[Viffermike]

Originally Posted by Solarphil

I wanted to chime in with my .02 on this upgrade. The Eton's aren't perfect, they're a bit restrained (brings to mind British audiophile speakers of a certain vintage) with a slightly depressed midrange, but by God they're clean and accurate compared to the stock HK; a world better. I listen to most of my stuff through an iPod Classic, and through a fluke of BMW's interface each time I mess with the USB socket the first song up in the queue is Sleigh Bells' A/B Machines, which is a bit of a test for a system's bass response. With the stock speakers it was all hissy piss and flatulence. After the upgrade, even my daughter said she likes that song. Similarly, Peter Gabriel's live version of Shaking the Tree before was just muddy water, but now it's clean and clear. I can hear when Tony Levin's bass transfers from the Etons over to the stock mid-subs and it gets a little blatty, but in general it's really, really livable.

So in short, yes unplugging the center channel is a no-brainer. For a hundred bucks, the JL's can't be argued with. However, most of the music is coming from the front, unless you're a passenger in the back. My experience with music is to spend the majority of your hard-earned shekels on the speakers that are right in front of you, you'll get the biggest bang for your buck that way.

But hey, that's just my thoughts, and I did the JL's last. If you did them first and they work for you, then that's cool. That's why they make both chocolate and vanilla ;-)

Yup, yup, yup.

(Incidentally, my iPhone's first song is Genesis' "Abacab", which starts off with that Doppler-esque synth flourish, followed by semi-grating guitar fills and the song's signature Moog quarter-note mid-bass metronomal riff. It's actually a good test of a system's sonic tautness and detail. Sooo much better with my Hertz's in!)