center channel issues

[Tacitus]

Hi all. These are probably standard neophyte questions, but bear with, I've been only 2.0 for almost a decade.
I've got an Onkyo SR604 hooked up to the Polk RM6750 5.1 surround system. I've noticed that that the center speaker cracks or has slight distortion during certain points of dialogue- like when a word is spoken loudly, for example. What can be done to remedy this? Is this a speaker issue or a receiver setting issue?
And related to this, I've also noticed that occassionally dialogue is very hard to hear, even if the volume setting is loud. Should I increase the center channel output, or turn down the others to compensate?

Thanks.

[importantbrian]

I have this exact issue with a CSi3 center and RTi4s. I hope someone knows what the problem is.

[scottvamp]

Hey guys welcome to the forum. Center channels can be tricky. 80% of your frontstage comes from that center speaker. My first CS400, one of the largest centers Polk makes, I blew it with in minutes of recieveing it. It was either Lost in Space or Titan AE. With that said, make sure your reciever is set to small, calibrate your system and there is a good possability that you may have done some damage to the speaker. Notice the part of the movie and volume and use a different speaker and see if the problem is still thier.

PS I use dual CS400's centers my now.


Good Luck!

[importantbrian]

Yeah, I thought that my be the case so I checked it and the center is set to small, and is set the correct distance from my seating location. I also checked all the connections which seem to be fine. I'll try switching it to another speaker. It doesn't sound like anything is blown. I mean it only does it on certain voices.