Importance of Center Channel in small room

Center channel is needed for off axis listening - especially far outside the sweetspot. If you sit in the sweetspot then you are actually better off without one of those horizontally mounted center channels under the screen.

Think about it - would you listen to stereo with one speaker turned upsside down => that is the equivalent effect of a center channel that sits two feet below the mains...it creates all kinds of problems...

Funny though some people on the other forums HATE center channels and always prefer phantom.

Yes indeed - a large number of audio studio professionals do not like center channels - although not many will admit it, after all multi-channel mixing is all additional business to many of them. They mix with identical speakers all at the same height but many prefer the sound without a center - Chesky is a good example.

Remember that in order to move the location of a sound you need 10 DB extra loudness...in fact our ears tend to place things in the soundstage mostly by time arrival. Therefore you don't need to sit in the sweetspot to get excellent imaging provided you are far enough back!

In a small room the geometry is inevitably going to be less forgiving.