Home theater speakers are definitely a bigger contributor to the overall audio performance of a home theater system than the home theater receiver, and may well end up the most expensive part of your home theater audio/video component system. If you've got a certain amount of cash budgeted to purchasing a surround sound receiver and speaker system, you're usually best off allocating AT LEAST HALF of your receiver + speakers budget to the speakers.

A complete home theater speaker system requires 6 to 8 speakers for properly setting up a 5.1 or 7.1 channel surround sound system. If your system will include a Blu-ray Disc player and you've got a large enough room to work with, you should definitely lean towards setting up a 7.1 surround sound speaker system. That being said, we've got nothing against (starting with) a nice 5.1 surround sound system. Most home theater receivers on the market today are ready for at least 7.1 channel surround speakers, but do a fantastic job handling 5.1 speaker systems.

Speaker placement A 5.1 channel surround sound speaker system includes five "voice-matched" speakers plus a powered subwoofer (the .1) to provide low frequency bass effects. The front left and right speakers are typically located to each side of your television or projection screen and the center channel speaker (used primarily for dialog) is usually placed directly above or below your screen (or behind a perforated front projection screen). The two surround speakers generally sound best to the left and right sides of your home theater seating area. 7.1 surround sound adds a pair of rear effects speakers. The .1 subwoofer usually sits on the floor and can be "hidden" virtually anywhere in the same room, but you should experiment with sub placement and settings before deciding on its permanent location. .2 adds an additional subwoofer.

Speaker types There are several different types of speakers used for home theater surround sound. Tall floor standing "tower" speakers are often used as main left and right speakers, because they can deliver the widest frequency range for both movies and music, and they look nice placed on the floor to the sides of a television -- just be sure that the speakers are magnetically-shielded.

Smaller "bookshelf" speakers are convenient for placing on top of shelves in your entertainment center. The obvious advantage to bookshelf speakers is that they take up less space than floorstanding speakers while still being able to accurately reproduce the highest and midrange audio frequencies, although they usually lack the deeper bass response of tower speakers.

Instead of classic floor standing and bookshelf speakers, many people today are choosing to install a much more compact "invisible" speaker system with tiny "satellite" speakers that can easily be "hidden" when mounted on the walls or ceiling.

Or a multi-channel "sound bar" speaker that can be wall-mounted below a flat panel television.

If you are lucky enough to be building a dedicated home theater room in new construction, you should definitely consider installing in-wall speakers and/or in-ceiling speakers.

Any time you run speaker wires through walls, the ceiling, or floor, you should have a qualified electrician pre-wire with CL2/CL3 rated in-wall speaker cable or other cable that meets or exceed local wiring code! Depending on your particular situation, you may also need to invest in some speaker mounts or floor stands.