Center channel as LCR

[Brad1138]

For surround sound, I am of the belief that using competent center channel spks on stands at every (floor) location is the best practical option. You generally can't use large "main" spks as center or surrounds, and you don't want anything less than a center (like a bookshelf spk) for the center position.

I run 5 Mirage MCsi center channel spks for LCR and side surrounds in my 7.2.4 setup (long story on why I have 5 of those). The rear surrounds are Mirage also, but a different model. I love having the same speaker in those locations, I would never go back to having different speakers, especially for LCR. Many speakers have "matching" (yet different), center speakers, but they don't really match all that well tonally.

I am curious on others thoughts about using center channels like this.

 

[LightninBoy]

In general, I think its a bad idea. The typical center channel is highly compromised to fit neatly and discretely under a TV. I wouldn't want to put that compromised design at all speaker positions. To be honest, the typical center channel (the 2-way type) is so fundamentally flawed, I wouldn't even use it as a center channel. Ironically, many of them are better suited to be vertically oriented and used as mains. Also, the typical bookshelf speaker performs better than the typical center channel speaker.

Note I am heavily using the words "in general" and "typical". I'm sure there a few examples of center channels where using them for all positions would be fine. But I don't think there is any case where it would be optimal.

 

[kyuu]

The typical center channel is only "compromised" in that it's an MTM configuration laid on its side when that configuration works best vertically. So yeah, they actually are better as mains or really any other position than center. Of course, for the center channel you have the competing goals of good power handling, which MTM excels at, while needing to fit in a vertically restricted space. 3-ways are ideal, but that generally results in a speaker that is too large and expensive for many situations. So, horizontal MTM it often is.

The drawbacks of this arrangement are overstated for most use cases, I feel, since a decent design will have at least a 40-degree window where the lobing isn't an issue. At typical distances of around 3 meters, there shouldn't be any issue for the main listening position as well as the positions to either side. For those outside that window, they're going to have other issues besides the lobing, like being much closer to one of the main speakers than the other and probably being quite close to a boundary as well.

So long story short, I agree that using MTMs all around is an underrated strategy for those who aren't going full floorstander. Small 5-6" single woofer bookshelves don't generally have enough power handling (distortion at high SPLs) for far-field listening, I feel.