Josh,
Executive summary as I own both M55 and M3: They are both very nice but have different characters. M55 is more forward in the midrange, and you more desire a sub for the bottom. The M55 wins on looks. They are easily worth $150 but are not necessarily an “upgrade” from the M3.
Here’s the long story.
I was in exactly the same position as you are. I bought a pair of M3Ti to see what the buzz about Axiom was all about. They did not work out for my extreme nearfield monitoring idea (they need to be more than 2 feet away), but are wonderful in the family room with the TV. All the folks here keep going on about how good the M22s are and I want to try them, but $400 is a lot of money when I already spent the $275. And then here comes a pair of M55s on Audiogon for $150. I can swing that, but should I??? (This was along about last August).
Well, I did. They look beautiful. The fellow’s pictures on Audiogon today do them justice. It is a different person, BTW. They look way better than my M3s in Boston Cherry, because they are glossy, mostly. Also, the M3’s have each fallen off the stands and that is not good for the back corner and top edge that got dinged. The M55s look great on the shelf in my little studio. Yes, I still have to get farther than 2 feet away for the best sound, but I like them better than the Audix MM15s that I had before. They did not replace the M3s in the family room because they are even taller and narrower, and too good looking to risk them falling off the stands.
How do they sound? Different than the M3s. I had at most an hour of playing them side by side fairly loudly, and then the family came home. They cannot stand hearing the same passage over and over, so I quit the comparison. M55s have a little more midrange, let’s say between 900 Hz to 2 or 3 kHz. The bottom is a little less. You really really want a sub with them, where I am happy without one using the M3s for TV and movies. (My daughter was watching Pirates of the Caribbean on Christmas and I was again astonished at how much sound comes out of the little guys, even hearing it from the backside-not-optimum location.) Since I actually have no sub, I push in the silly loudness (and subsonic filter!) on the vintage Luxman receiver that drives the M55s, and it is not so bad. The efficiency is quite similar, but it is a little hard to compare the levels because of the different frequency response. The highs sound nice on both and the imaging, well I don’t remember if I found a difference. Both speakers are very good, but have a different character. As to accuracy, well that depends on your reference, which really depends on how the recording was made and mixed. That’s a whole different topic to not open here.
I would still love to hear the M22s. I tried to get my brother in law to get them when they are done remodeling their family room, but I don’t know if he will. Like 2x6spds, I am in Orange County and we could do a three way comparo with the M3, M55, and M22. I’ve got the RS meter and tone generator so we can set the levels equally at 1 KHz. Heck, Phil can do the burgers and I will bring the beer. Probably a few more amps too so we can feed the same signal to everybody at the same time, no speaker switching.
They are worth the $150 (did I say they were beautiful, and sound good too?) even if they may or may not sound much like the M22s. Best of luck trying to decide !!
Bryan
