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In-ceiling: Am I wasting my money?

Hi everyone:

Bought and moved into a new home. The builder has in-ceiling speakers installed in the living room. There are 5 speakers, but I have no interest in using them for HT -  just for music. They appear to be 8" Monoprice speakers, I have no additional details on them.

For the short term, I'm thinking of picking up a Sonos: Amp since I'm already invested in that ecosystem. I can use that to drive 4 of the speakers by hooking them up in parallel.

Now, here's the big question - I was toying with the idea of picking up a 200 watt/chan McIntosh integrated amp and replacing the Monoprice speakers with four higher quality in-ceiling speakers - perhaps something like the B&O 10" Celestial (BOC106) which are really made by Origin Acoustics (but with prettier covers).

So - am I wasting my money by doing this and I'm better off just sticking with the Sonos Amp and maybe upgrading (or keeping) the speakers to something better but not as expensive? Or... full speed ahead?

Note / extra info: Unfortunately, the layout of the room and the decor in it has ruled out a floor-standing or in-wall system... so I'm trying to keep this to an in-ceiling system. The living room ceiling is about 14' high and flat.

Thanks.
eisenb11
eisenb11 OP
33 posts
 
Thanks Erik, oops - just to clarify: Sonos' recommendation for 4x 8 Ohm speakers is to wire 2 each to each of the Amp terminals. So 2 speakers in parallel to the right and 2 in parallel to the left.

Sounds like the consensus is that that in-ceiling speakers are totally no-beuno (surprised because there are a bunch of $$$expensive$$$ ones out there!) for good music.

Unless I hear otherwise - sounds like best bet is to plunk the $500 on the Sonos and move on!
rocray's avatar
rocray
1,448 posts
 
I agree with the above posts. Background music,not serious listening,so why spend serious money?
erik_squires
16,898 posts
 
I'm not saying there aren't degrees of quality in in-wall or in-ceiling speakers, but given they are background music devices, investing in a boutique stereo amp is not going to serve you well.

Loudness or bass and treble controls though, may be ideal. :)
tuberist
953 posts
 
ceiling=background music. I liked the elevators comment. No I wouldn't spend money trying to improve ceiling mounts....but only your opinion matters, it's your money, spend how you like.
jetson
140 posts
 
I had my main rig in the living room and brought music into my kitchen using an AudioSource 100 amp( 50 watts x 2 into 8 ohms or 60 watts into 4 ohms)[$140] and ran it a LONG way (guessing 75-100 feet) to some in-ceiling speakers with adjustable tweeters, like Klipsch CDT-5650-C II or  Polk Audio RC80i [$100-150 each] wired in parallel using 10 ga landscape stranded lighting wire [about $0.80 /foot].

It provided good (better than expected) background music for an all in cost ~$800
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