Originally Posted by
HCSGuy
I’ll give you a few of my opinions, and you can use them, or don’t. First, I also cook a lot, and have a pair of in-ceiling speakers in my Kitchen, though mine are sealed can Triads with a 5.25” woofer. In general, an open baffle, conventional in-ceiling speaker will go lower in the bass region, as it has your entire attic as an enclosure - expect a sealed can speaker to start rolling off at 80hz or so, as they generally have smaller back cans than the engineers would like. Having installed AV systems into many, many homes over the last 25yrs, I have never had an issue with open baffle speakers leaking sound into adjacent rooms, as long as you restrict their use to top floor rooms - don’t ever use them between floors (e.g. in the first floor ceiling of a two floor home). You can pile up insulation over them to keep R value. There are reasons to use sealed can speakers relating to huge temperature differentials and condensation, but you’re not going to experience them in Palo Alto.
Second, If there’s a room I do a lot of listening in, I prefer a horizontally dispersing speaker over a down-firing one. I don’t know where you are in your remodel, but if you can move your Radio shack speakers into the middle of the room and re-mount them facing down, listen to them and see if you’re OK with how they sound. In general, downward firing speakers are background music only for us. However, I realize that finding open wall space for an in-wall speaker (Which generally does need to be a sealed back-box unit, as walls are almost always shared with another room) is tough. I couldn’t do it in my Kitchen, though I could have gone really old school and put a pair of bookshelf speakers on top of the cabinets, but figured that as a pro, I’d get judged harshly for that.
I have used the James speakers that Widget recommends, and like them, with two conditions. First, since they are not serviceable from the interior of the home, if something happens to them you have to either remove Sheetrock, or get them out from the backside - because you have an open attic, you’re OK. Second, make sure whatever distributed audio system you are using has EQ, or at least tone controls, so you can adjust the bass to your preference. They are a very high end solution for a client who really doesn’t want to see the speakers - that may be you, or may not be.
Lastly, we have done a few unconventional systems over the years as well. If you really have to have in-ceiling speakers, consider small in-ceiling speakers, but 4 of them, so they cover the room better. Triad and KEF both make small in-ceiling speakers with 4” (or smaller) woofers that sound good, though they have no bass at any significant volume level. Then put a subwoofer somewhere in the room - it doesn’t have to be a fancy one. Kitchens tend to have lots of empty space above cabinetry - get two 8” subwoofer drivers and a subwoofer amp from Parts-express, and build a subwoofer that has the two drivers facing away from each other. This way they cancel out each others’ vibrations, and the china in the cabinet doesn’t rattle.
Hope this helps…
