Center Channel Speaker Question

Your receiver has Audessey. Try to turn the dynamic EQ on. It may boots the midrange up a bit. You may get away of buying new speaker.

"Am I correct in understanding that all I need do is use center channel wire, hook up 1st LM1 and continue wire to 2nd LM1 effectively wiring in series? If the result is not pleasing then I can fall back to using 1st LM1 as center."

No, that's parallel. You can try it that way but your amp may strain a little. For series do this: 1. Connect a speaker cable from the + on your amp to the + on one of the speakers. 2. Connect a speaker cable from the - on your amp to the - on the other speaker. 3. Run a speaker cable from one speaker to the other connecting it to the unused binding posts.

As far as the volume issue goes, I meant that using 2 speakers for the center will take the demand off 1 speaker used as a center. That's why I suggested the test in my first post. Listen to some music just using your main L and R front speakers. After a minute or so, just unplug 1 of the speakers and listen to it. If you do that, you will see immediately what I am talking about. Just listening to the 1 speaker play music, you will see how hard that single speaker has to work to keep up with the main 2. Its just a rough test. When you are watching a movie, different info is sent to the center channel, so the test isn't 100%. That said, its still a very good indicator as to how the front and center speakers interact with each other.

Yes, a series connection will be safe for the amp, however the resulting 16 ohm impedance load will reduce the center channel amp capability from its rated 110 watts to about half or 55 watts. This will then be split between the two speakers. Sound from each LM1 will likely sound thin and anemic, and have very little dynamic range. It makes more sense to run a single LM1 with 110 watts than 2 with less than 30 watts each. A series connection will just reduce the overall performance.

Now I am not against using 2 center speakers, actually if it was safe to do a parallel connection, I would say go for it, however I do not agree with,

You can try it that way but your amp may strain a little.

Initially it might work OK, but long term is likely to cause premature failure. Again, talk to Marantz tech support.

IME, runing two speakers in series will not help give you clarity. The problem is that the crossover in the first speaker interacts with the crossover in the secound. Phase is negtatively effected. A parallel hook up does not have the phase issue but as others have stated you may have an impedance issue.

Of course yiou can always try it as YMMV.