[comabereni]

I guess this is called "front channel stacking". Paradigm Atoms, as nice as they are by themselves, and as improved as the sound becomes after adding a pair of 8" sealed subwoofers, sound even better after I add a pair of Ensemble satellites (Cambridge Soundworks) to the same front-channel signal.

I had no intention of ever using the Ensemble satellites again--they sound thin in the midrange, a little bright, and must be placed relatively close to the woofers to sound coherent. Atoms, on the other hand, shine in the midrange, are probably a bit thick in the upper bass region and a little rolled off on the top. Playing both pairs on the front channel simultaneously results in a noticeably better overall sound as each pair of speakers seemingly fills in and corrects for the deficiencies of the other. In addition, the soundstage is improved without getting into gimmicky signal processing. I'm going to experiment a bit more with placement for best overall effect.

Anyone else try this successfully? I'm guessing I got lucky. Thinking logically, it can't be much different than going from a bookshelf speaker with fewer drivers to a tower with more, only speaker matching would be more hit-and-miss compared with driver matching in a lab. I read where a guy doubled up his Totems and the result wasn't as good as a single pair. My main curiosity at this point is what detrimental effects might potentially result from duplicating the midrange and treble (though the ill-effects in this case would be theoretical and superceded by what I'm hearing--it IS better).

-coma

 

[ooheadsoo]

There are combing effects that you will encounter. The dispersion pattern will change, usually for the worse. There will be cancellations in frequency response as you change your listening position. But you may have lucked out, who knows, but chances are it doesn't measure very well