There have been plenty of questions about this and suggestions on these forums in the past, but I thought I'd share my findings about routing my home cinema front channels through my stereo system, because my conclusion is that anyone with separate hifi and home cinema systems in the same room really should try this.
Background first (skip next 2 paragraphs if you're not interested!). When I first got in to home cinema (going back about 12 years here!) it was with a Yamaha DSP-E800 processor which was a DD/DTS processor with 3 channels of amplification built-in, and was specifically designed to be added to an existing 2-channel hi-fi system. I got the matching centre speaker for my front pair (PMC TB2s at the time) and I got some Mordaunt-Short di-polars rears (or were they bi-polar, I forget), and an REL Quake sub. All of this sounded pretty decent and certainly the novelty of suround sound won me over. Later I upgraded the Yamaha to an up to date Denon receiver, using exactly the same configuration as with the yamaha and it was a substantial improvement.
However over time I came to realise that the difference in tone between the mismatching amplification and speakers was quite noticeable. When I moved home I got rid of all the HC bits (except the sub) and started again fresh with a whole new system (Sony STR-DA3300ES and Monitor audio radius r180 * 5, later adding a pair or r90 as surround backs). This was more like it; I could tell that there was reduced weight and richness due to the smaller front speakers, but the whole sound was much more cohesive and generally better, so I have happily lived with this system for the last 3 years.
I got round to thinking recently though, that I needed to reduce the speaker-count in my lounge, because 10 speakers in a room is a little bit ridiculous, and I wanted to see if I could have a bit of a clear-out of some unneeded gear in order to start a Naim DAC fund...
So I tried routing the front L&R through my hifi once again. I disconnected the front 3 speakers from my AV amp, connected the front L&R pre-outs to the AV input on my SuperNait (going into Neat Momentum 31 speakers), fixed the amp volume level using the 'unity-gain' mode, and re-ran the auto set-up. It correctly recognised that I had no centre speaker attached (I figured the mismatch never would have never worked). I had to tweak the levels a bit manually afterwards. The improvement is absolutely vast. It sounded quite different so it took a little getting used to, but I've just been kicking myself for not trying this before. The only time the lack of a centre is noticeable is if you sit too far off axis, where the front-image is skewed towards the listener, but that's not an issue for us really.
The weight, power, detail and impact that the sound has now is just awesome and I'm really not noticing a mismatch between the fronts and the rears.
So - If you haven't tried this, then I seriously recommend that you do. I would still say that whether it works or is too compromised will depend heavily on your amp and speakers and how well they match to create a cohesive sound, and certainly it's better not to have a centre than have a mismatching one, but it could be the best free upgrade you ever made!
Background first (skip next 2 paragraphs if you're not interested!). When I first got in to home cinema (going back about 12 years here!) it was with a Yamaha DSP-E800 processor which was a DD/DTS processor with 3 channels of amplification built-in, and was specifically designed to be added to an existing 2-channel hi-fi system. I got the matching centre speaker for my front pair (PMC TB2s at the time) and I got some Mordaunt-Short di-polars rears (or were they bi-polar, I forget), and an REL Quake sub. All of this sounded pretty decent and certainly the novelty of suround sound won me over. Later I upgraded the Yamaha to an up to date Denon receiver, using exactly the same configuration as with the yamaha and it was a substantial improvement.
However over time I came to realise that the difference in tone between the mismatching amplification and speakers was quite noticeable. When I moved home I got rid of all the HC bits (except the sub) and started again fresh with a whole new system (Sony STR-DA3300ES and Monitor audio radius r180 * 5, later adding a pair or r90 as surround backs). This was more like it; I could tell that there was reduced weight and richness due to the smaller front speakers, but the whole sound was much more cohesive and generally better, so I have happily lived with this system for the last 3 years.
I got round to thinking recently though, that I needed to reduce the speaker-count in my lounge, because 10 speakers in a room is a little bit ridiculous, and I wanted to see if I could have a bit of a clear-out of some unneeded gear in order to start a Naim DAC fund...
So I tried routing the front L&R through my hifi once again. I disconnected the front 3 speakers from my AV amp, connected the front L&R pre-outs to the AV input on my SuperNait (going into Neat Momentum 31 speakers), fixed the amp volume level using the 'unity-gain' mode, and re-ran the auto set-up. It correctly recognised that I had no centre speaker attached (I figured the mismatch never would have never worked). I had to tweak the levels a bit manually afterwards. The improvement is absolutely vast. It sounded quite different so it took a little getting used to, but I've just been kicking myself for not trying this before. The only time the lack of a centre is noticeable is if you sit too far off axis, where the front-image is skewed towards the listener, but that's not an issue for us really.
The weight, power, detail and impact that the sound has now is just awesome and I'm really not noticing a mismatch between the fronts and the rears.
So - If you haven't tried this, then I seriously recommend that you do. I would still say that whether it works or is too compromised will depend heavily on your amp and speakers and how well they match to create a cohesive sound, and certainly it's better not to have a centre than have a mismatching one, but it could be the best free upgrade you ever made!
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