How much will 7.1 add to my movie-watching experience vs 5.1?

[vanderrg]

I currently have a 5.1 setup (RF-7 series) and have held off attempting to go 7.1 because I have no rear wall behind my seating (well...there's a wall there but it's 15 feet away). So I would have to have in-ceiling rears and have been concerned that in-ceiling speakers wouldn't be able to keep up with the rest of my system and would create a performance bottleneck of sorts (i.e. I don't want to have to worry about blowing them when cranking things up).

Anyway for those who have had both kinds of setups how much do those rear speakers add to the moviewatching experience? Do enough movies take advantage of them to where you are aware of sounds behind you?

Also my surround speakers are RS-7's so they are not direct radiating speakers ...since they don't produce sound localized to my right and left anyway would I get less of an additional sense of directional sound by adding the rears? In other words if my current surrounds are creating "ambient" sound that fills the room in a non-directional way, then how much sense would it make to add more speakers to the rear?

Any opinions are appreciated-

BV

[TheSoundBroker]

Having the rears does add a bit. For me, I choose 5.1 vs. 7.1 as a coverage issue more often than not, but given the choice, I'll go 7.1. With multiple rows of seats or a particularly difficult layout, 7.1 is less likely to give you holes in coverage. As for what speaker to use...you'll need to go to CDT-5800C's. They are the only in-ceiling speaker that actually will keep up with the rest of the system. Just make sure you roll them out at 60hz or higher and they'll thump. I've done a few bigger ref systems with them...they work great.

Adding monopoles in the back will give you a bit of a sense of direction to the surrounds...and that is not necessarily a bad thing to have a bit of localization...assuming the effect is on one channel or the other. Remember...you can always turn the level down a bit if necessary to balance them with your sides.

[popbumper]

Personal impression - I would say "little". I have an all Forte/Academy system, with KG 2's on either side at the rear. The problem is, there are very few movies that actually take advantage of the format, and when they do, there is little signal information at the rears, anyway. I would not say the difference is substantial, IMHO. I use it when available, but these are usually movies that have great soundtracks anyway, and the additional channels add little.

Chris

[gary r]

Back speakers are a plus.

[J.4knee]

The rear surround channels are rarely active in most movie sound tracks. I have a full on Heritage 6.1 rig and I can count on less than one hand the number of times the rear center was active. In multichannel music it is also very rare. I am not a very big fan of in ceiling speakers. If you must go with rear surrounds I'd get RS-7's or similar and hang them from the ceiling and angle them down slightly so they point at your seating position.

[JawjaBill]

I prefer the 7.1 setup because of the unconventional nature (shape/size) of my area. The 7.1 allows me to be not so fussy about speaker placement. As mentioned above, the is very little source material for 7.1 but I use Logic7 on everything that is not and I love it. The rear surrounds in my setup are RCW-5s.

[Buckeye_Nut]

Personal impression - I would say "little".

I have an all Forte/Academy system, with KG 2's on either side at the

rear. The problem is, there are very few movies that actually take

advantage of the format, and when they do, there is little signal

information at the rears, anyway. I would not say the difference is

substantial, IMHO. I use it when available, but these are usually

movies that have great soundtracks anyway, and the additional channels

add little.

Chris

Chris,

You might want to consider taking a closer look at your surround

processor because it sounds like yours isnt doing it's job very

well.

Most if not all 5.1 action movies that contain a lot of sound effects, should

translate very well into a 7.1 matrixed back soundfield. If yours isnt,

you have issues with your sound processing.

[CAS]

Regarding the previous mention of the CDT-5800c's, I would agree. I have the dicontinued RCR-5's (which are nearly identical to the 5800's, but the 5's have slightly better frequency response and sensitivity, however the 5800's have a directional woofer as well as the tweeter) and test tones to those will make the blinds shake. For anyone who doubts the abilities of a ceiling speaker, 2 eight inch drivers definitely get the job done.

[ottscay]

I would agree that you should check your surround processing. Since there is very little 6 or 7 channel material encoded (very, very little...), you will be matrix processing it (e.g. DD PLIIx) to get the 7.1 On my Arcam AVR-300 with 4 monopoles (rb-75s) it sounds awesome; the difference in say a jedi fighter panning across behind you is immediately noticeable, so it improves the experience fairly dramatically. With good dipoles in a house with a small area behind you with a less robust matrix processor...it might hardly be noticeable to go from 5.1 to 7.1.

Sorry, I really didn't answer your question at all! Good luck.

[toddvj]

If you have a back wall 15 ft. from your seating area, you should just get some tower speakers, or bookshelfs on stands, and place them a few feet back. I wish I had a room like yours. I sit right against the wall in my room.

[TheEAR]

In a very high quality system the two extra speakers/channels do add to form a better sourround effect.

I use side and back sourrounds and the sourround will truly sourround you.Not just hint at sourround sound. Even with no 7.1 source mall receivers and pre/pro's capable of 7.1 will emulate the two extra sourround channels.And in most cases this works great

I use tower speakers(RF7) fronts,(RF7) rear sourrounds (RF5's side sourrounds) all around save for the center(RC7).In a very small room,so small I have speakers under a meter away from me(sourrounds).

Needless to say the setup is a dynamic monster,and sounds better than anyone can imagine in such a tiny toom.

[Guest " "]

I went to 7.1 and think the jury is still out on this since there hasn't been much programing released at 7.1 yet.

[Buckeye_Nut]

You're missing the entire point. Whether or not DVDs are encoded

with 7 discrete channels is irrelevent to 7.1 surround.

That's why receivers have these things called sound processors, so that

they can process the sound into a matrixed 7.1 format[]

Many receivers do an excellent job at it too!! Just be sure not

to buy the same receiver as that guy who earlier in this thread

commented that his receiver does a bad processing job []

[vanderrg]

Thanks everyone.

The only prob with floorstanding or bookshelf speakers on stands a few feet back is that about 8 feet behind the seating is a pool table. If I put speakers where they would need to be on the floor then they would intrude into the area around the table needed to play. That would probably be the best sounding solution but I think it would cramp the table too much.

The suggestion of hanging some more RS-7's or some direct-radiating bookshelves from the ceiling and angling them downward intrigues me. Previously I had thought that ceiling speakers would be the only nice-looking possibility.

And while the opinions on the 5800c speakers on this thread have bolstered my confidence that the right ceiling speakers wouldn't let me down, I think it may be even look cooler to have the rears hanging down from the ceiling...or it may look sort of forced. It's hard for me to visualize.

The diverging opinion as to the improvement in sound going to 7.1 has lead me to do some work and just experiment. I have some B-2 bookshelves that I'm not using and I think I'll set them up behind the listening area just to get a feel for how active I can expect the rears to be...

[DrWho]

I currently have a 5.1 setup (RF-7 series) and

have held off attempting to go 7.1 because I have no rear wall behind

my seating (well...there's a wall there but it's 15 feet away). So I

would have to have in-ceiling rears and have been concerned that

in-ceiling speakers wouldn't be able to keep up with the rest of my

system and would create a performance bottleneck of sorts (i.e. I don't

want to have to worry about blowing them when cranking things

up)....

I assume you have the RS-7's for surrounds?

From what I understand of your situation I think your best bet would be

to get two pairs of RB-75's and cieling mount all of them...putting the

rear speakers the same distance from the listening position as the side

surrounds. A slightly cheaper alternative would be to keep the sides

the same and go with either RS-7 or RB-75 for the rears (try to get an

audition if you can). I think you should be able to use the same

mounting bracket for both speakers too, which would make it easy to do

swapping.

If you are concerned about a speaker hanging down into the middle of

the room then you might also consider building insets into your cieling

where the speakers would slip inbetween the cieling joists. I might

have to draw a picture to make it more clear.

Anyways, the reasoning behind 7.1 stems back to research done by Bell

Labs way back in the 70 's where they determined that 7 channels were

the bare minimum to achieve perfect 360 degree spatial imaging.

[popbumper]

OK, I lied (without knowing it), I admit it - I did a test the other night, putting in "Top Gun", and switching between DTS-ES and regular DTS. The difference was - uh, well, FAR more apparent than I had imagined; with the rears on I was swimming in sound, with them off it was not nearly as dramatic. I stand corrected!

Chris

[Frzninvt]

There is alot more content back there than people think. There are a number of DD-EX and DTS-ES DVD's out there that are discrete playback. I watch and listen to everything in 7.2, I don't have to resort to DPLIIx either. My NAD can upramp any DD 5.1 to DD-EX 7.1 which is a great feature, and non digital signals are run in Matrix 7.1. It's all good.

[Tom Adams]

My answer to this question is along the lines of what SoundBroker said. Personally, in my room which is 16' x 28', I have two rows of seating. The first row is 14' from the front wall. So, my logic was that the room needed 7.1. for adequate coverage for two rows. Now, had my room been say 18' deep and I had one row of seats, I'd have done 5.1 for I feel sure it would've been more than sufficient for that size room.

To me, a good 5.1. systems beats a so-so 7.1 system. And from what I visualize of your room, I'd vote for 5.1.

Tom

[Buckeye_Nut]

OK, I lied (without knowing it), I admit it

- I did a test the other night, putting in "Top Gun", and switching

between DTS-ES and regular DTS. The difference was - uh, well, FAR more

apparent than I had imagined; with the rears on I was swimming in

sound, with them off it was not nearly as dramatic. I stand corrected!

Chris

Top Gun has a DTS-ES version???

[popbumper]

Yes. Have you seen how several times, DVD's are packaged as "extended version, special edition", etc.? I had originally purchased the STANDARD widescreen Top Gun, until I saw the repackaging for the special edition - I believe in this case for the "anniversary" edition or something such. It's a very good rendering, and the additional sound track really adds!!

Chris

PS - if you can't find locally, let me know, I'll pick one up for you. You are in Ohio?