Speaker coverage basics: getting even sound in any space

The most common complaint about background music is not the music. It is that one table sits under a speaker while another hears nothing, so the volume gets pushed up until the loud spot becomes unbearable.

Spacing follows ceiling height

Ceiling speakers project in a cone. The higher the ceiling, the wider the cone at ear level and the further apart the speakers can sit. Low ceilings need more units spaced closer together, not fewer units turned up.

Things that quietly ruin coverage

• Hard surfaces: glass, polished concrete and tile lengthen reverb and blur detail.
• Open kitchens and coffee machines: background noise raises the level you need at the far end of the room.
• Retrofits: speakers placed where cable already runs, rather than where sound is needed.
• Undersized amplifiers: no headroom means distortion long before it gets loud.

Zone before you specify

Draw the zones first. Entrance, main floor, quiet corner, terrace and back of house all behave differently and want their own volume. Once the zones are agreed, speaker count, amplifier channels and cabling follow logically.

Araya surveys the space, plans coverage, installs the hardware and supports it afterwards, so curation and acoustics are solved together rather than by two suppliers blaming each other.