New house, buying new speakers, room size and current gear "issues" ... Help?

Hi everyone. I am moving into a new home and there is a room that is appx 13x13, with a 10 foot ceiling. I own the following gear:

Mcintosh: 462, C2600, Men220, MT-5 turntable, 8207 amp. TO THIS, I was going to add a processor, and an 85 inch TV, and use all the gear as a combo 2 channel/home theater rig.

The speakers I fell in love with, as per another post, were the B&W 802D3. I was planning to buy the matching center speaker, the HTM1, and add some in-ceiling for atmos, and in-wall for rears.

I will state that I can put this all in the open concept floor plan living room if need be, but the idea of THE ROOM, dedicated to the joy of music and movies, is much more in line with the home theater I am leaving behind in the old house.

SO, my question and parameters for answering:

The above gear is all new (save for the turntable which is a year old) and was bought to suit the living room scenario. It can't go back, I don't want it to go back, and if it means using the living room... so be it. So no gear changes.

SPEAKERS: Can I get the 802 and HTM1 for a room of that size, or is it a bad idea? I can do room treatment, and will. But are those speakers just OVERKILL?

I ask, because I want to buy long term speakers. Ones I will keep and enjoy for, say, 10+ years. Especially at this price! And we may not be in this house for more than 3-5, so I want to futureproof, without buying something that simply doesn't work for the space.

This "problem" all goes away if I use the living room... but I really don't want to.

Thoughts? Help? Ideas? Thank you all so much, in advance

 

All I can say is small square room is not bass friendly. You can get too much of certain bass freq due to room modes. That you might be able to solve by using a good av receiver that offer room optimization adjustment with a mic.

Also, in a small room, it is hard to move around the subwoofer/speakers to solve the bass null issues. That part is harder to solve as software can't solve room null.

Solving bass issue was the main reason why I moved out of my bedrooms to my living room.

 

Yeah, I understand that. I guess, that said, it's fair to say I'll give up some of the bass response of the 802's, but they may serve me better in the future or should I decide to put them in a larger space such as the living room...

 

you can put those speakers in that room just fine. a bit of acoustic treatment and youll be golden. I think treatment sounds far better than what dsp can do and isnt that hard.

 

I recently moved into a new home and am in a similar situation looking for new speakers. For 4-5 years I had my system in a 12x12x8 room and could never get large floorstand speaker to work in there, and I never tried anything near as large as your target.

If this was audio only, I would recommend trying the diagonal configuration for your speakers. With a large tv screen in there, I don't know bout this.

The one thing I know will help for sure is lots of bass trapping. It was the best thing I did in my square room to tame bass boom.

 

You will have at least a couple of issues to surmount if use the B&W 802D3s in a 13 x 13 room with an 85" TV between them.

1. The speakers will end up fairly close to the sidewalls to avoid overlapping the TV screen, and you'll have a reflective TV screen between the speakers. You may be able to work around this, but it will limit your ability to treat the room. You could eliminate the reflective, untreatable surface between the screens by using a ceiling projector with a rolldown screen, but that will probably be a more expensive option.

2. I expect that you will need a lot of diffusion, in addition to bass traps.

 

if small room kef reference 1. you can supplement it with a pair of rel or jl audio subs. ps. great gear you got. my goal is to get a mc462 next year. a c2600 would be the perfect preamp to get as well but my budget won't allow the matching preamp for quite a while longer. your room is similar to mine in terms of size so it'll be interesting to see how well your system winds up sounding.

 

Agree on the room treatments. A room of that size and shape will require them.

On the bright side, they can seemingly work miracles.

 

OK... GOOD NEWS! Wifey figured out a way to allow this all to go in the Living Room!! HUGE space, crisis averted! TY ALL for your ideas and suggestions Truly appreciated!

 

You'd better return the favor this Xmas then!