Help!
I've got an old Harman Kardon AVS20MKII receiver, with an Apex 660 DVD player, and just two front speakers. I know, nothing special. Well, I've been thinking about adding a center channel speaker (apartment living - no room for the rears! and the neighbors won't appreciate a sub!).
Reason being, on a number of discs, movie dialogue sounds somewhat muted compared to the left/right channels. In particular, the Vampire Hunter D:Bloodlust disc is way out of proportion (although this is a special case - apparently it was mastered with a 5.1 track ONLY, ie. no DD 2.0). Still, it's not just this disc; I figure that a center should help movie dialogue across the board, and I s'pose I'd like that warm fuzzy feeling of knowing that I'm getting (pseudo) DD 5.1 somehow.
I guess I am hoping for a Dolby 3 Stereo setup (or something like it), where dialogue goes to the center, and the surround effects are mixed in with the mains.
The receiver is just Pro-Logic, but it does at least have preamp-in jacks for the front pair. The DVD player just has RCA-out (well, it has digital coax too, but the receiver doesn't).
So, the obvious answer seems to be to plunk down $ for a DD receiver - but even then, I'm not sure that I'll be able to get by with just 3 speakers? What happens if I'm missing the rears and sub?
Alternatively, since the build quality on this Apex is OK but not the best, could I get a DVD player which does DD decoding, and route that to the HK somehow?
Or, is it possible with my current setup, and I've just got things wired wrong?
Please enlighten me if you can! FWIW, I'm sure that this is FAQ material *somewhere* - but searching on "dvd dolby digital receiver pro logic" etc. just returns oceans of results.
Anyway, thanks for reading,
Brian
I've got an old Harman Kardon AVS20MKII receiver, with an Apex 660 DVD player, and just two front speakers. I know, nothing special. Well, I've been thinking about adding a center channel speaker (apartment living - no room for the rears! and the neighbors won't appreciate a sub!).
Reason being, on a number of discs, movie dialogue sounds somewhat muted compared to the left/right channels. In particular, the Vampire Hunter D:Bloodlust disc is way out of proportion (although this is a special case - apparently it was mastered with a 5.1 track ONLY, ie. no DD 2.0). Still, it's not just this disc; I figure that a center should help movie dialogue across the board, and I s'pose I'd like that warm fuzzy feeling of knowing that I'm getting (pseudo) DD 5.1 somehow.
I guess I am hoping for a Dolby 3 Stereo setup (or something like it), where dialogue goes to the center, and the surround effects are mixed in with the mains.
The receiver is just Pro-Logic, but it does at least have preamp-in jacks for the front pair. The DVD player just has RCA-out (well, it has digital coax too, but the receiver doesn't).
So, the obvious answer seems to be to plunk down $ for a DD receiver - but even then, I'm not sure that I'll be able to get by with just 3 speakers? What happens if I'm missing the rears and sub?
Alternatively, since the build quality on this Apex is OK but not the best, could I get a DVD player which does DD decoding, and route that to the HK somehow?
Or, is it possible with my current setup, and I've just got things wired wrong?
Please enlighten me if you can! FWIW, I'm sure that this is FAQ material *somewhere* - but searching on "dvd dolby digital receiver pro logic" etc. just returns oceans of results.
Anyway, thanks for reading,
Brian