Would FXi's help in this room?

kuntasensei

Here's my living room HT:
http://clubpolk.polkaudio.com/showcase/view.php?userid=13126#equipment

The trouble I have is that my center surround really doesn't fill in the sound like I would like it to. I was wondering if maybe a single FXi30 instead of the RTi28 would help with that, or if I could wire a pair of FXi30's side by side in that position. As you can see, there's no real way to space out two center surrounds on that wall because of the window into the kitchen (and I only have a 6.1 receiver). And I would think that bi/dipoles would be wasted on the side surrounds since the right surround has a hall next to it and the left surround leads into the dining room. Someone correct me if I'm wrong on that.

Any suggestions?

PolkWannabie

Given how close the rear is to the seating area, I'd either use bipoles or move the couch out a foot and have speakers on the floor behind pointing up. I know the second idea is a tad bizarre but it might provide interesing results.

Dennis Gardner

With your current setup, I would suggest 1 easy move and 1 strange move.

I would pull the sides forward to the other sides of the doors, and aim them directly at your couch. Easy move, since sides should be to the side in 6 or 7.1 setups, not too far back.

Now for the strange suggestion, I would move the center rear to above the cabinets in your kitchen, laid on its side. I know this is a farout suggestion, but it would truly give you much better imaging than what you use now. Part of your gaps now are caused by rear sounds getting to you before the sides can, unless you use alot of delay processing.

I know that it may seem or look weird, but your current soundfields are out of whack a little and this would make your room seem a lot larger.

I also agree that behind the couch would be okay, only if the sides are moved forward.

Hope you don't take this wrong, just trying to help.

Dennis

kuntasensei

I appreciate the suggestions. That couch actually is over a foot away from the wall, though it doesn't look like it in that picture, so I might try putting the speaker behind the couch and see what happens. The left and right surrounds are only about 6 inches behind the sides of the seating position, so I'm happy with them as they are (and they're aimed slightly forward at the listening position). Besides, that doorway on the right hand side is a very wide opening that you're only seeing about half of in the picture, so moving the speaker in front of that doorway would put it about 3-4 feet in front of my listening area. I'm happy with my left and right surrounds, since 5.1 sounds really solid with EX/ES turned off and I'm getting a fairly decent phantom center image from the side surrounds.

As far as pans around the room go, the delay settings sound fine the way I have them and rear pans are pretty cohesive. The real problem is that the proximity of the center surround prevents anyone outside of the seat directly in front of the speaker from really hearing it, which is why I was thinking bipoles would help. I can't put the speaker anywhere in the kitchen area, because the cabinets extend up almost to the ceiling.

I was thinking that maybe putting 2 FXi30's for rear centers right next to each other and wired in series would give me a very diffuse and wide soundfield there. Or should I wait and get a 7.1 receiver to run those seperately? I want to eventually get a receiver that handles DPL-IIx and lets me set seperate delay times for the left and right surrounds (which the 600 won't let me do). Or, maybe I just have upgradeitis again and want to buy stuff.

Dennis Gardner

The FXs work good for making a diffuse sound and would really put sound across the wall better than the monopole RTi.

Tour2ma

I agree with trying the rear 28 behind the couch firing upward.

If I were going to use f/xi 30's anywhere, it's be the side surrounds.

PolkWannabie

Dennis,

I'm not sure I agree with your suggestions.

Side surrounds should either be to the side of or slightly behind the listening area and the other side of that opening will from my vantage point put them in front of the listening area. Additionally surrounds ought not to be pointed at listening areas.

Dennis Gardner

PW,

I agree, and have my FXs slightly back of my sweet spot also, but my rears are 8 feet behind the sides. His photo fooled me as I thought the sides were actually behind the rear. I also didn't know the right door opening to be so large.



Dennis

kuntasensei

Today, I moved the right surround closer to that door opening so that it would be away from that hall a bit more. That helped with my problem with sound echoing down that hall considerably. I didn't have the wire to drop the center surround behind the couch yet, but moving that right surround seemed to tighten up things in the rear soundstage. I'll experiment with the center surround next weekend when I have more time.

Thanks for all of the suggestions.