Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Home Theater Directional or surround

I've heard at a friends house how Axiom can really shine in a acoustic friendly envirement. I have a somewhat large room, approx. 3,200 cubic feet with open beam ceiling hardwood floors and my M80's have to placed in a corner to boot. They sound different than my friends. We're both using Onkyo 801's. His room is carperted with wood shutters and a 9 foot ceiling. My question to this knowledgable group is would I be better off with directionial/bookshelf speakers or continue to use the QS8's.

If you are a big movie watcher I would stick with the QS8's, you might try to add a carpet or another treatment in the room to change the acoustics.

I think the QS8s would still be the way to go. For movies in a large room, directionals *can* work well if you can get them far enough away from the listening position that you can get some reflected sound as well, but I don't think there would be many situations where they would sound *better* than the QS8s.

In other words, I don't think you *need* directionals for a large room, just that you can get away with them and give up less relative to something like QS8s.

Put some more soft stuff in the room. Failing that, get a couple of big dogs

Hi N24color,

Axiom has run multiple extensive tests and in each and every situation its Quadpolar “QS” surround is always a better choice than a direct radiating or di-pole speaker. Stick with your QS8 and try pulling it away from the corner as much as possible; an 18 inch distance from an adjacent wall should normally be applied.

Good luck !

The 8s work great even in an odd shaped room!

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They sound different than my friends. We're both using Onkyo 801's. His room is carperted with wood shutters and a 9 foot ceiling.

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This is not surprising.
I've had my entire Axiom setup in three different locations now and the sound varied amongst each room. Our old basement room was the worst for acoustics. We had a bit of trouble trying to get imaging to work properly because of the limited space. Given the large size of your room this should not be a problem and it should allow for more successful tweaking of speaker placement. Try rearranging the locations of surrounds and mains based on the numerous suggestions already listed in the forums or in Alan's monthly Audiofile articles.
The direct firing speaker may not provide a solution over the QSx surround design.

To date my personal opinion is that large, hard walled rooms with little absorption points which are highly reflective are not particularly flattering to creating a nice sound for music. I know, i have one.