DIY center speaker, help please. - Page 4

alfalfa · 7th June 2003, 7:03 PM

Like I said it depends on the setup of your room. The higher up you mount the speaker the more likely your side listeners will be off the vertical axis.

If anyone is curious they can mount a speaker or box up near the roof. Put a laser pointer on top of it pointing forwards and adjust the angle the speaker is pointing downwards so that the laser pointer is aimed at the head of the listener sitting in the middle. They can then rotate the laser pointer around and see if your side listeners are in the same vertical plane relative to the speaker or if they are significantly off axis.

Could you clarify what you mean by the vocals being localised. I thought a center channel should localise the sound ie it should sound like the sound is coming from the point where the center speaker is located.

However if you dont like localised sound then consider a bipolar speaker design that diffuses the sound. I think mirage omnipolar speakers and bose 901(?) also achieve the same effect. Those designs create a very diffuse sound field by producing lots of reflected sound.

As always the best advice to go with what sounds best to you.

iNeLuKi · 7th June 2003, 7:26 PM

Yeah a centre should be localized but you dont want it to be extremely "narrow" sounding, especially if you have a 10ft screen and characters on the far left or right have the vocals extremely localized in the center. When you listen to music you dont want the vocals sounding cramped because live music never sounds like that.

I have yet to experience off axis problems with a horizontal MTM, so If I bother with a centre it will probably just be a bog standard MTM design.

7th June 2003, 7:03 PM	#46
alfalfa Member Join Date: Feb 2003 Location: Australia Posts: 256	Like I said it depends on the setup of your room. The higher up you mount the speaker the more likely your side listeners will be off the vertical axis. If anyone is curious they can mount a speaker or box up near the roof. Put a laser pointer on top of it pointing forwards and adjust the angle the speaker is pointing downwards so that the laser pointer is aimed at the head of the listener sitting in the middle. They can then rotate the laser pointer around and see if your side listeners are in the same vertical plane relative to the speaker or if they are significantly off axis. Could you clarify what you mean by the vocals being localised. I thought a center channel should localise the sound ie it should sound like the sound is coming from the point where the center speaker is located. However if you dont like localised sound then consider a bipolar speaker design that diffuses the sound. I think mirage omnipolar speakers and bose 901(?) also achieve the same effect. Those designs create a very diffuse sound field by producing lots of reflected sound. As always the best advice to go with what sounds best to you. Last edited by alfalfa; 7th June 2003 at 7:09 PM.

7th June 2003, 7:26 PM	#47
iNeLuKi Member Join Date: Feb 2002 Posts: 6,567	Yeah a centre should be localized but you dont want it to be extremely "narrow" sounding, especially if you have a 10ft screen and characters on the far left or right have the vocals extremely localized in the center. When you listen to music you dont want the vocals sounding cramped because live music never sounds like that. I have yet to experience off axis problems with a horizontal MTM, so If I bother with a centre it will probably just be a bog standard MTM design.