Surround speakers

[LampCord]

Just wondering people's thoughts on which way to go with surrounds: HTM-200's or CBM-170's.

My listening room is 20x12 feet, thick carpet, padded furniture in case that matters.

I'll be using 340's accross the front.

Seems like the CBM's would have more bass and be a better match but the 200's seem like they were more designed to be surround speakers.

[JohnnyCasaba]

I think the general consensus is that either can be used for surrounds but unless you have placement issues which dictates use of a smaller or sealed surround speaker, with the small price difference between the 2, get the 170's. FWIW, I have 4 170's with the 340c.

[LampCord]

I think the general consensus is that either can be used for surrounds but unless you have placement issues which dictates use of a smaller or sealed surround speaker, with the small price difference between the 2, get the 170's. FWIW, I have 4 170's with the 340c.

Yeah, placement shouldn't be a problem for me, I already have a couple pretty good stands I'm using with my JBL's. Seems like they should work well with either Ascend speaker but I will probably need some Blu-Tack or similar substance.

[bikeman]

Seems like the CBM's would have more bass and be a better match but the 200's seem like they were more designed to be surround speakers.

I'm going with the 200's for a couple of reasons. They fit my current stands and the 170's don't. I have to move the surrounds out of the way when not in use and the 200's will be easier to move.
If I was going for multi-channel music, I go with the 170's.

David

[BGHD]

I tried 170s and 200s as side surrounds and found the main difference with multichannel music only. When blasting a couple movies with the 2 (e.g. Matrix, AOTC, etc), no noticeable difference to me. I'm about 50/50 HT/music, so I went with 170s as side surrounds (340s as LCR). But, I wouldn't be unhappy with the 200s if I were slightly WAF/space/aesthetics-limited, even for multichannel music. They still sounded very good.