Decide where you will place your furniture, especially the chairs or sofa from which you will do most of your movie viewing. Position your speakers in relation to this arrangement. Speaker placement will be done according to your furniture arrangement, so make sure it suits your lifestyle and you plan to keep it.
Measure the height of your furniture with you sitting on it. You will want to place the main surround speakers at your ear level on the right and the left side of your room.
Set the Dolby rear speakers behind you; offset from the center at about a 150-degree angle from the center of the television screen. This placement will really give you the ambiance of being there when the music or action starts in the movie.
Experiment with the subwoofer before tying down the speaker wires for your home theater. Subwoofers provide great sound from corners, but you may get better sound by placing it in the middle of a wall, depending on how your room is shaped. Subwoofers can go anywhere in the room to produce the deepest bass sounds.
Put the central speaker directly above your television in line with the front of your seat.
Make sure all the speakers are equal distance from your seat to take advantage of your home theater system.