Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Home Theater QS4s or M2s for surrounds

I know the multidirectionality of the qs4s make it a better speaker for surrounds - but for a little over half the price the M2s would sound very good as well.

Any thoughts? Advice? I am trying to save some bucks without having buyer's remorse.

Thanks

I Just purchased the m3's as my main surrounds and should be getting them this week end. I will also have a qs8 in the rear (6.1). Some people have told me to trade the m3's in and get the 8's;however, I will need to demo them out... will let you know how things work out later.

My system consists of M50s for mains, an inverted M3 as center and two M3s as surrounds.

The M3s and M50s are as perfect a match as can be found, short of all M3s or all M50s. I have absolutely accurate pans from speaker to speaker during sound transitioning.

My preference is toward more full range speakers in all locations, even if it cuts down on surround dispersion, so buyers remorse is not an issue

I have all speakers crossed at 60hz, cause the speakers told me to!

I seem to be the only one on these boards with this problem, so maybe it has something to do with my particular set-up, but another reason for crossing at 60hz is that it gets the dreaded voice component out of the sub that I consistently get when I cross at 80hz.

I am extreemly happy with the sound that I get with M3s as surrounds and center; but I can't help but think that if Axiom produced a QS series speaker with 6.5" drivers(not to mention a 6.5" drivered center)I'd surely want to give those a try to see if they could match what I have right now for seamlessness and full-range presentation, cause then, buyers remorse could surely kick in!

Plus I could move a couple of my M3s to my dining room system to replace the Brand X speakers that currently reside there!

Rich.

So, the QS4s have better directionality but the M2s might have more bass? I will have to check the specs.

Yep - M2s go down to 70 (+- 2 hz) while the QS4s only go down to 100hz. My sub crossover seems to do best at 80Hz - but I don't really know that for sure.

The M2s are a lot more bulky than the QS4s, though.

Hmm

I used to be a direct radiating (bookshelf) surround guy, and things sounded good when you were in the sweet spot. The bullits in action moves wizzed by ya, but when I went to Qs8's they feel like their going through ya A lot of people use direct radiating speakers because they also listen to a lot of music SACD and DVD-A, however, I find the Q's to do very well in that arena also.

If you think about movie theaters, the walls are lined with direct radiating speakers so your surrounded by the sound. Thats what is nice about the Qs4's or Qs8's, they do the same thing in one package.

If the room is fairly large already then the "illusion of larger room" difference between the M2s and QS4s will be much less. For a small room I would argue for QS4s really hard.

I slightly preferred M2s to QSxs for music, although I never got a chance to really A/B test them directly and be sure.

Cool, I didn't realize there was a corellation between room size and apparent effectivness of direct surrounds.

Good to know.

I have a fairly large room

Did Alan write that and I missed it






(Every time I read one of Alans' gems, I learn something, I gotta sit down and read them all. I've read some, but not all.....oops)

Nope, this is my personal opinion, unblessed by Alan. Not so much that the larger room makes the reflective surrounds less effective, just that one of the benefits of reflective surrounds becomes less important to you.

Several people have reported the same with rear speakers in a 7.1 system -- if you have to mount 'em on the wall right behind the sofa you had better get QS rear(s), but if you have several feet behind the sofa then direct speakers may be better. Again, this is for rears not surrounds...

Hey!! Good deal!!

Good theories always begin with a good opinion. And an opinion that backs up what I hope to be true is an opinion I can embrace!

I can dig it

I always have to chime in on the direct versus radiating surrounds. I am using M22's as surrounds in a 5.1 system and I LOVE them. I traded in my QS4's once I hooked up the 22's for surround. And yes I listen to a lot of music but what sold me on the direct surrounds was movies not music. The 22's can pack a punch as a surround and really impress me when it comes to surround elements such as rain, vehicles passing behind off camera, arrows and just about everything.

I don't know about the whole comparison with movie theaters for surround. I have never heard a movie theater that sounded anything close to as good as my home setup. I am certainly not trying to mimic what I hear in theaters.. . . otherwise I would just get some BOSE or something and be stoked!

So hear is one vote for the M2's or 3's over QS4's. Of course 80-90% of the people on this board would disagree with me but oh well. Perhaps they haven't tried a full range speaker as a surround or perhaps I am just different, I don't know. But I do know that I am very satisfied with my system for both music and movies.

Click on my name to see my system components.

Looks like were in agreement on lots of things....including how poor most theaters sound in comparison with a good home system

Glad to hear that I'm not alone on the desire for more full-range speakers,too!!
Rich.

Thanks for the input everyone.

My room is very narrow - about 7 feet seperating the surrounds. Maybe I need to go with the QS4s.

95% music in use.

The M2s would stick out more AND need about 2-3 inches behind them for their bass to sound right I believe. I might knowck my head on them daily if I go that direction.

DARN

let's see;.....if I had to choose between a questionable sound difference in a smaller room, and bumps bruses and contusions, I know for sure what I'd pick!

Far fewer sharp edges on the QS series alright

Funny, they don't advertise the lack of sharp edges on the product information page!

The QS4s are smaller - or at least look much smaller than the M2s with their slopes - so - maybe I will just buy one at a time from b-stock.

>>95% music in use.

If your system is going to be used for 95% music then it might make more sense to configure a 5.1 music system instead, with M2s behind the couch rather than beside it. That will take better advantage of the room size, will be ideal for music, and will also be pretty decent (but not ideal) for movies.

Do you have some distance behind the couch ?

Hmm

The way it is set up now - the M22s are slightly in front of the couch, the M2 is over the couch, the Athena surrounds are about 10 feet away. In other words - the M22s are aimed away from the couch, as is the M2 - toward where I sit.

My wife is usually on the couch and doesn't care about surround sound. I usually sit at the dining room table which is more or less between the surrounds.

The kitchen is in back of me - back wall is about 12 feet behind me.

I could possibly put M2s back there instead of QS4s parrellel with my head. They would be a ways back though.

Against my better judgment - here is the living room / dining room as taken from the kitchen - after a month or so of my two year old redecorating and no guests coming over. (what a mess).

Picture taken from the kitchen. Just a link - not a picture - I have some shame!

http://www.8th-day.org/contactus.htm - look at the bottom of the page.

link

Ahh, now I get it. I wrongly assumed the couch was the primary listening position, so substitute "sweet spot" everywhere I said couch

If you were going to do heavy movie watching I would say that is DEFINITELY a room that would take full advantage of QS surrounds. For mostly music, though, I'm not so sure...

If you are pretty sure you are going to stay mostly with music I would go for M2s behind you, either on the back wall or the side walls.

If you wanted a "least cost" experiment for music you could try :

- make sure the receiver can handle "phantom center", ie setting the center speaker to NONE splits the signal between the mains

- pick up a single M2 and use your existing center to get a pair

- mount the two speakers well behind you on the side walls if possible

Again, if there is any chance of your family watching relatively more movies you are probably better off going with QSs...

Convenient link added by bugbitten -

oh darn - now even more people will see it!

Actually, thanks for the link Bugbitten.

And now for your amazement and amusement - the kitchen area in this God-forsaken 7'x20some' room

Same link as earlier

I guess I always though music coming from behind you wouldn't be heard well - ear structure is in the way.

????????????????

I had used full range speakers in the past as surrounds. I had Mirage M3-si speakers for mains and Mirage 895is for surrounds. The only difference between the front and rear speakers was that the rear speakers lacked the 10" driver and were physically smaller. Otherwise they were all full range bi-polar speakers.

Part of the issue I had with bipolar speakers for home theater was the inability to "pinpoint" where the sound was coming from. When I first auditioned the M5-si (smaller brother to the M3-si) I loved what it did for the music in a two-channel setup. However, in a home theater setup the sound became a little too "vague".

I should mention that they were in a small room and likely dipole speakers would have performed better, however I was unjustifiably put off at the price of such a small speaker compared to the full range speaker. I couldn't fathom paying the same money for a speaker that could not produce the same range of sounds. My inexperience at the time.

I tend to agree with Bridgman's advice on small full range speakers for the rears (if you have the distance) with the disclaimer of the smaller "sweet spot" of the direct radiating speakers.

Unfortunately since almost every room construction and layout differ to some varying degree, there appear to be no formulas for a specific installs. Best to experiment. Perhaps you can also use the listening experience of a high quality movie theater as your reference when selecting speakers to try and achieve "that type of sound".

quote:

"I should mention that they were in a small room and likely dipole speakers would have performed better, however I was unjustifiably put off at the price of such a small speaker compared to the full range speaker. I couldn't fathom paying the same money for a speaker that could not produce the same range of sounds. My inexperience at the time."

Sounds like my room and question and inexperience almost exactly. Thanks.

Small room = need dipole (or quad pole)