Speaking out

To get the best out of your system, the speaker arrangement is crucial. It depends on the room layout, the reflecting surfaces and listener position. Big speakers and sub-woofers can be placed almost anywhere.

But the small ones need accurate positioning. The wrong place to keep them would be near ceiling level and on side walls. Instead, place them in front of you and close to the floor. "The ground reinforces the bass. And the back walls reinforce frequencies above that," says Koshy. The speakers should be four to 10 ft apart. The sweet spot, where both speakers align and optimum sound is heard, should coincide with the position where the listener is usually seated. This process is called imaging. The two speaker and the listener position should form an equilateral triangle.

That is, the distance between the speakers should be equal to their distance from the listener. For a home theatre system, the third speaker should be kept either below or just above the television screen. The impression should be that the sound is coming from the centre of the television screen. For that, the centre speaker should also form an equilateral triangle with the main speakers. "I should not hear my speaker, just the singer or the band playing. That is what good music is all about," says Koshy. And good placement is essential if you want to be in the middle of all the action.