2.1 or 5.1 is better?

[mdram]

How does that work? Is there a special 3-channel encoding format? Or does the receiver matrix the right / left channels to create a center channel?

sorry, been away. the avr maps those other channels to a speaker that is there
a decent avr does wonders

most broadcasts are 5.1, some are in stereo.

 

[shortylickens]

I do t think it was very popular. Didn’t 7.1 come out quickly after? Not sure how many movies have 6.1 soundtracks either.

Nope. 6.1 was around for a long time before 7.1, but I dont know how popular it was if at all.

 

[alcoholbob]

Wasn't 6.1 just DTS-ES? And the extra 6th channel IIRC was just matrixed from the rear outputs, not an actual discrete channel.

 

[purbeast0]

As someone else mentioned, maybe check out the used speaker market. I saved like $5k on my 7 speakers because I bought used.