Is surround sound for music and home theater on its way out?

[harshness]

I can't figure out why the voice only comes out of the center channel and why I can barely hear the rear speakers.

The voices come where the director wants them to come from. Typically, voices are supposed to be emanating from a face that you're watching on the screen. To hear the voice all around you when the talker is clearly in front of you ruins the effect.

Surround sound is supposed to put you near the scene, not in an actor's mouth.

 

[navychop]

I must say when I went from a minimal center to a good one, the difference was night and day. Makes me wonder what's more important: A good center, or a good sub.

 

[Teehar]

I must say when I went from a minimal center to a good one, the difference was night and day. Makes me wonder what's more important: A good center, or a good sub.

No doubt the center is more important.I upgraded my center speaker for Christmas with a Pioneer Sp c22,perhaps one of the best upgrades I have ever made.

 

[harshness]

If we use phantom stereo, instead of the voice being locked to the center of the screen, where it's supposed to be, it moves around based on seating position. Someone left of center gets the phantom image left of center and someone right of center gets the phantom image. Only a person in the sweet spot gets the image where it is supposed to be relative to the screen.

Perhaps you could extend this argument to explain the fascination with center channel speakers that use twin drivers for the midrange. I find they are quite excellent at phase cancellation/noding.

 

[jayn_j]

Perhaps you could extend this argument to explain the fascination with center channel speakers that use twin drivers for the midrange. I find they are quite excellent at phase cancellation/noding.

This one is a double edged sword. The center is generally oriented horizontally, and you want it to be as narrow as possible, so manufacturers use a pair of smaller drivers to get similar response.

I tend toward Klipsch and have KG5's as my mains. Now that i am running in the theater with the 120" screen, I need something that fits below. I have experimented with an RC-45 which has twin 6" drivers and a KG3.2 which I have modified to turn the horn 90 degrees. The KG3.2 has only a single midrange driver. Neither one is ideal, but frankly, I do not hear any significant difference wrt nodes or cancellation. I certainly do hear the loss of lower midrange because of the smaller drivers.

Obviously, the correct solution is to go with an AT screen and move the speakers behind them. Then I could use identical ones (maybe Cornwalls). Someday, when I have a few extra thousand to throw down at the theater.

 

[John Kotches]

Perhaps you could extend this argument to explain the fascination with center channel speakers that use twin drivers for the midrange. I find they are quite excellent at phase cancellation/noding.

It's not the same argument ... but here goes.

A lot of the dual midrange drivers are just bad imitations of an MTM array ala Joseph D'Appolito and his D'Appolito configuration.

To be properly considered an MTM / D'Appolito array you have to space the drivers correctly based on the Mid/Tweeter crossover point and you have to use a 3rd order crossover to minimize the overlap. With the MTM configuration, spacing between the drivers is critical and the lobing is minimized.

This Wikipedia Link on the MTM array ala D'Appolito covers this in much greater detail.



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[John Kotches]

Jay:

Take a look at Seymour AV. They sell high quality AT fabric that will be quite a bit less than a few thousand...

I am assuming you can reuse your existing frame.

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[jayn_j]

Jay:

Take a look at Seymour AV. They sell high quality AT fabric that will be quite a bit less than a few thousand...

I am assuming you can reuse your existing frame.

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Good ideas, but I would still need to build a false wall and find black AT fabric for the surround, so I had decent l/r separation. Then I would need to find a third KG5. All together, probably over $1k.
The key would be finding another KG5, or easier 3 or 4 Cornwalls in reasonable shape.

 

[madmadworld]

Man that was awesome when it first came out.

I know this much,when playing a movie/show with 5.1 on a scene with dogs barking,gets our dogs started barking every time.With tv or even small stereo speakers they pay no attention.Certain car sounds convince them that we have company.

found out i will most likely never upgrade. looked over at Crutchfield then emailed them to find out none of these home theater receivers have a tape loop. deal breaker for me and my EQ.

 

[harshness]

deal breaker for me and my EQ.

An analog-connected equalizer is a show stopper for a digital surround configuration so it is just as well that they couldn't help you.

 

[madmadworld]

An analog-connected equalizer is a show stopper for a digital surround configuration so it is just as well that they couldn't help you.

don't use the EQ for movies and such. but for music always. no big loss ...money for other gizmo's
watch maybe 5 movies a year if that, bunch of garbage these days.

 

[ohioankev]

I would guess the increase in sound bars is due to the crappy speakers nearly every TV comes out with.

This is partially off topic but I actually have to buy a sound bar because my TV is junk. First of all I bought the TV from my cousin after he lent the money to help out his brother in getting a TV and in the end his brother could not pay him back. With that said it's a Funai Emerson brand LCD. The problem I have is whenever someone with a pitch voice sings, screams and sometimes even talks or a high pitch noise plays on a movie or TV show my TV will turn the channels, turn itself up or down, access the menus by itself or turn the TV completely off. I figure this is somehow connected to the infra red sensor touch buttons on the TV itself triggered by the vibration from the speakers.

 

[madmadworld]

great story yet sad

 

[Magic Static]

My Onkyo has 7.1 has a self balancing speaker set-up. It comes with a mic you set in your chair and the unit optimizes the speaker settings. In my setup there is no wall behind me for hanging rear speakers. They are on swing arms mounted on the side and when we use them we just swing them out close behind us.

 

[jayn_j]

I think most of us have found that Audyssey is a good starting point for optimizatio0n, but we all tweek it some afterwards for our own preferences

 

[navychop]

Absolutely. A little more bass and rears for me.

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[raoul5788]

Absolutely. A little more bass and rears for me.

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So you like it deep in the rear?

 

[wildbill47]

I have 7 speakers placed in different areas of room and use surround sound when watching movies and network feeds. PBS concerts are really good on KU feeds. HD is outstanding. It is like being there as the HD video is like watching 3d.

 

[Bear Paws]

The guy from Cnet is talking about music.. I can't disagree with him, live music is not surround..even in a closed acoustic halls...music is unnatural in surround. Especially from ""clam shell'' venues like a philharmonic. However the real world we live in is in surround. The diesel truck with air horn coming up from behind you, the squealing tires under you, the police helicopter overhead and the sound of the car engine in front, with the wife nagging you to slow down from the passenger seat ..

A good stereo coupled with center speakers and solid bass output that is mixed right to pan properly is about as natural for music as it gets. Not often are we center stage in a orchestra in real life surrounded by voice, strings, reeds, wind, and percussion... . If that were the case we would probably would be the ones making the music... which is a whole different experience in sound aspects. .

The newer sound bars with processors are really quite good for music or even for watching the Big Bang Theory. Real stereo they are not but its close enough not to break the bank. Of course an ''audiophile'' will throw up on cue at the mere mention of that.. An audiophile is just another term for snobs with a big wallet and a technical thesauruses...

Most of the time its the price that they are paying for, not the sound. Materialism over music. They do not listen to music, they listen to their equipment. They are congenitally incapable of even enjoying music, because they are too focused on imperfections perceived and real....You need to love music, not your gear.. Music in the raw is not sterile.. One of the saddest pitfalls of being an audiophile is avoiding listening to recordings that may be excellent music, but don't make your system sound awesome.

 

[jayn_j]

And the zombie thread emerges from the grave.

I found that for music, I was able to create a macro for my harmony remote that turns off the surround and center speakers, adjusts the receiver to straight stereo. The problem was that I had to restore the surround for every other activity on the remote. Tedious, but doable. I think some of this is what we are used to listening to. I don't mind a bit of ambience surround in a live recording. For studio stuff, I prefer pure stereo. But have you noticed that over time, there is less and less stereo in the mixes. Stereo mixes in the 60's used to have totally different sounds coming out of each channel. Listen to The Beatles Abbey Road or The Beach Boys Pet Sounds albums for good examples. As John said earlier, a few albums did manage to get it right. Yes John, I do own Running on Empty and enjoy it.

Perhaps I am just getting old, but these days where the CD has been replaced by a low bandwidth itunes download, I don't see any care being paid to channel mixing, and most of what I hear could very well be mono.