Home Theatre Setup

Hi All,

I've finally settled in a permanent location and hoping for some advice on building a sound system for the living room, with the goal of ultimately putting together something that can be used as a 5.1 system too. I took a visit to the B&O store, which suggested that the below might work well:

TV: Beovision 11 - 46 or 55
Fronts: BL18 or BL20 or BL5
Rears: BL17 or BL3
Sub: BL19

I would greatly appreciate any advice on the above combinations, particularly the BL5 and BL3 as I wouldn't have a chance of hearing them in person. Or if there are any other products which you think might be a better fit. I appreciate that the options for the fronts are at quite different pricing levels, but I guess the question is more around if you were building a system, would you spend the extra $$$ on the BL5 vs the BL18, and are there any issues given the BL5's are no longer produced?

I was also advised at the store that if I were to run a projector, I would need a Beosystem 4 to run the setup, but would love to confirm if this was true.

Thanks a lot in advanced!

 Best,
Jayson 

If it were me, I’d take a BL 5 over BL 18. Also, BL2 is a better sub for movies than BL 19 IMHO. It is pretty easy to find BL2.

Do you have any space or wife restriction? What's the size of the room?

If you go bl5 or bl20 you don’t need a sub. All are great speakers but bl5 over everything. 2nd for me is bl18+sub because it looks som much better and sound is fairly comparable to bl20’s.

As rears 17’s or 18’s all day long if it’s a bigger space, but in a smaller space 3’s are great too.

How big is the space and does it open up to anything else? As in what’s the total amount of continous area?

Also if you can, and want a bv11, go with a 55”.

I would only go for a projector, if it is a dedicated movie room and you have another room, another possibility for having an everyday tv).

For an ’all-in-one’ experience with tv viewing etc and movies, I’d go for a bigger tv....as Miki suggests a BV11-55 (or an Avant55).

If possible even bigger (an Eclipse 65).

Same thoughts about the sub - when sub then the BL19.

In a movie only room you could go for a BL2 or even better two of them - but they can be hard to tame....depending on your room.

As Miki wrote - with BL5/20 you won’t need the sub.

MM

Got it, thanks Jaffrey!

Sorry hit enter too quickly.

Thanks a lot Miki and Millemissen for your advice!

It's basically a warehouse conversion with an open living space of about 8m x 6m, the front 4m x 6m is where the tv and speakers will go, with the rear 4m x 6m housing the kitchen and dining area. If that changes anything?

yes that changes it massively, there is too much volume too fill/too much volume for the amount of sound energy created by smaller speakers to keep the pressure levels up. They could still sound good, don't get me wrong, but they will have a very hard time sounding imposing or big. So for a space that big go with lab 5's all day long and 17's rear, they'll have a much easier time of making it sound good and you don't have to crank them so much, aka you'll have some headroom. 

on which axis will everything go? will the 6 meter wide bit have the screen(so front to back speakers will be 4 meters?) or will the 4 meter wide bit hold the screen (so front to back speakers is 6 meters)? My livingroom is about 6.5 meters front to rear speakers and I recently went from 5.x to 7.x and it made a huge difference in sound as my couch is more or less in the middle of that space. So my thinking was that nowadays 4x lab 3's are roughly equal in price to 2x 17's so that would also be an option and maybe even the superior option (of course you could also go 4x lab 17's lol) to go with especially for mostly movies.

 

Just some thoughts, could you maybe send/show a picture of the space so we can see and be more helpful?

btw, how high is the ceiling?

In my old house I used to run the "Classic" Beoliving setup with a Besosystem3 with BV4 50, a motorized screen with a JVC HD1 and BL5, BL7-4 and BL3. Viewing distance to the screen was probably 3,5m. The 50 inch screen is a little bit small to my taste especially with HD content. 

The biggest issue was the performance of the center to keep up with the BL5. I tried a couple of different setups, 7-1, BL3, BL4000. The BL 7-4 in my setup had the least "hole" in the sound experience. 

An other drawback these days is the missing room correction which is in most receivers today. If your room is not perfect (and this might be true for most of us) the can make a big difference.

For a dedicated home cinema I see to many issues with B&O today, but for casual viewing and not a die hard sound geek this is OK.

Thanks Miki.

The 6m wide bit will have the screen and front to back speakers will be about 4m. I'm actually hoping to use it more for music than movies to be honest, but still nice to have some surround sound for movies when it happens. I'm no audiophile though but appreciate a good sound!

Definitely, pictures of the space attached. Apologies, I'm not the best at taking photos.

Ceiling is on a slant with the lowest point about 2.7m high (TV side) to the highest point about 4.7m high (dining side).

Thanks so much again!

https

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Sorry not sure why the photos are not embedding, but attached are the links.

https://imgur.com/1MSU1e2

https://imgur.com/LGipGyq

Jayson234,

 

it's a very nice space and if it's music you're after than bl5's are true gems especially in a big space like that. personally I think bl20's sit too low and I would advise that you mount the rear speakers up high, you seem to have the spaces for it. One thing that slightly worries me is the fireplace, how often is it on? and or how close do you envision a bl5 being next to it?

In your case I would go for 2 Beolab 5s. Certainly if you will listen a lot to music. I wouldn’t go for surround speakers in that space. By contrast, that wall deserves a big screen to be mounted. There are some nice screens at reasonable prices these days. Good luck.