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Center channel speaker sounds boxy?

30K views 38 replies 14 participants last post by  squared80 
#1 ·
I have gone through several center channel configurations in my HT. First was two BIC DV 84's placed head to head, wired in series. Sounded good, with a huge sound stage. But movie track audio was boxy sounding, especially male voices. Regular broadcast TV was just fine, however.

Now, we just upgraded to the Klipsch RC-64 II. Yes, on sale being last year's model.

It is awesome on music video, recorded or broadcast concerts, and regular live TV. But...center channel movie dialog still sounds boxy. And it sounds boxy with male voices on FM broadcasts. For the price ($$$), there should be zero boxiness in the Klipsch. BTW, we upgraded the side and rear surrounds to Klipsch Reference Series also. The main left and right speakers are VMPS Towers. The put out bass with an impact that will rearrange your intestines! The dual subs are from Madisound, being built from kits.

As much as I like all 55 pounds of this speaker, we may return it.

I know there are others who have experienced this issue. What did you you to remedy it, if anything?
 
#2 ·
I have no idea what “boxy” sounds like, but if your complaint is with male voices, I’m going to hazard a guess that the problem actually is too much lows, causing them to sound boomy or muddy. A center-channel speaker with small woofers would be the solution. Alternately, if your receiver has dedicated center-channel EQ, a reduction of all bands below 200 Hz would make a huge difference.

Regards,
Wayne
 
#15 · (Edited)
My center has four 6.5" cast basket cerametallic woofers. And a compression horn driver (Klipsch RC-64 II). These are the smallest woofers in my theater setup, with most of them being 10", or 12" in size. Throw in several 8's in the surrounds.

You say a center with a smaller woofer would be a solution. How much smaller? At the other end of the spectrum, this center does have impact out the wazoo...something that I do not want to give up.

I'm beginning to think that there is no perfect solution. We can either have a center with great music rendition, huge impact with gunshots, bomb blasts, car crashes, but (sometimes) dialog is sucky, or maybe we can have good dialog without any male voice and female voice boominess, but sacrifice that other positives listed above?

Again, when the Integra arrives we will do what we can with the EQ. My room was designed from the get go for sound, including custom built acoustic panels (home made), plus dimensions to avoid standing waves.

Thanks to you (and everyone) for your input!

edit: I am not the Lone Ranger on this issue, as when you do a search on center channel issues, boomy male voices, dialog difficult to understand, you will find many complaints similar to mine.
 
#4 · (Edited)
Thanks for the input. It is most helpful. The Integra has not arrived yet. But the EQ for the center channel should address this issue. Yes, the male voices tend to be a bit boomy, not so much muddy in coloration. Almost like multiple octaves are being added to the tone. But it is not all male voices. Some are worse than others.

Another issue is when the speech gets quiet, it is nearly impossible to make out what is being said. Maybe this is a problem with most movie dialog in the center. There is never an issue with TV broadcasts.

Some movie soundtracks are nearly crystal clear without any of this boominess or unwanted coloration in the center channel. And some movie dialog tracks are very hard to understand.

We had some friends over for a screening of "Love & Mercy" recently. One person complained she could not hear the actors speaking, so I turned the center way up to compensate.

The Integra has Audyssey MultEQ XT32, which was the flagship version of the firms auto calibration, room correction compensation, using 8 mike locations for EQ.

If the new Integra processor can fix this, that new center speaker ($$$) will be returned. Amazon has a 30 day return policy.
 
#5 ·
Thanks for the input. It is most helpful. The Integra has not arrived yet. But the EQ for the center channel should address this issue. Yes, the male voices tend to be a bit boomy, not so much muddy in coloration. Almost like multiple octaves are being added to the tone. But it is not all male voices. Some are worse than others.

Another issue is when the speech gets quiet, it is neerly impossible to make out what is being said. Maybe this is a problem with most movie dialog in the center. There is never an issue with TV broadcasts.

Some movie soundtracks are nearly crystal clear without any of this boominess or unwanted coloration in the center channel. And some movie dialog tracks are very hard to understand.

We had some friends over for a screening of "Love & Mercy" recently. One person complained she could not hear the actors speaking, so I turned the center way up to compensate.

The Integra has Audyssey MultEQ XT32, which was the flagship version of the firms auto calibration, room correction compensation, using 8 mike locations for EQ.

If the new Integra processor can fix this, that new center speaker ($$$) will be returned. Amazon has a 30 day return policy.
Do you have Dynamic EQ engaged by chance? Try turning it off.

Sent from my Pixel using Tapatalk
 
#8 ·
there are several acoustic issues that lead to problems such as you described - mainly Impulse Response , Time Alignment, Room Acoustics - EQ'ing a speaker or adjusting the volume of a certain channel does not account for any of these issues - you merely have the same problem at lower or higher amplitude... most people just settle for putting a bandade on the most glaring issues .... when you hear a system that has been corrected of these problems is when you start to realize what you've been missing .....
 
#9 · (Edited)
I do not have my new Integra yet, so the EQ has not been tried yet.

The entire room is treated with acoustic panels, to greatly reduce "slap echo". The walls were constructed so they were not multiples of each other, to combat potential standing wave issues.

The center speaker is on the stage below the screen, angled so the speaker is in the plane with the listeners ears. We have seating for 13, on triple risers.

I would post a photo, but can't as I will not have my photos on a third party website.

You can see photos on this "other" forum...https://community.klipsch.com/index...-center-channel/&tab=comments#comment-2263322
 
#23 ·
Nice home theater system Oleson.
I got several center channel speakers, and got a "Boxy" sound with one of them.
It was a Kef coaxial speaker with a 16 cm diameter main speaker (very close to the diameter of your Klipsch speaker).

I tried to modify it and never succeeded completely.
The issue is that the 16cm speaker has a "Boxy" sound when driven in large configuration (full audio bandwidth).
One solution is to cut the frequency of the center channel with the equalizer (as proposed before in the forum).
A workaround is opening the speaker box and filling it with acoustic damping material, and/or modifying the bass reflex port tuning (reducing the aperture).
Best bass reflex port location is on the front or the side of the speaker (not at the back panel as it will interact with the wall).
Do not forget a good decoupling of the cabinet (damping feet).

Ultimate solution is having smaller diameter speakers: 13cm and 11cm are better suited for the medium according to my various tests.

It is very difficult to have a full bandwidth center channel efficient for all types of sound track.
Good luck with your tests.
 
#24 ·
I spent yesterday afternoon completely rearranging my theater audio installation. Several items were removed as they were no longer needed, or being used.

The Integra has a very nice menu for setting up your speakers. My wife and I literally took a tape measure, and measured each speaker distance from the "sweet spot" in the seating area.

We then applied the x-over points, with 200 hz being used for the center.

All speakers were then adjusted to the same volume output. I simply used my ears, then went up/down with the volume until it all sounded the same in relative output.

The center was EQ'd with a smooth roll off in the midrange area, around 2500 hz. Just enough to take some of the "edge" off, and allow the Klipsch to work seamlessly with the VMPS Towers. No other speakers were EQ'd, including the rear and side surround Klipsch 81's/61's.

All of this was done manually, without the help of the Audyssey MultEQ XT32.

So far, I am pleased with the results. The center is cleaned up in dialog presence.

On a side note, my NAD T163 is working perfectly now. The remote input is fully functional. If I had known this before, the Integra would not have been purchased. And the NAD is an awesome product. Their thought is music first, and that is my thinking also.

The new Panasonic DMP-UB900 in concert with the Integra DHC-80.3 is a powerful combination. The largest thing that strikes me is the low end impact. Not just car crashes / bomb blasts / special effects, but also the bass lines in recorded music. I would say more defined and with more presence than with the NAD T163 & Panasonic DMP-BD85.

Is all of the $$$ spent worth it? Time will tell. I was considering returning the Integra and putting the NAD back in the setup. The best bang for the buck was the five new Klipsch speakers installed, especially adding the rear left/right surrounds giving us 7.2. We previously had 5.2, never utilizing the 7.2 capability of the T163.

So far, I like it!
 
#25 ·
I recently replaced my RC-7 center channel and replaced with it with an RF-7 Tower so all 5 surround speakers would be RF-7 Towers. This has helped greatly with Dialogue clearness. I didn't realize it but the Klipsch Center speaker was Tingy on dialogue. The sound improvement has been awesome. Don't know if this is an option for you. I have a Sony 75" Z9D and modified RF-7 Box to fit under TV.
 
#26 ·
So far, the dialog has improved. But it is very dependent on the source material. I really did not need to buy the RC-64 II. We had two towers in the center before, set up head-to-head, wired in series (8 ohms).

With the new Integra, they would have been fine, maybe even better the the Klipsch center. The soundstage was to die for!
 
#27 ·
Update: While watching The Smithsonian Channel last night, the center dialog was a bit unclear, or slightly muddy, on both male and female voices.

When the commercial came on, the voices were bright and crystal clear.

I guess the marketing department knows how to do voices in the studio and engineer the soundtrack to work well!
 
#28 ·
The center channel dialog boominess might be coming from the sub(s). Many like to run their subs hotter than they should be which boosts the bass from the center channel too much. This will get worse the higher the crossover is set to. So try lowering the center channel crossover to 40Hz or just set the center channel to large. The purists might say you'll loose some low frequency effects coming through the center channel, but the benefits in dialog clarity greatly outweigh any such concerns.

One that's done, you might still have boomy bass and a "shoutiness" on the dialog. This is typical of a center speaker jammed up against the wall or in a cabinet. The boominess can be largely remedied by eq-ing out any peaks in the bass and providing a gentle rolloff from about 80Hz downwards. The "shoutiness" (in my case anyway) was due to a broad peak in the 300Hz to 900Hz range which again, can be eq'd down.
 
#30 ·
I would be curious to hear the outcome as well. I would guess that running Audyssey may have fixed the center channel issues. Of course that depends on whether it was a good measurement session as well.

As a previous owner of the same RC64ii I would not have described it as boxy at all. However that was also with Audyssey multxt32 engaged.
 
#31 ·
No, as we now have a brand new Yamaha Pre-Pro in the lineup. I did everything by ear, and the overall sound is killer. Had a group of 13 people over to watch Midway, in 4K. They were blown away, with the picture and audio quality.

Note that we are now all Klipsch. Dolby Atmos.
 
#36 ·
An update to an old thread...

With an all Klipsch speaker system (15 total), RC-64 II center, RF-7 III's L&R, I think the issue is solved.

The advice given has been taken. The freq's below 250 hz have been rolled off by 6+ db's. The 2500 hz area has been boosted a bit, 2.5 db's.

Using the Yamaha Pre-Pro CX-A 5200 ADVENTAGE, and tweaking all of the speakers for levels and EQ, the improvement is satisfying.

All adjustments were made manually, using my middle aged ears.

174837
 
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