big screen - two channel system enough for dialog?


If I have a large screen (100"+), will I need a dedicated center channel to hear dialog well??

My priority is music, and movies are mostly drama and comedies where dialog is critical. Surround effects are NOT a priority. Many folks here believe you can get much better value from 2 channel systems, but I am getting older and dialog intelligibility is key.

I am concerned about blu-rays needing to downmix from 5 to 2 channels and with such a big screen and separation of my mains, will two channels just make the dialog more diffuse??
tswei99
If you are okay with the bass limitations of the K-horns, then a natural choice for the center channel is a single Cornwall or maybe a pair of Heresys.
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Marakanetz, I could seat at least two additional rows of eight people in my theater, but the people in the second and third rows would not be able to see over the heads of the people in the front row. The second and third rows would not be elevated. Therefore, I keep it to eight people in one row so everyone has a great seat. For kids movies I've had as many as 25 kids over for a movie...most of them sat on the floor and they loved it.

My theater is not a dedicated theater, it is also my living room and my music listening room.
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I've gone through 3 or 4 center speakers, and was never satisfied with any of them, due to their inability to render the human voice as well as my L/R tower speakers. I did not find any improvement in dialog intelligibility when using a center speaker. The biggest drawback with all of the speakers I tried was that they could not reproduce the baritone quality of male voices, no matter what crossover settings I tried. I finally have just decided to use the phantom setting with my L/R mains.
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I've gone through 3 or 4 center speakers, and was never satisfied with any of them, due to their inability to render the human voice as well as my L/R tower speakers. I did not find any improvement in dialog intelligibility when using a center speaker. The biggest drawback with all of the speakers I tried was that they could not reproduce the baritone quality of male voices, no matter what crossover settings I tried.

Agreed. That's why I use a full-range tower laying horizontally as my center channel. Anything smaller was inadequate and a waste of time.
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