When I was a young lad, I remember the first tape deck that I got that had Dolby B and Dolby C NR [Teac V-350C]. Dolby C was for the cool kids. Eventually the idea of ‘home theater’ came into existence, and with it Dolby Surround and Dolby Prologic. They took the standard stereo sound track and expanded it into front and rear surround using DSP (sorta 4.0). It seemed like magic. Along came the ever awesome Laserdisc with support for AC-3 5.1. That AC-3 (Dolby Digital) is still in use today on every Blu-ray. The enthusiast with the ear for the finer things might remember DTS, which is the early days required a laserdisc to offer either DTS or AC-3, but not both.

Fast forward 30 years.

I need to figure out speaker and speaker wire placement for the room in our new house that will have a TV. I’m not big into watching TV these days, but having it sound in a way that doesn’t suck is worthwhile. This isn’t for music either.

What is the current cool audio surround format? It seems like Dolby Atmos is probably the most interesting. It can support anything from 2.0 to 24.2.12. I’m thinking about wiring for 7.1.4 (more or less 11.1). This seems like a good compromise supporting some in ceiling speakers. If I need more than 12 speakers, I’ll just have to miss out. Thoughts?