November 2020,

 

I've just  wanted to touch base to say that, as you may already know, I've moved to multichannel for over 2 years already and have no plan to ever come back to regular stereo. EVER.

 

While in Cold Lake Alberta, I was listening in 4 channels (ITU setting with rear surround in front of me at around 20degree forward because I had to listen against the back wall and the 90degree side speaker was not practical.) The Itu setting, strongly recommended in the Floyd Tool book, was spectacular in recreating a super wide soundstage but I had no rear speaker and no real "surround experience". I didn't know better and was happy at the time.

I had no center channel either due to lack of space.

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Now in Montreal, I decided to use my tiny affordable JBL306P as setting up the big horn system in the apartment was not practical. My 2 mains mid-bass cabinets currently sit in the hallway under the stair of my apartment building. Moving 450 pounds mid-bass cabinets on a set of stairs is a very arduous task, we moved one up (the center channel) and it took over 70minutes with 4 mens.. The other 2 will stay where they are. until I move again.

 

Within 2 weeks of living in the apartment, I bought a 3rd JBL306P, modified it like my other 2 306P and set up my living room as a 3 front channel stereo. Improvement over regular stereo was too good to ever revert back. The filled center it portrayed made me realize how much I was missing in Cold Lake with no center channel. But I didn't have the super wide soundstage I was used to as I had lost my 4 channel front system. I was missing it too much to not do something about it.

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1 week later, I had bought 2x more JBL305P... Same as the JBL 306P but with a 5" woofer instead of the 6" and a 20% smaller cabinet size.  I wanted a smaller speaker as I was planning to hang those speakers on the wall and rear channel aren't taxed as much as the front ones.

Unlike the Cold Lake house, this apartment living room allowed me to use the rear speaker in the actual rear position and that is exactly where I've positioned them.

 

Within days, I was set up in the recommended Dolby 5.1 speaker positioning and listened to it for a while. It was much better than 3 channels front but the super wide soundstage I once had in Cold Lake wasn't recreated. 5.1  was much better than 3 front channel but I felt I was not satisfied yet.

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I've moved my speaker from the 5.1 Dolby setup (rear speaker in rear) to 5.1 Itu position (rear speaker in front) and regained the super wide soundstage I had in Cold Lake. 

 

Between the Dolby and the ITU placement, it was hard to choose a tradeoff.

Dolby with the rear in the rear created a spectacular effect of immersion but lacked soundstage width. The itu had super soundstage width but no real immersion as nothing came from the rear. I had to do something yet again...

 

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1 week after, I bought 2 more JBL 305P as a solution to my tradeoff. Enter 7.1.

 

I've used the ITU 7.1 speaker position with the side channel in front of me and the rear in the rear. WOW, the 7.1 really beat the 5.1 (either ITU or Dolby configuration). I have the super width and the immersion feeling, what a win-win. Only drawback is once again, extra cost.

 

The 7.1, despite most of my library being 2 channel stereo is  better 95% of the time than listening to the said tracks in native stereo. Very few songs do not respond well to the matrix used to recreate 7.1 from 2.0 source. Listening to actual multi channels is even better as the 7.1 matrix is bypassed. The matrix does a good job of doing 7.1 from 2.0 but the native multi channel does make your jaw drop.  

 

Listening to Pink Floyd in native surround, "money" or "the machine" songs are weird experience. The sound engineer kind of over did it. Distinct sound comes from everywhere and it's almost annoying. I would compare it to 3D TV when the action scene has something coming at you all the time to make you react (move your head to avoid a collision), it does create a "Wow effect" at first but is very annoying after a while. The Pink Floyd album is made that way, one can't change it. 

 

But listening to classical music, Michael Jackson or the Rolling Stones  is extremely good in native multi channel. The sound engineer did a wonderful job at mixing the extra channels to not be annoying but very immersive at the same time. Miles Davis Kind of Blue is also very well made, the studio reverb is recreated and it really feels like you are sitting in the studio. 

 

Yes, I know, my budget 3's series JBL speakers aren't exactly statement pieces and their tweeter badly lacks resolution. The built-in amplification is Class D and the speaker aren't exactly hyper dynamic or detailed. Yet the "immersive feeling" I get with 7.1 is almost making you forget those limitation. I dare to say that it is very satisfying given the constraints I have.

 

Moral of the text, I would urge you to do the same and at least install a center channel in your system, I know it costs more and will require some work but you may thank me later. There is passive solution for 3 channel stereo but active and DSP are really required for best result.

 

Happy listening.

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