Center channel speaker which excels at dialogue

most center speakers are just main speakers turned on its side, the aerial cc3 center was 1 of the very few that was actually designed to be a center, I owned 1, after selling it, I went through several centers, aerial cc3b, aerial cc5, definitve, etc, I recently bought a used aerial cc3, and won't make the mistake of selling it again, the aerial may be a little more then your budget, but it is the best, good luck

See my post to your other thread. To repeat, the Spendor SC3 is a phenomenal center....

If I had to choose a center channel speaker the first and best that comes to my mind is Magnepans.They are pricier than what you are asking for one,but you might find one at A-Gon used!

You have some homework cut out for you. The first is decent and $300. You may have to raise the bar slighly as very few dedicated center channel speakers show up on AudiogoN. Ya gits whatcha pay fo' especially at the mid-price ranges, (diminishing returns factor in at the extreme high price end). Second is time and timbre matching, and don't kid yourself, it is a huge factor as the sum of your parts become greater than the whole as an integrated speaker array. Your last post mentioned the Maggies - extremely fast with with many timbral nuances that might not even mate well with an elecrostat like ML's (a guess - they may), but certainly not a dynamic speaker or a horn. Try reposting your question with your mains (and sub?) mentioned an see what kind of responses you get.

alan

Have to agree the Maggie center is the best I've heard for dialog regardless of price, you do have to raise your budget to probably around $450 to get a CC1.