Is there a way to route the preview audio to the Center speaker? When working on a 5.1 edit/mix I would like the previews (using the preview tool or in the media bay) to come out of the center channel. Mainly when working on Dialogue editing. I know it is possible to use the Phones channel for this (prefs/control room-> Use phones channel as preview channel), but I would like to keep my phones channel as a dedicated output for my headphones. Any suggestions?
This may be too simple, but can’t you set the monitor output in the Control Room to be independent of the rest? Then you keep your headphone output. And under the outputs the 5.1 configuration.
Do not know what you use for hadware. Otherwise it would also be a possibility to control it externally?
That won’t work I’m afraid. I don’t have any external hardware for my control room. I use the Nuendo control room for all my monitoring, including a 5.1 setup, a stereo B-monitor set, headphones, cue and talkback. I have a focusrite audio interface. My main mix busses (5.1 and 2.0 downmix) aren’t connected to physical outputs.
It would be nice if you could select how a preview is being monitored, besides the option to use the headphone channel for this (which I could route to the center speaker). Especially when doing dialogue editing on centerspeaker it is a bit annoying that previews (such as DOP, preview tool and mediabay) are routed to the L/R monitors. It would be cool if you could select the center speaker for this.
I agree with you: It would be great if there was a separate entry for the preview function in the audio connections. Then you could route it to any output you want. Make this suggestion to Steinberg. Maybe they will listen to you. 
But while we wait for Steinberg, we need another solution. 
This is not necessary. But you could then set the inputs/outputs and the control room independently. They can also share the same connections. (As long as you remove the exclusive assignment in the program settings.) Maybe this separation would bring advantages? (But you have to know that yourself. I don’t know your needs enough to recommend a new configuration of your ports.)
Why don’t you do that? And for your “real headphones” you create a new bus. This will not be called “headphones” in Nuendo. But as long as it is connected to the headphones, it doesn’t matter.
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I know what the options are regarding routing physical outputs. (I’ve been using Nuendo intensively since N3). I could use the Phones channel for previewing and route that to the center channel by removing the exclusive assignment. But I also use the Phones channel in the control room to monitor through headphones. I could create another monitor output bus and route this to my headphones output. I will see if that works for me.
I didn’t mean to get too close to you. How long and intensively you use Nuendo, I can not know.
Maybe someone has another idea. I keep my fingers crossed that there will be a solution for your problem soon.
Can you set up an output path that downmixes to mono and outputs to center channel only? I know it means having to switch whenever you want to do this, but it’d be a solution though, no?
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@MAS No worries! Although I know many ins and outs of Nuendo I’m still discovering new options and features every now and then. And suggestions or solutions from other users are always welcome.
@MattiasNYC: Maybe. But I’m not sure if this works with previewing audio, which appears to be routed to controlroom separately.
Okay, I found a way to make this work. But it involves using the mixer functionality of my audio interface.
I activated the “Use phones channel as preview”, and created a button for this option on my Avid control app (iPad), to toggle this function on/off. But…
It is not possible to route multiple control room sources (i.e. Center channel and phones preview) to a single hardware output. Even with the “exclusive Device ports for monitor channels” deselected. This option only refers to routing Main and Group bus outputs directly to hardware outputs.
So I had to use the mixer of my audio interface, mixing the “center” channel output of the control room together with the “phones” output (mono downmix) to my center speaker. Now I can select to have the preview sent to the regular stereo monitor output, or tot the center monitor output.
I also created a third monitor output (the first being the 5.1 setup, the second being a stereo B-monitor setup),which is routed to the headphone output of my interface, thus allowing me to still use headphones by selecting this monitor output in the control room.
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Glad you found a solution for you. 
We often use an external solution as well (e.g. ASIO Link Pro) when Nuendo doesn’t want to work the way we want it to. 
Yes, unfortunately this does not work within the CR. Just recently had a situation where I wish it was possible.
We use the function to use the same outputs in the CR as for the output buses.