6.1 speaker choices - Axiom Message Boards

I have a 6.1 compatible receiver, and if I were to get the 6th speaker for the rear, would I want to use a speaker that's similar to the rears, or would I want a centre channel speaker? Or something else? Cheers!

You can use either a match for your surrounds, or any direct radiator. A center channel is probably overkill.

For example, people running QS8s for the L and R surrounds will pick either a third QS8 for the back surround, or a single M2, which is direct-radiating but incorporates the same drivers.

As far as I can tell, the jury is still out as to which is better in back, direct-radiating or diffuse (bipole/dipole/quadpole).

I'll throw in my vote for the 3rd QS8 in the rear. My system sounds great! I guess the room size would make a difference in any setup. What size is your ht room? Any quirks we should know about?

I seem to recall that rear diffused sound is better in a 6.1 setup,and direct in a 7.1. Easy enough to set up and let your ears be the judge.

My current room is as quirky as it can get. I can barely get away with a 5.1 setup currently, but I'm planning ahead for when I move. At that point I will have the room for the extra speaker. I wasn't sure if the rear centre was identical to the front centre in terms of dialogue.

I've watched quite a few movies in 6.1 and the rear center doesn't get a significant amount of dialogue (hardly any for that that matter).

In reply to:
I've watched quite a few movies in 6.1 and the rear center doesn't get a significant amount of dialogue (hardly any for that that matter).

Well I wouldn't expect too much dialogue out of the rear speaker, that would be kind of wierd.

But I do get sound out of the rear. Keep in mind that not all DVD's are encoded as 6.1. It also depends on whether your receiver or pre/pro has any kind of proprietary processing to convert 5.1 audio into 6.1/7.1. My Rotel 1066 has what they call RS processing that creates a matrixed back channel from any 5.1 source in fact it even works on top of ProLogic2 so I even get 6.1 sound for stereo sources if I want it.

But still, you'll get the most rear audio from a DVD that is natively encoded for 6.1, and particularly DTS-ES discrete, which is a true 6.1 format as opposed to a matrixed back. Compare the DD-EX and DTS-ES tracks on Lord of the Rings and you'll notice the DTS track makes better use of the back channel.