Rob V

I have a nice 5.1 Atlantic Technology surround system (about 12 years old) in my great room. I'm looking for a sound-bar to replace the center speaker (which is pretty bulky). Can a sound bar be used as a center speaker only? I cannot use a sound bar as my only speaker because the room is too big and open.

Any ideas or recommendations are appreciated!

Spiky

They should be able to be used as a center in straight stereo mode. AT makes a few sound bars, probably has the best chance of matching your other speakers' voice.

The 3 front and center speakers really should match to give the best surround. Sounds like you've had a pretty nice setup for a long time. Swapping the most important channel to TV/movies to something that sounds different may mess up your imaging quite a bit with different timbre/voice. I played with many different setups before finally getting a matched set and the difference was quite noticeable to me.

Rob V

Thanks Spiky... I've got a great setup but my TV is old and is being replaced. My speakers are giant towers and the center speaker cannot be mounted. I appreciate the advice about keeping the center and L/R's the same.

Spiky

What are you switching from/to? There's always a way to mount something. For instance, you might be able to place the TV on top of the speaker, new ones are pretty light.

soundman2

If you already have a center channel that is good and matched to the fronts. You should consider keeping it.

If you have a TV console - you could keep the center ( bulky ) channer on the console just in front of TV - that is what I did. Of course you would have to adjust TV height so the speaker does not block the view - you could raise/adjust the TV stand or raise the TV by keeping a say wooden block underneath.