voice matching question

[morbo]

I have a question about voice matching the front stage in a home theater. Everyone seems to think its a very good idea, but I have read many different interpretations on what it means. Some say it means you must use the same midwoofer so that the critical 'voice' band is covered by the same drivers across the front. Others say it is most important to use the same tweeter so the sounstage/ambience sound the same. Still others say the most important thing is that the dispersion characteristics be the same.... it seems to me that even using identical speakers across the front, the response will not be identical (assuming a situation like mine, center baffle flush with the front of the TV), the TV gives the speaker a much larger 'virtual' baffle...

I am wondering what opinion's people here have about this subject?

[Paul H]

I think the answer to your questions is "yes"

All of the factors you mentioned can impact the 'voicing' of the centre, although I believe the effect of the larger baffle created by a TV is a distant third to the matching of the drivers.

Paul

[morbo]

ok. That is all well and good for situations where 3 identical speakers are possible, but in situations where it is not, which are most important to focus on?

[Dennis H]

I think the most important thing is the same in-room frequency response all around. That's why receivers with built-in EQ are so popular.

Not surprising to me is that one of the best sounding auto-EQ systems is the one that tries to do the least, i.e. the old 'do no harm' thing. The Pioneer receivers just have an octave-band graphic EQ, no parametric or FIR filters. Basically it's just a fancy tone control. All it tries to do is get the "voicing" (frequency response) the same all around the room whether the problems are caused by using different speakers or using the same speakers at different distances from the boundaries which mucks with the baffle step, etc.

[morbo]

Yes I've seen those, and like the way they give you the option to choose either a 'flat' target, or leave the front L/R alone, and adjust all speakers to match their FR. Definately a nice feature.

Maybe I should have been a bit more specific to start. I have a CSS WR125 fullrange as my center channel, which I will be swapping out for the FR version. It sounds very good as a center channel, the larger 'virtual baffle' created by the TV really evens out the lower midrange, and that combined with the fair size hump you get from 100hz-250hz or so makes bsc unneccesary, at least to my ears. To me, this is pretty much the ideal center channel, sound wize and size wize. I really don't want to replace it, as I've never heard it strain so far in my small (~ 9' by 15') listening space.

However, voice matching it means the main L/R speakers should be FR125s as well. While I do really enjoy their sound, they are not really well suited for the type high volume stereo listening I've recently been getting into. Whenever the music gets really complex, the highs get a bit congested or blurred. Don't get me wrong, on some music they sound just amazing, in fact, so good on simple passages and vocals that I find myself skipping forward to tracks that feature them prominently. I think for my front l/r pair (which are also my 'music' speakers) I would like a bit more of an 'all-rounder'. So I thought of pairing the WR125 (or maybe 2) with a nice tweeter like the seas 27tbcg, 25tffc (which I have on hand), or the cheap little dayton NDT20. The WR should be pretty easy to cross to any tweeter, except for the low sensitivity. The question is, will such a speaker, crossed at say, somewhere between 2.5-4khz, give me any of the benefits of voice matching? Because if not, I'd rather go with a proven design like the ModulaMT or NatalieP.