Multi-room Audio systems are everywhere ... it seems to be the hottest sector out there right now. And one of the most important components of your system will be the speakers ... after all ... there will be at least 2 of them in every room. They are what you hear and what you see ... or try to hide.

For the Home Demonstration Project, PSB stepped up to the plate and provided us with their CustomSound Model 6.1R to mount in the ceiling. This round-mount model coaxially combines a 6.5-inch woofer and 1-inch aluminum-dome tweeter. The woofer uses a 6.5-inch polypropylene cone with rubber surround, and the neodymium-magnet tweeter is swivel-mounted to make it easy to adjust placement to cover the listening area as evenly as possible from off-axis locations in a wall.

Having the swivel-mounted tweeters is a must for most installations because it's almost impossible to find a position in each room that is ideal. With these speakers you have the ability to aim them towards the listening area that you feel is the most commonly occupied. 

For the installer, these speakers offer easy installation with a unique system that for me seemed to work very well. There is a split ring backing plate that slinks through the opening in the drywall and once in place it's a simple matter to screw the speaker home. The worst part of any ceiling speaker installation is cutting the hole and cleaning up the mess :-(

Once in place you can swivel the tweeters and get the sound where you want it. There are also high and mid-frequency equalization switches which allow you to tailor the balance of high and mid frequencies to your needs. A nice feature.

If you want to hide the speakers completely they come with paint shields and metal grills. This way you can exactly match them to the ceiling color and they disappear completely.

I can't tell you how great it is to have good quality sound wherever I go. When I was growing up my parents bought a home that had a radio system with speakers in several rooms. I thought that was awesome at the time but then again I also thought the sound in my basement bedroom ... where I mounted 7 speakers (scrounged from various places including the kitchen radio) in the walls ... was great too. In those days quantity ... not quality was my measuring tool. Just blasting the Beatles from all directions was good enough for me :-)

Now things are different and with digital sound reproduced through quality speakers it makes a room come to life. If you like music ... then why not have it everywhere? Multi-room audio systems are here to stay and while you can spend a fortune on speakers for a home theater ... that's not necessary with multi room systems. In-ceiling speakers located throughout the house add a new dimension to your environment.

Here are some specs etc. on the PSB speakers. Enjoy!