When we ordered our Ascends for our new HT, the plan was to place the center speaker behind an acoustically transparent screen. As the project progressed, various factors were discovered, such as marginal viewing distance if the screen was moved out 2+ feet to accommodate the center, that lead us to just paint the back wall and use it as our screen.

That has worked out fine, but I had ordered the 340SE center in vertical configuration. Experimentation has shown that there is s significant difference in sound if the center is oriented horizontally, especially off axis. That left me pondering my alternatives. Here they are, listed in order of most likely to least likely:

1. Use the speaker as is, in vertical orientation. The center sounds fine, but it is now at the bottom of the screen. Our screen is so low that vertically oriented, the speaker is only a few inches off the floor. That leads to two sub-optimum situations; the center is that much further away from the horizontal axis of the L/R mains and the tweeter and bottom woofer are further away from the actor's faces. Once you get involved in the movie, it's not noticeable, but usually at first I do notice it.

2. "Field modify" the center to be used in horizontal orientation. This is really where my question lies. What is the difference between a horizontal center and a vertical center? Is it driver orientation or more than that? Would it be possible to rotate the tweeter 90 degrees and then have a horizontal center?

3. Send the center back and either swap for a horizontal center or have Ascend modify it appropriately.

4. Mount the center above the screen in a vertical orientation. I need to do more precise measurements, but I'm afraid this may either be impossible or very difficult. Horizontal placement above the screen would be do-able. Since faces are usually closer to the top than the bottom of the screen it makes sense, but since our ability to locate sounds in a vertical plane is not great, I wonder if the difference would be worth the effort.

Any thoughts would be appreciated.

Doug