Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Home Theater M22 for a Large Room

Time for me to start thinking about upgrading.

Right now I have a mish-mash of equipment, 20 year old Sony mains, Infinity surrounds and a JBL center channel run by a Pioneer VSX-811s. I find the Pioneer running a 5.1 system to be a bit under powered, I have actually thrown it into a shut down with a DTS test disk at nominal volumes. It is set up with preouts so I thought I would keep the Pioneer and turn over the speaker powering to Emotiva.

The Sony's are to large for my better halfs liking so I'm looking for something smaller and less intrusive I was hoping the M22's would fit the bill.

Would 4ea M22's and 2ea QS8's paried with a VP150 fill a 27x25 room nicly?

Regards
Robb

I think we need to know a couple of things before we can answer.

Are you setting up as 5.1 with all 4 M22s as mains, or are you going to a 7.1 setup? How much of that space do you want to fill with sound?

That's a pretty big space. I don't think I'd use 4 M22s in any case, but 2 might work out with a good sub. I'd prefer to use M60s or M80s for that space, but that won't help you with the WAF.

Sorry, I should have clarified that in my other post.

7.1 Set-up
2 ea M22 for mains
2 ea M22 for surround back
2 ea QS8 for surround sides
1 ea VP150 for center channel

I do have a sub, a cheep little Quest that will also need replacing but I want to focus on that last.

Due to WAF factor as you call it *laugh* The suround backs will be at the back of the room on book shelves. The couch is in the middle of the room so there is equal distance from the mains to the listener and the surround backs to the listener. The surround sides will be slighly closer to the listener parallel to the couch.

I hope that makes sence.

Robb

As long as you have a good sub I think the M22s would work. I have them in an open main floor that is near the size (28x~20) of the room you are going to put them in and they work quite well on their own, no sub. The M80s of course just plain work no matter where they are, as long as you have the power behind them.

Have you looked at the hearing things forum for a possible audition in your area?

Looks like there is a person in St. Albert with the speakers I'm looking at.

Thanks for the tip

Robb

If you have the time for a road trip and he isn't available let me know.

That is a pretty big room, how loud do you plan to listen? For HT it will probably be fine, however, if you like to crank up some 2 channel music from time to time, you may want to consider m60's for the fronts. My room is bigger than yours, and my old 60's and 80's filled it nicely with killer bass and ample power, not sure the 22's would do as well.

I like movies to be nice a loud, I do listen to music from time to time.. I would say the split would be around 80/20 movies. Most of the time I stream MP3's through my Xbox to my rec'er so I don't have great quality 2 channel music to start with.

My great room is 30 feet long with dining area at one end that is 18 feet wide and living/theater at the other end with a triagular entry area that widens the room out to 27 feet at one end. The ceiling is 11 feet and there is both a doorway and a long serving bar into the kitchen.

My 6.1 set-up is a pioneer VSX-45, M22 mains, M2 surround back, QS8 surround sides, VP150 for center channel, and SVS 25-31 sub.

I have plenty of headroom for volume both for movies and music.

Seems to me that using 2 M22s for rear surrounds is a waste of good speakers. There is little rear content that I'm aware of.

Yes, but you will never get the same bass response in that room as you would get with 60's or 80's. My HT/Rec room is 30ft x 31ft x 9ft ceilings that leads into a wide hallway to the other end of our basement which is also about 1,000 sq ft.

The 22's can't provide the same bass performance for music or HT in larger rooms, compared to a large floor standing speaker. Also, a receiver, in my opinion won't give you enough headroom as seperate monoblocks driving 80's.

Lots to think about for sure, I have time to make the decision on what to do as I just started looking.

I do plan to hand over powering the speakers to Emotiva to take the load off my rec'er

I think seperate amplification is a good thing if you have speakers that can make use of that power, and a large room to fill. The 22's are great speakers, but they can't fill a large space like full range speakers, even with seperates.

If I were you I'd think about starting in a 5.1 setup and use the money saved to upgrade your sub before spending money going to 7.1. If you're set on the 22s as mains, I think you'd notice the effect of a better sub rounding out the sound long before you'd notice the subtle gain from the 2 extra surround back speakers.

Jason

I'm leaning towards something bigger for the mains but I have the challenge of getting my wifes approval for something bigger.

I probably would go for the extra power first because my rec'er can't drive my present 5.1 system all that well, as mentioned above I can throw it into protection mode at *nominal volumes* with a DTS test disk. Maybe my rec'er has other issues, I don't know.

** Due to my room being 27x25 maybe they aren't so nominal..

Is that logic correct? If not pleas feel correct me, I am a newbie after all!

Any chance you have a voltage selector on the back you have set to 6 ohms? If so, turn it to 8 ohms. I'd be suprised if it had problems driving Axioms, they are very efficient and easy to drive, using minimal wattage. The 60's would be slimmer looking than your old speakers. Also, you can get a color that looks nice with your room.

For several years, because of space issues, I always used bookshelf or similar type speakers(Paradigm Studio 40's) in my main L/R configuration. I later replaced the Studio 40's with a piano finish pair of M22's. I must admit, although both of these speakers sounded excellent, when it came to the upper bass frequencies, they seemed to be straining a little at loud volumes. Once I was able to change my set-up, I purchased a pair of M60's and the difference was noticeable immediately. I found, believe it or not, that the full range reproduction capability of the M60's blended better with my sub woofers(I have four) in that I was able to lower the crossover point, up the volume of the subs slightly, which enabled me to take advantage of that REAL DEEP BASS.

This was my experience, so if someone has the space to get either M60's or M80's as your mains, you certainly should notice an improvement for BOTH movies AND music.

Good point Casey, the blending does seem to be much easier/better with the floorstanders and I suspect the blending is even better for larger rooms. In my smallish room the M22 and sub sounded very seamless, but in Mojo's much larger room(double the size of mine) the sub and M22s never really worked together, they have always seemed to be independant from each other.

It's not that I have a space issues, I have wife issues! lol

The theater ( albeit a poor one ) has one of the 25' walls all to itself, there are no chairs, end tables, decoations etc. They need to be smaller because speakers are ugly in her eyes. *gasp*

My understanding is that its because the speakers still deliver some sound below the crossover (rolled off). I do not know how much below the crossover they contribute, but clearly there is some effect there.

Hmmm, time to visit the Custom Wood pages. Let her pick woods and finishes...

Robb - to answer your questions on volume levels... how far away from the speakers are you sitting? If you're 20' away, I guess it'd be easier to understand if the receiver craps out at "average" volumes, but even then it seems unlikely to do so if it's working correctly.

One other suggestion - look through the wall of fame for some of the truly beautiful setups some folks have put together with their speakers in full view. RickF's theater is a fantastic example.

I will also add to what Mark said... the custom finishes make a world of difference with WAF. My wife and even my mother in law (an even tougher customer) both think our high gloss cherry speakers are "pretty." That's not really a word a guy wants to hear associated with his theater... but hey, if it pushes the wife over the edge, it's worth it.

Us guys use the term purdy. As in, "Them sure are purdy speakers." *sip beer*

MUCH better!

I double checked, my rec'er doesn't have a voltage selector.



I sit about 14' from each speaker and the speakers are about 8' apart from each other.

I think you need to say it with a southern drawl!

Definitely works better that way!

Some time ago Alan made the comment that listening tests had shown using 2 pairs of speakers for mains- 2 side by side for left and 2 for the right,worked quite well. If floor standers are not an option, perhaps 4 m-22's as mains would be. It would avoid the "giant box" exclamation from the wife when they show up on the doorstep. Might be worth asking Alan about.

It won't avoid the why are there four of them question after unpacking. Other than that using double fronts works well.

RobbP,

If you need to go with m22's as fronts for WAF have to understand that you will still need to put them on speaker stands and so they will end up taking up as much room as if you just put a tower speaker there to begin with. I prefer the look of a tower speaker as opposed to a bookshelf sitting on a speaker stand from a cosmetic standpoint. But when I was buying speakers, budget was the reason that I went with m22's (and I have a small room that I use them in). Since your room is so big I don't see why you wouldn't go with tower speakers since they will do such a better job filling your room. Just look for pictures of m22's sitting on ugly black stands to show to your significant other and maybe those tower speakers won't look so bad.

- Nick

Agreed, for looks, I'd take a tower speaker any day over a bookshelf on a stand. They do take the same amount of room and bookshelf speakers on stands are more susceptible to tipping to boot.

But then again, in 'discussions' with my wife like this, if she was dead set against "ugly speakers," I don't think I'd be given the luxury of a choice between a (towers) or b (bookshelves).

Instead, the choice would be "C" (Bose cubes), "D" (in wall speakers), or "E," her favorite, using the speakers already in the TV. These arguments are especially tough when logic and reason are not valid points of dissent. Hopefully the gods of home theater are on your side and will eventually allow you to prevail using one of the arguments in this thread for support!