Bookshelf speakers on the bookself

Slipery99

Hi everyone,

First post here, although I have been browsing the websites for a couple of months. I recently got married and moved out into my own little 600 sqft apartment. I was pretty lucky at home with a nice Sony 52 inch, paradigm speakers, and a 15" Klipsch subwoofer, but now that I ventured out on my own I had to buy my own things. I just purchased my first set of Polk speakers for a decent price up here in Canada. I got a pair of mint RTI 6's and a PSW 111 for $250.

Here is my system so far:
Sony KDL40EX400
Sony STRDH520
2 RTI6's
PSW11
Mission 780( Surrond speakers in back)

I plan to add a CSIA6 and wallmount my TV at Christmas, but my main dilemma that I came here for help with are my Front L/R speakers.

I have an identical wall unit to this IKEA one, but in black: http://www.ikeafans.com/galleries/index.php?n=17925

While the wall unit is asthetically pleasing, it isn't exactly suited for home theatre. We did buy it with our wedding money though, so it is a bit hard to go back on the choice now.

The two options I have for my front speakers are to put them right beside the TV or put them on the 2nd lowest bookshelf and remove the 3rd lowest one. Both of these options aren't ideal as the RTI 6's are rear ported and I will get like a maximum of 5 inches of space behind them. If I put them on the shelf, I get to have my speakers at 7 or 8 feet apart, but then there is no space behind the speaker and it is walled in on almost all sides. I am about 8 feet away from the TV, so pretty similar distance from both speakers. I have a couch the comes about 15 inches from right bookshelf and my subwoofer is near wall on that side.

Any ideas?

I think because I don't have a center speaker right now that I am probably better off just placing them next to the TV, as far out from the wall as possible.

The last thing I have mentioned is: stands. I don't have the money to get some right now, but perhaps once I do the center speaker and I mount the TV then I can put them on stands? I am wondering what it would do to the sound to have the bookshelf as a backdrop rather then the wall. I guess it will depend on whether the bookshelf is empty or full.

Sorry for the long message, and thanks for the help.

HTguru1982

I think either option would work for the time being. But I would definitely opt for stands when the funds are available. I don't think you'll be sacrificing much in terms of performance. I've seen people mount these particular speakers on their wall without any problems. While it's true for most speakers that it's best to keep them away from the wall, I don't think that applies to the RTi6 since the port is in the front(correct me if I'm wrong). And since you have a sub, I imagine you'll be crossing everything over at 80hz so any possible change in bass performance should be minimum. The only thing you want to avoid is placing them on their sides.

Slipery99

Thank you very much for the advice. Seems like the way to go. I am excited to hook these up, just have to wait for my speaker wire to get here in a week Too expensive locally.

Slipery99

I just wanted to add... How can I find out if my receiver is capable of bi-amping the front speakers? By this I mean: I have the 4 binding posts on the back of the Rti 6's. So should I be able to hook up my extra 2 channels in my 7.1 system (only planning on running 5 channels), to the binding post to give my fronts some more juice? Not sure if I need this with my RTI 6's?

B Run

I wouldn't mess with bi-amping them honestly, but yes it's an option. Changing the brass jumpers out with speaker wire will help more than anything.

Slipery99

What would be the best way to do this? I have seen people using banana plugs, but I just have the wire in the binding post. Can I stick the second set of wires into the same hole and the pair of wires are touching? No experience with anything electrical Thanks.