hi,
it's great to have discovered a forum of great experience breadth and intelligent discussion.
my question involves use of the center channel speaker. in the old days of stereo (last week), i used the "dialog enhancer" function of the DVD player to mix the center channel into the left & right speakers. it worked very well.
with the receipt of my axiom system, that function was turned off, and the center channel enabled in the AV receiver - and volume set per instructions.
to me, the sound from the center channel seems very localized. in other words, with eyes closed, it's very easy to locate the center speaker. the dialog of people on-screen seems "shifted" towards the center speaker, even if they were slightly off-center.
when i was running things in "dialog enhanced" (no center speaker, dialog merged with left & right speakers), the sound was MUCH more "buried" in the screen. the stereo speakers were fine at creating the soundstage. IMHO, it seemed they did a better job.
soooo, here's my question: has anyone ever observed this before? is there a solid reason (other than architecture) that the center channel should be preserved?
i'm going to make a few tweaks with the next movie, but turning the center sound downwards would seem to only bury the dialog.
all comments appreciated, thanks.
Elden
