I have 30 year old JBL L-100 speakers (you know the ones with the egg crate grill). I just bought a new Onkyo NR801 receiver and would like to add a center speaker. My primary listening space is an office about 25x10. I listen to a 50-50 mix of movies and music. I've considered Polk and Infinity as I have both Best Buy and CC stores close by. At present I've "borrowed" the center speaker from my teenager's low end Infinity surround system. But it sounds veiled and mildly unplesant. It's also about 8 times more efficient than the JBLs, that were once considered very efficient. Brent from Axiom recommended a VP150, though that's not a surprise. I can't afford to replace the JBLs at present, but might consider it in a year or so. Any help would be greatly appreciated!

The Polk CSi5 is the single best speaker I own. It's big, heavy, expensive and some say ugly so it may not be for you. My brother-in-law has the CSi3 (we were surprised to learn on a recent vacation that each of us had independently looked long and hard for a home theater system and bought nearly the same system) and says the same thing. I haven't heard the Axiom center speakers, but my M22s are good enough for me to say that you can believe the hype about the Axiom products as well. Since you mentioned the sensitivity, the Axiom center channels are more sensitive (93 and 95 dB) than the Polks (89 and 90 dB). Maybe somebody smarter than me (i.e. almost anybody here) can correct me, but I think you should be able to adjust your receiver to account for that regardless of which speaker you choose.

Does JBL have a center that matches? That would be the standard advice to answer to your question. Or get one more of your speakers to use as a perfectly matching "center."

Maybe you can find one (or two) on line used and cheap at amazon, half.com, ebay or audiogon.com

Everything I have read says you want something that matches pretty closely to your existing speakers - even if there is a better sounding center out there.

Of course, if you plan to upgrade in the future maybe a VP100 or VP150 is a good idea and will sound good enough until you can get some M22s or whatever (same advice goes if you decide on another brand).

I know little but I have read the above over and over.

First of all I do appreciate the quick response. I've looked over the JBL line, but nothing they make today, comes close to my ancient L-100 speakers. I've listened to the JBL Northridge center speaker at BB, along with the Sony. I was surprised that they sound and look quite similar. Both seem to have a rather large hole in the midrange, sounding pretty thin. It doesn't look like there is a match from JBL.

I will give a Nod to the Axiom VP 150 heavy an Sounds wonderful an things sound great out of it giving it a thumbs up

I have to agree on doing it right. But that's where the quest begins. It seems that with on line dealers there aren't any real audio dealers avaialble, even in a major metro area around Detroit. I've been looking at the Polk, CSi5 at ABC Warehouse, but they're about to drop that line and stick with the lower CS line. And no one carries the higher LSiC line to listen to. I really limits things to the skilled on-line dealers like Axiom.