Speech vs background sounds help needed

[macmurchu]

Hi lads
I have an Onkyo txsr608x receiver and Klipsch speakers in a 5.1 setup. No matter what I am watching it is so hard to clearly hear speech without having the volume way up to the point where as soon as dramatic music or any loud effects come in it would be considered too loud. This happens no matter what listening mode I select on the receiver and the speakers appear to be working fine. Output level on the subwoofer is at minimum as well.

Any help greatly appreciated
Cheers

 

[Leemix]

Hi lads
I have an Onkyo txsr608x receiver and Klipsch speakers in a 5.1 setup. No matter what I am watching it is so hard to clearly hear speech without having the volume way up to the point where as soon as dramatic music or any loud effects come in it would be considered too loud. This happens no matter what listening mode I select on the receiver and the speakers appear to be working fine. Output level on the subwoofer is at minimum as well.

Any help greatly appreciated
Cheers

I assume this is a problem for most of what you watch, not just one movie/show.
How is the center spaker placed, a good description or a picture(best) will help us help you. Also a description of the room and whats in it, is it carpeted/rug on floor between your head and center speaker etc?
Have you tried both with and without room correction?(is the reciever set up right with the auto setup?)

You can try to increase the volume on the center channel 1 to 5 dB, this will increase volume for most dialogue but not effects that are usually in the other channels.

Is your hearing impaird?


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[lovinthehd]

Could be a few things. Could be simply the mix of the movies, meant for playback at a fairly high level. Could be your hearing. Could be center speaker placement and/or level. How did you setup the speakers with the avr for delay (distance) and level? Did you run Audyssey to help or did you set them up some other way? Have you tried raising center level some to compensate?

 

[Verdinut]

I assume this is a problem for most of what you watch, not just one movie/show.
How is the center spaker placed, a good description or a picture(best) will help us help you. Also a description of the room and whats in it, is it carpeted/rug on floor between your head and center speaker etc?
Have you tried both with and without room correction?(is the reciever set up right with the auto setup?)

You can try to increase the volume on the center channel 1 to 5 dB, this will increase volume for most dialogue but not effects that are usually in the other channels.

Is your hearing impaird?


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

On Page 24 Section 2 of the manual, OP can read instructions on how to proceed for increasing Center channel volume.

 

[ryanosaur]

Treading carefully here... but how many "issues" have been raised recently about this specific topic... Especially in regards to the big K's Center Speakers? I'm beginning to redevelop my distaste for them, I'm afraid. Perhaps we should have a sticky thread about Center Speaker Design Qualities and Performance, and how many complaints are posted about specific designs?

I agree with what's been said previously, re:
Speaker Placement
AVR Setup
Automated Room Correction programs

However, in terms of all of that, nothing will alleviate a poorly designed speaker. This is the 3rd or 4th recent post about K's Center Speaker and poor speech band performance.

@macmurchu: do please see if you can get a photo of your front setup posted as this will help us to help you in terms of speaker placement issues. Likewise, it may be beneficial to wipe and re-run any room correction you have done already, just to eliminate a poor testing by the AVR, for example. If you have not done room correction. please try it: it can always be undone... but in terms of setting distances and level, most seem to do a decent job.

Cheers!

 

[WaynePflughaupt]

What Verdinut said. Might also try some EQ as well, if the receiver allows independent adjustment for each channel. Boosting 3-4 dB in the 2 kHz range in the center channel speaker could help.

Regards,
Wayne A. Pflughaupt

 

[TLS Guy]

Treading carefully here... but how many "issues" have been raised recently about this specific topic... Especially in regards to the big K's Center Speakers? I'm beginning to redevelop my distaste for them, I'm afraid. Perhaps we should have a sticky thread about Center Speaker Design Qualities and Performance, and how many complaints are posted about specific designs?

I agree with what's been said previously, re:
Speaker Placement
AVR Setup
Automated Room Correction programs

However, in terms of all of that, nothing will alleviate a poorly designed speaker. This is the 3rd or 4th recent post about K's Center Speaker and poor speech band performance.

@macmurchu: do please see if you can get a photo of your front setup posted as this will help us to help you in terms of speaker placement issues. Likewise, it may be beneficial to wipe and re-run any room correction you have done already, just to eliminate a poor testing by the AVR, for example. If you have not done room correction. please try it: it can always be undone... but in terms of setting distances and level, most seem to do a decent job.

Cheers!

I don't think it is all about the Ks except that the crossover point is at the worst possible place for speech intelligibility.

Basically because of commercial constraints, most centers are horizontal MTMs. That give a narrow horizontal dispersion and a wide vertical one. This makes for adverse ceiling floor and also screen reflections.

Really there are only four options a good center design.

1). A good full range driver.

2). A good coaxial design.

3). A good three way design preferably with the mid range driver covering the entire speech discrimination band

4). A vertical and not horizontal array with an appropriate lobing pattern.

As far as I'm concerned there are no other options. So most centers are ruled out of court and fatally compromised off the drawing board.

As I keep pointing out the center speaker is the greatest design challenge of the lot.

 

[snakeeyes]

I don't think it is all about the Ks except that the crossover point is at the worst possible place for speech intelligibility.

Basically because of commercial constraints, most centers are horizontal MTMs. That give a narrow horizontal dispersion and a wide vertical one. This makes for adverse ceiling floor and also screen reflections.

Really there are only four options a good center design.

1). A good full range driver.

2). A good coaxial design.

3). A good three way design preferably with the mid range driver covering the entire speech discrimination band

4). A vertical and not horizontal array with an appropriate lobing pattern.

As far as I'm concerned there are no other options. So most centers are ruled out of court and fatally compromised off the drawing board.

As I keep pointing out the center speaker is the greatest design challenge of the lot.

So with #3, the midrange driver would cover 80hz to at least 300hz?

 

[ryanosaur]

I don't think it is all about the Ks

*laughs
Indeed... as I said... trying to tread carefully. Not interested in a bashing war. Just noticing a recent, ummm, trend?, shall we say.

This is unfortunately a too-frequent topic, though.

 

[TLS Guy]

So with #3, the midrange driver would cover 80hz to at least 300hz?

No! It needs 400 to 500 Hz range out to 3.5 to 4.0 KHz range.

 

[ryanosaur]

So with #3, the midrange driver would cover 80hz to at least 300hz?

The speech band is (iirc) 300-3000Hz. I suspect the absolute lowest and highest could be covered by other drivers if the XO is executed properly... Perhaps the Good Doctor could comment more on this... but it seems that maybe from 800 to 2500 is the most sensitive for this.

 

[snakeeyes]

No! It needs 400 to 500 Hz range out to 3.5 to 4.0 KHz range.

Thanks.

 

[ryanosaur]

No! It needs 400 to 500 Hz range out to 3.5 to 4.0 KHz range.

Thank you!

 

[snakeeyes]

Hmm so Paradigm Premier 500c was reviewed. It’s crossover at 600hz was mentioned in the review by @shadyJ

https://www.audioholics.com/tower-speaker-reviews/paradigm-800f

 

[shadyJ]

Hmm so Paradigm Premier 500c was reviewed. It’s crossover at 600hz was mentioned in the review by @shadyJ

https://www.audioholics.com/tower-speaker-reviews/paradigm-800f

For the record, while I do agree with TLS guy on many aspects of speaker design, we haven't ever fully agreed about the audibility of phase distortion which is where is feels that the midrange driver should cover such a large range in 3-way designs. I don't think that phase discontinuity is a big deal so long as amplitude response is even and group delay doesn't become too severe. I think you could have a crossover point right in the middle of what TLS Guy calls the speech discrimination band, and the speaker can still sound very good (assuming the crossover is well-executed).