Should I even bother buying a 6.1 receiver? (1 Viewer)

[LowellG]

My main concern is my speaker placement. I already know I cannot place the surrounds on the side. The surrounds are going to have to be mounted about 3’ behind the listening area about 8’ high and 12’ apart. They will be projecting out over the listening area. If I add a rear center, it will go in between those two rear surrounds I described. Will I still get any desired effect from a rear center, or should I just save my money and go with a 5.1 setup?

Base answers on the assumption that this room and configuration will always be used. Don’t factor in the potential of moving the receiver to another room.

P.S. Receivers I am looking at are the Yamaha RXV630 and Onkyo 600.

 

[Paul Clarke]

It sounds like you only need 5.1. I know many will run as many speakers as they can but spatial proximity should be a strong consideration IMO. I never like hearing speaker HT output when the distance is close...too distracting but that's just me.

 

[Philip Hamm]

What are you using now? Personally I'm perfectly happy with 5.1 in my listening environment and have very little interest in anything more.

 

[LowellG]

"What are you using now?" Nothing, unless you consider an old Aiwa NSX-V70 a system.

My wife just changed the family room around for the 3rd time today. One we both are satisfied with. It's now definitely a 5.1 setup only.

My new question is will bipolars work mounted right on the back wall in line with a couch, or should I just point to monopolars at each other?

 

[brentl]

Philip buddy I agree, looks like we are both at the point where we won't upgrade just so we can say we upgraded.

I looked into 6.1, DPL2 stuff too, but when I figured out it was just the bug I stopped looking.

Brent L

 

[Drea Bruss]

Lowell,

I'm currently running a very similar surround speaker placement configuration as you in that I can't place the surrounds to the side of me becuse of a window on the side wall. I am using Phase tech dipolar/bipolar speakers for the surrounds and they are roughly 16 feet apart and mounted to the back wall behind the sofa. I have the spaekers set to bipolar and I am quite pleased with this set-up. I feel it gives you the best of both worlds in that it is more difuse than a monopole, but more directional than a dipole.

I've thought about going to a ex/es set-up but it would require using an in ceiling speaker becuase the mid-point between my surrounds is directly over the entrance to the room and there is a header there. I think I would expiriment with something like Lexicon's logic 7 that adds side surrounds as that would be easier to incorporate other than the cost of the processor. DPL2 has piqued my interest since it wouldn't require new spaekers etc.

Guess I'll stay in the 5.1 crowd for a while longer and just use the money I would have spent on new gear for more DVDs.

 

[Earl Simpson]

I had a brain dead rcvr, so I got reeled in by the big boys. No place for 7 speakers! I love my 3802, but 99% of all DVD's are 5.1 only. If I had it to do over again, I would have gone with a 6 amp rcvr(w/6.1) with more features for my $$$$$$$$. If you have a castle and secret under ground tunnels, then 7 channel would be great.

 

[Chuck C]

Like I've written before, 6.1 is truly a great feature. When I helped my friend set up his new Denon 2802, we listened to Gladiator w/ and w/o a rear center. Man, the rear center was awesome...much more preferrable to just 5.1. You're thinking "hmm, but most of my DVDs are 5.1" Well, there's usually a matrix mode or some proprietary rear surround mode that utilizes the rear center. It sets up for an excellent spacial effect. Take Widescreen Review's Reference "Holosonic" theater for example. They use a decoder to extract the rear surround. Besides, if you're gonna spend $400-500 on a receiver that has 6.1 anyway, you should at least test out a rear center.

 

[Arthur S]

Lowell, for what it is worth, I hooked up a spare DPL receiver and spare center channel speaker to try 6.1. Speaker placement for the rear center is far from ideal. About a foot behind the couch, sitting on a box, and pointing to the ceiling.

Despite the added complexity of running 2 receivers at once and the less than ideal rear center speaker placement, the 6.1 is worth it. With 6.1 encoded DVDs,like Gladiator, the effect was significant and a definite enhancement. I also found that other source material, not specifically encoded, has information that can be extracted to the rear center.

Having your surrounds behind you is not necessarily a bad thing. In fact, this is the preferred arrangement according to some audio companies. I think Yamaha reccomends this.

There is a slow, but steady move towards 7.1.

Why leave yourself at least one generation behind by sticking with 5.1?

 

[Chuck C]

Having your surrounds behind you is not necessarily a bad thing. In fact, this is the preferred arrangement according to some audio companies. I think Yamaha reccomends this.

The thought here is that the rear channels will produce an image as if there was a rear center...much the same as the Front L and R speakers do if you sit directly in the middle. Of course, if you're off axis, then you need a center speaker to create the effect that dialogue is coming from the center. The same idea holds true for the rear center.

 

[Philip Hamm]

The same idea holds true for the rear center.

With some very important caveats!!!

* It's not nearly as important in the back due to the fact that in the front soundstage there lots of dialog that has to be centered with the TV image. The rear hold no such limitation.

* 99.999% of the 5.1 movies were mixed for 5.1 channels. A few, very few, were mixed for a matrixed rear. For many of us an important aspect of home theater is to have the presentation be as close as possible to the original artist's intent. Matrixing a rear is not part of that equasion.

* The human ears are not set up very well for hearing directly behind them. The rear center will not have the fidelity of the rear sides based on this limitation.

However, it is correct that a rear center can be very good for "spreading out" the soundfield in the rear just like Prologic or the front three channels in DD/DTS. With 5.1 almost everyone in the room gets a good feel of the front soundfield, but only one person, in the sweet spot, gets a good feel of the rear soundfield. Adding the rear center goes a good ways towards "evening out" the response in a room.

 

[Matthew_Judd]

I have read that about 3% of DVD's have rear channel information (matrixed or otherwise). I don't remember where I read this so I can't speak for it's veracity. Also, now that I think about it they may have been talking about upcoming releases (estimate of DVD's released this year).
I'm looking to buy a receiver in the near future and decided that I did want 6.1 capability (7.1 is generally outside my budget). I'm only going to use 5.1 from the start but if I have the extra channel and the number of movies encoded with rear sound increases I can always add another speaker later. For my (limited) budget this seems a good way to go.
I see that you are considering the Onkyo 600. I'm leaning that way myself. $530 for 6.1 audio with lots of bells and whistles like DPLII makes me happy.

 

[BrentMann]

I've been watching this thread for some time, debating on adding my opinion. I've decided to. I have a question to those that aren't sold on the 6.1/7.1 setup. Out of sheer curiosity: (please take no offense to this, its meant for discussion, not bashing in any way)

Of those that don't think the 6.1/7.1 is worth it, who has had a decent demo? And of those that demo'd, did you see a discrete demo, like gladiator?

I've had a 6.1 for a couple months and love what it does for most movies. My informal couch research as proven that if a dvd uses the surrounds at all, the matrix 6.1 adds pleasantly to the experience. U571 jumps to memory.

Matthew_Judd, you'll like the DPLII, and the Onkyo line is good as well, IMO. I've got an Integra and I love it.