible in a given room. So placing the sub is really a matter of where it sounds best (hopefully, assuming you have flexibility). A test tone should sound consistent without a lot of swings up and down in volume...in that main seat, and if you're lucky, in the seats left and right too. THAT is the right spot for the sub. So now the sub is placed. How do you know where to cross that sub over with the mains? Well, it should be where it sounds best! So, set it to 80hz, play a test tone, see if it sounds consistent. Try 100hz. Then try music you know. "best" is usually "consistent" in the most basic setup terms (imo). Set the fronts to small, the subwoofer crossover frequency knob on the back all the way up to max (so the AVR controls it), and experiment. It's fun and cool to find better spots for the front speakers and the subwoofer. The sub is really key, find that spot and you'll be in HT heaven.

Blended perfectly...which isn't all that hard to do....a subwoofer will make music sound much, much fuller. You should not be able to even locate where it is when you are listening, it should sound seamless with the fronts and the wife should love that because all her music will sound better. For theater, there's a huge amount of content that comes in below 50hz, which is where I'm guessing the bookshelves begin to fall off These sounds will be much louder with a lot of impact, and are often what the significant others complain about. Size mostly determines how low it can play. Any sub would improve that setup because the bookshelves are not designed to cover the full range no matter which they may be. Want to get a completely capable sub for about $300 or less, you can get a used SVS (Derrick mentioned above) or even a really nice DIY sub with a built-in amp -- one you could build, or buy used in the local market easily. They come up all the time, everywhere. ANY sub will improve bookshelves, certainly anything from Klipsch. So if you want to start small or inexpensive, or both, a used Klipsch would be great, and cheap.

Welcome to the forum! I had a similar starting setup. AVR is plenty strong, Klispch doesn't need much. Those numbers are just the rated wattage i.e. what they are capable of 440C is a great center, much better than the R25C that would have matched the 26fs. If it's not a big price bump, I would grab a 450C personally, but would be very happy with a 440C also. With a sub the fronts should almost always be set to small, and then that let's the sub handle everything from the crossover down. The crossover can be set to a lot of different Hz but I think you will find -- listening -- that either 80 or 100hz will be best, possibly even 120hz. Some people, especially friends i know that love rock music, will run their fronts LARGE (full range) and the sub. There's a choice on the menu for this. WIth one sub there is a possibility you will like this better. Setting up a sub is very different if you set the fronts to large or small. Where you place it, how high to set the gain, and even the sub crossover are different Listen, enjoy, and your ears are the ultimate judge. Enjoy the speakers.

I completely agree with Willand that I noticed the difference instantly and even at lower volume. Good luck it should be fun to implement.