Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Home Theater 4.0 sound

I'm finally replacing my sound (and TV-HD upgrade) system. I anticipate about 70% music, 30% home theater. I'm thinking of going with the M60's or M80. I'm not too much into the home theater experience but might occationally want to experience a bit of surround sound. Is it practicle to add just two rear speakers (for a total of 4)? Would I be missing any sound signals when watching DVD's or TV? I'm upgrading to a new receiver as well. Thanks.

They would actually be referred as left/right surrounds, not rear. You would normally want to place them to the left/right of the listening area. Rears are introduced in a 7.1 setup.

Also, I assume you don't want to use a sub, or you would have 4.1.


To answer your question, sure. Since you would not have a front center channel, your left/right mains can be run in phantom mode on most AVR's to simulate the center channel. Most of the dialog (voices) from movies is in the center speaker, it is very important for movies. Since you don't have a sub, make sure you pick 60's or 80's for good bass, however, it won't give you the same experience of LFE that a sub can give you...

Every receiver I have seen will run fine without a center channel -- you just configure the receiver for "no center speaker" and it automatically splits the center channel info between the left and right main speakers.

I'm less sure about what happens if you don't have a subwoofer. Does anyone know if the LFE tracks (the .1 channel) get routed to mains or what ?

The other interesting question to keep you awake at night is what happens if your surround speakers are not full range -- any receiver can send the low notes from surround to the subwoofer if you set the speakers to "small", but only about 1/2 the models will let you send the low notes from center or surround to the mains (assuming the mains are full range).

My recollection was that Yamahas were really flexible, HKs had almost none of those routing capabilities (trust me, I own an HK ) and Denons were somewhere in between.

If you set the front speakers to large and select front for LFE instead of subwoofer then the fron speakers should receive the LFE and will play them if they are able to.
At least that's the case on my Yamaha VX2400

JD, welcome. Yes, a four speaker setup with side surrounds(probably best a couple feet farther back than directly to the side)would be good for both music and movies. Using processing such as DPLII or Logic 7, depending on what your receiver has, the ambience present(to varying degrees)in two channel material, which originally came from the sides or back, is extracted from the front channels and directed to the surrounds where it belongs and makes the listening experience a bit more realistic.

For movies the two main speakers can form a "phantom" center in the absence of an actual center speaker. The .1 LFE channel occasionally present in movies for special effects would be directed to the mains if a sub wasn't used, as would be the low bass from the surrounds set "small".

Wow, thank you for explaining this so well!

The manual for my Marantz receiver clearly states that if there is no sub woofer, and the mains are set to large, then the LFEs are split to the mains. Same thing if the center is set to large.

Quote:

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Since you would not have a front center channel, your left/right mains can be run in phantom mode on most AVR's to simulate the center channel

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Why do i foresee the next question being:
"Hey, does anyone know how to select the phantom mode in my [insert AVR brand here]? I can't seem to find that option and my manual says nothing about it."

Hi JDad,

Much good advice here, but since I play Cam the Critic role at Axiom, I feel I should point out the big disadvantage of using the phantom mode without a center channel speaker.

It works fine if you (and only you) are sitting directly between the main left and right front speakers, which form the "phantom" image of a singer or actor's voice centered between the two stereo speakers. However, for anyone sitting to either side, the phantom image collapses to the closest left or right speaker, just like it always did in pure stereo days.

The huge advantage of a center channel is that it locks the singer's voice or dialog voices at the screen or in the center of the stereo soundstage, even if you are sitting way to one side of the room.

I will second Alan's comment. I was very, very happy when I went from 4.1 to 5.1.