Home Theater For Dummies, 3rd Edition by Danny Briere & Pat Hurley

Author:Danny Briere & Pat Hurley
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Wiley Publishing
Published: 2010-03-07T16:00:00+00:00

Center speakers

We start with the center speaker. On the one hand, the center speaker is probably the most important speaker in your system; on the other hand, it’s (supposedly) optional. How can that be, you ask?

Stereostone Age

If you decide to extend your home theater outside the boundaries of your home theater room, you may consider outdoor speakers for your gardens, pool area, or soon-to-be-outdoor theater greens. The discussion in this speaker section is pertinent also to shopping for outdoor speakers. One of the leading vendors is Stereostone (www.stereostone.com), which makes speakers in all sorts of simulated rock forms and colors, such as brown sandstone and black lava. There are omnidirectional speakers, subwoofers, and even stereo fountains. You can get them with or without visible grills in the layers of the rock, and with volume controls for individual speaker control. All this in weatherproof enclosures that start as low as $150 and go up to $1000 for the most sophisticated models. Other manufacturers, such as Klipsch, have begun offering their own outdoor “rock” speakers.

Connections are everything

When connecting your receiver or amplifier to your speakers, you’re pretty much going to find two types of connectors: spring clips and five-way binding posts. Spring clips are considered the lower end of the two, and most audiophiles tend to put them down. You see, spring clips have more exposed wiring, less surface contact, and greater likelihood of signal degradation over time due to this exposed wiring. Five-way binding posts, on the other hand, have a much more flexible connection structure. Not surprisingly, you can connect at least five ways. There are pin-form connectors, spade lugs, banana plugs, and a large washer-like area at the base that allows for more extensive contact with bare wire. There’s too much to try to put into words here; we recommend that you get someone at a stereo store to show you a five-way binding post. Just know that the five-way binding posts are the way to go if you have a choice.

Well, many people say the center speaker is optional because the left and right speakers can handle the sound that comes from the center speaker. However, we think that you miss out on a lot, and we don’t recommend this setup at all. The front center speaker, we feel, is critical and not at all optional, but some budget crunchers will try to convince you that it is.

Now, why is it critical? Ah, our favorite subject. The center speaker anchors your onscreen dialog and serves as a seamless connection between your left and right speakers. As that boat zooms by from left to right, you don’t want to have a gap in the middle of your sound field (a concern as screens get larger and larger). Center speakers are usually located behind the screen or above or below displays so that you can localize the onscreen sound as much as possible.

To achieve this seamless harmony with the left and right front speakers, your choice of center speaker is important.

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