Tony,
I don't doubt you believe what you have heard but a large part of my point is that what you heard seems to keep changing. Never in your previous posts did you say that you also heard this effect with music, and now all of a sudden you say you did.
Previously you had reported a 2dB SPL difference (which somehow moved up to 5) which is barely distinguishable to the human ear, and now you are saying that the
timbre also changes off axis.
Can you understand how all your scattered reportings are casting doubt on your reflections about the VP150 as an ineffective center channel?
What is really going on here and what exactly have you done in the past to solidify your personal results? Did you measure the VP150 with pink noise first, detect some difference, then listen to music and say "oh ya, what's up with that?". Did you then test out the other center channels in the same way or were these center channel tests done first?
Why would Axiom sell a speaker model (that has been tested off axis both with sound measurements and as well
human sound tests) that is so incredibly flawed?
They certainly do not come off as the type of company that sells by marketing and not research. In fact, if i remember correctly, the VP150
started off as a WTWTW config and the sound tests concluded that the TWWWT config was preferred by blind listening tests and by the gist of it, sound measurements as well.
Do you think Axiom has not
done off axis measurements with the VP150? Why do you think they would sell this model as an improvement in soundstage dispersion over the VP100 which is a standard 3 driver config (like so many other apparently more? successful center channel companies' designs)?
Why do you think placing a tweeter above a woofer will remove this 'suckout' effect?
How do you figure placing the tweeter in the middle of a woofer config will remove this effect? Why can you not measure an off axis response with the M2 placed on its side? My M60s on their side certainly have it.
I was over at a friend's place and recently measured the off-axis response from his Tannoy center channel (a single driver). It was not a 3 driver config but the Tannoy design is unique in its sound dispersion. Nonetheless, the dB dropped rather quickly (-5dB) after moving to the far left of his couch (7 feet) and beyond, probably about 110 degree off axis. My VP150 did not. I had to move to about 130 degrees off axis and an extra 4 feet left of my couch (7 feet long so total of 11 feet) at 8 foot distance to measure another 2dB drop beyond the one already measured by all of us (total of only 4dB lost at 11 feet left of centre of VP150!!).
I would say that is a pretty impressive sound stage, far more than the single driver config. This was measured only with pink noise though as i would have had to unhook all my other speakers to isolate the center channel with music playback. With all front channels driven, there is NO loss in SPL like what is measured with pink noise isolated to one channel and this IS something that is incorporated into the idea of setting up one's HT surround system properly. EVEN if a speaker had some issue such as comb filtering, again something Alan also concurred with, the effect is minimized with the speaker setup as a whole.
I am certainly not saying you should have loved the VP150 but i'm doubtful about the dramatic sound difference (during music or movie playback) you report and the reasonings that are being presented to support it.
The only reason to think a difference exists for you and no one else comes down to the room and the dispersion of the VP150 specifically. Perhaps you have one truly unique room.
