Jan Loosman reported special speaker setup for 8-channel surround sample sets, which proved convincing and realistic sounding. His report, including the photos of his setup below. Thank you, Jan!
Alternative routing of the most distant front perspectives to additional side channels.
The latest 8 channel sets offer besides the rear perspective, 3 front perspectives which can be mixed through the front speakers to suit your taste. The most distant front perspective however is recorded in the middle of the church and can also be successfully used to feed independent side channels to imitate this position in a Hauptwerk setup. The results are remarkable.
The soundfield will now furthermore extend to the side and above. This gives a more genuine impression of the space in the church, more sense of reality. There is more.
Like adding rear channels which gives more authenticity to the front channels, adding additional side channels improves this effect furthermore. Stops are better situated in the virtual space now, and sound more natural. The sensation is much more playing the real thing now, more convincing!
So, routing the most distant front perspective to the dedicated side channels is another option how to use the 8 channel sets successfully.
Note by Sonus Paradisi: This reminds me of another user, who reported some time ago, he was routing the distant perspective to additional speakers positioned high above the front speakers. He swore the soundfield being deeper with a better localization of the pipes (compared to the mixing all the front perspectives into a single pair of speakers).