Yes, Dean has indicated his preference for a vertical center speaker and during the seven years I've been here I've pointed out their advantages numerous times.
I'll try an M60 as center as Fred suggested. I'm not sure what I can extrapolate to what an M22 as center might sound like.
Your difficulty with finding a mode for using the sub with the mains in 2-channel play shouldn't be, since the regular stereo mode(not direct)sends signals to the sub below the crossover set when the mains are set "small".
Thanks, I missed that! Stereo it is now to include sub. Any idea how 'Virtual' might differ from 'Stereo'?
As far as making poorly recorded material sound less offensive, I found in the past that reducing the upper midrange/lower treble area around 3-6KHz(on a receiver with variable crossovers)helped somewhat. On your 1909, using the manual equalizer to drop that area a bit might help on some recordings. Since bad recordings sound worse the louder the playing level, the best cure may be to listen to them with the sound level set to about 30dB(assuming that your listening room noise floor is higher than that).
I am not familiar with how to drop the 'mid lower treble area'. I am only familiar with adjusting the x-over for each pair (and CC/subs) of speakers. How would I do this?
-30 volume level produces ≈ 79dB (continuous) at the 12' listening position. That is ok, not rock out level, but if that is all one can 'stand' for poorer CD recording's, that will need to do.
