Background: I'm planning on buying a set of Axioms for a brand-new HT room (13'x23'x7'8", though the listening area is only ~13'x13') -- new HT, that is, not new room. I have a feeling that a M22ti/VP150/QS4 combination would fill the room with sound just fine, especially as this is a townhouse and I'm not going to be knocking the walls down with full-out 120 watts per channel any time soon, much less 175. But I'm looking to get the *best* sound I can for a reasonable budget, so my current target is M60ti/VP150/QS4 (plus an HSU STF-2), as so many people say the VP150 is worth the extra (and it's not *that* much extra), and the M60s -- well, it just seems like towers are, well, more appropriate -- I somehow expect a fuller sound (albeit with no justification for that). The price of the whole system is getting marginally out of hand, though (going with a $3000 projector, for one thing), so I'm going back through and seeing what I can trim. One possibility was switching the M60tis to M22tis. That's a silly question to ask, though -- it's been asked many times, and the answer seems to be more or less "well, if you have the extra money, spend it". So since I've seen many praises of the QS8 over the QS4 as well, I'll pose this question in a more interesting way: given a decent sub, would you prefer M60tis+QS4s or M22tis+QS8s? I'm not a true audiophile, but I want my music and movies to sound *good*.
My sources are 70% movies, 30% music -- I want a really immersive HT experience, but I actually care about the *sound* of the music a bit more than the movies. Not planning on doing DVD-A or SACDs any time soon, though; straight CDs as a source for music.
I've decided against the QS8s so far because one, I don't need the extra power, and two, it just seems that surrounds aren't nearly as important as mains in 98% of movie scenes, not to mention 2-channel music; especially not enough to justify spending more on surrounds than mains. OTOH, it seems that in my situation (M22s delivering sufficient power, and a sub present), the improvement of the M60s over the M22s may be marginal or even nil (though I'm a bit worried I'd regret this decision later -- and I'm hoping not to have to upgrade at all for the better part of a decade).
But again, I'll put the question more simply: M60/QS4 or M22/QS8 (given a sub either way)?
Thanks for reading this far -- and even more for any insights!
