{"id":93935,"date":"2018-09-27T05:00:14","date_gmt":"2018-09-27T12:00:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.highdefdigest.com\/blog\/?p=93935"},"modified":"2019-01-28T13:37:49","modified_gmt":"2019-01-28T21:37:49","slug":"front-wide-speakers-poll","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.highdefdigest.com\/blog\/front-wide-speakers-poll\/","title":{"rendered":"Poll: Do You Use Front Wide Speakers?"},"content":{"rendered":"

In all the years I’ve had surround sound, I’d never given much thought to implementing Front Wide speakers between my main Left and Right channels and the Surround speakers. Recently, however, I gave it some consideration. Does anyone here use Front Wides? Is it worth the effort?
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This train of thought started as a result of my idly perusing the Electronics section of my local Craig’s List, where I spotted a pair of bookshelf speakers that are part of the same model range and were designed as a timbre match for my main tower speakers. I didn’t really need<\/em> them (my existing speakers are all perfectly fine), but they’re prettier to look at than my other Surround speakers and the deal was too good to pass up. (In fact, I wound up spending more to buy new stands for them than I did on the speakers themselves.) After picking up the speakers, I put them in the Surround Left and Surround Right positions to the sides of my seating and pulled my prior speakers from those spots out of service.<\/p>\n

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This leaves me with two perfectly good speakers I’m not doing anything with. (Actually, I have a bunch of spare speakers I’m not currently using, but these would really stand out as a waste of potential.) The idea of that gnawed away at me until I started considering the idea of moving the new speakers to the Front Wide positions and putting my previous speakers back where they started at the Surrounds.<\/p>\n

Planning this out, I ultimately realized that it wouldn’t be feasible. Although my Denon AVR-X8500H receiver is the flagship model capable of decoding 13 channels of Dolby Atmos surround sound, I’m already at the processing limit with a 7.1.6 setup. I thought about removing the Surround Backs for a 5.1.6(+W) configuration, but it turns out the receiver doesn’t support that. If you engage Front Wide speakers, Atmos and DTS:X are restricted to decoding only four height channels, even if you’re still within the 13-channel limit. The only way to use Front Wides is to scale back to 5.1.4(+W) or 7.1.4(+W). The main reason I upgraded to the X8500H is for 6 height channel decoding, and I’m not giving that up. I guess I’m sticking with 7.1.6.<\/p>\n

This leaves me wondering if I’m really missing anything, of course. I know that some people who have Front Wide speakers really love them. What’s the consensus among our readers? Are Front Wide speakers are worthy upgrade or a waste of time?<\/p>\n

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Do You Use Front Wide Speakers?<\/strong><\/p>