Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Technical Questions Sound quality and possible power issue with M80'S

I have been shopping for new speakers for a few weeks now. I have tested B+W 685's, paradigm studio 10's and studio 60's... So far my favorite for sound quality has been the studio 10's.

I like them because although they can handle a decent amount of bass they really focus on the mid range and are very clear. I also liked the balance over all between the mid range and bass.

On the other hand I am looking for more of a sound stage that will be achieved by tower speakers... I liked the studio 60's but I felt like they were too focused on the low end.

Which brings me to my next problem, all advice has been pointing me toward the M60 or M80... I have not heard them yet but I like the idea that the M80 is balanced across the board with equal amounts of tweeter, mid range and low end speakers!

Am I right in my assumption? Also can my yamaha 863 which only has settings down to 6 ohms power the 4 ohm rated M80's????

Welcome Mountain,

First of all, you should never adjust the ohm setting on a receiver, as that just limits the voltage, providing less power to the speaker. The 8ohm standard selection will work fine for most situations.

All I can tell you is I found the m60's and m80's similar to the B&W 703's about 5-6 yrs ago. As you can tell, I'm still an Axiom owner.

I've also heard the Axiom lineup is similar to the Studio series from Paradigm.

The m60's and m80's are a great all around performer. They have great detail and accuracy, and good/tight bass response. The m80's can handle more power, and might be slightly better in the detail/bass categories, but it is very close, in my opinion haveing owned both.

I've always told people the M60's/M80's are very true/faithful to the original recording/CD. Music that is recorded with the best engineering techniques in the studio, will sound fabulous. On the other hand, if your listening to compressed mp3's, or CD's recorded with sub-standard quality, those flaws might be heard. That is not the problem of the speaker, as some may tell you.

Any receiver should be able to drive a 4ohm speaker, the receiver doesn't know what is on the other end. However, if you really push certain receivers to loud levels for a long time, some may go into protect mode and shut down. Denon's, HK, NAD, SN, Outlaw Audio, etc. have historically been recommended by Axiom. In the past some Yammys and Onkyos have had issues, but I've heard the latest models are more compatible.

Welcome Mtbound10. I answered your questions over at Audioholics. There are lots of very knowledgable people here, so you are in good hands.

There are also a couple of people here that have done direct comparisons to the Studios, so hopefully they will post as well.

Mtbound, I auditioned Studio 100s before I bought my M80s. The two, to my ear have many similarities although I must point out that I heard the Studios in a sound room at a local audio store vs my M80s in my family room. They are both very detailed speakers with full range, I felt the soundstage was wider on the M80s and the Studios were a little "cleaner" on the highs, otherwise they were very similar, to me. I haven't heard the Studio 60s, but auditioned the Monitor 7/9/11s as well as the Studio 100s.

Adrian,

Thanks for the info... that helps quite a bit actually. I listened to the studios and BW's in a sound room at a audio store as well so I am sure there was a little help...

Right now it is looking like the M80's... I am wondering though if the M60's might feature a little more clarity and less bass though?

I'm repeating stuff I've posted a few times but I'm too lazy to search and link. I have compared my M60s against Studio 100s in the same room. It wasn't a scientific comparison but both me and my buddy whom owned the Paradigms agreed that the two were so similar they were extremely hard to tell apart. Impossible for me but he is a musician so 'maybe' has a better ear. I prefer to say he is deafer.

He agrees that they are so similar that I go the better bang for the buck but he and his wife prefer the fancier look to suit their decor. The Axioms, actually suit my laid back decor better.

In short, you can't go wrong.

I'd say go with the m80's. If power is an issue you can always pick up an amp or another reciever down the line. depending on how loud you listen (and for how long) you may not have any issues at all with your current AVR.

Sorry that I too, am repeating myself here as well, but the similarities between Axiom and Paradigm is no accident. In the past, many of the well known Canadian-designed and built speakers such as Axiom, Paradigm, PSB etc. did their initial R&D in Ottawa at the National Research Council which had one of the original "Anechoic" chambers(this was before all of the above grew to the point where they could have their own on site). The idea was to design and build a speaker that was as neutral and transparent as possible so whatever you were listening to was as close as possible to the original. Later on, of course, it was the companies' desire to expand on what they learned and as time went on improve what they were doing in terms of design tweaks, model choices, cabinetry etc. etc.

It is interesting to note, however, that another Canadian speaker manufacturer that many of us know, "Totem", chose specifically NOT to go the "Anechoic" chamber route as the designer wished to imprint his "own" concept of what a speaker should "sound" like. These speakers, of course, are considerably more expensive.

Obviously, Axiom generally, will represent better value because of internet only sales, as opposed to the others who have chosen to go thru dealers.

Yes.

And less lobing and a more beautiful aesthetic.

/M60_posse_recruitment_off

Actually, the M80s have more clarity. The M60s certainly have less bass...

Someone slipped the squirrel a 'mickey'. I agree with Ken, and I have them both in my house right now. Tom, has Fed Ex showed up with your new hearing aids yet?

Note: I have a very large room, so Tom may not be on drugs or otherwise impaired. (but I seriously doubt that he is not )

MT, you can always engage the tone controls to turn down the bass a little if you find it too much. You can always take a little away, but you can't add in whats not there.

Well I have pretty much decided to go with the M80... I will of course take it for a test drive before I make any final decisions but it is looking like M80 all the way...

I like the proportion of the drivers for one... Most towers that I have seen and or tested have two or three subs to every one mid and or tweeter. The M80 on the other hand seems to be well balanced throughout!

I emailed Axiom earlier actually to forward my question to the pro's in the office about my concern with my reciever be able to drive the 4 ohm load on the M80's... Brent responded the same day after looking through my receivers manual and does not see the yamaha having any problem driving the M80's!!! ROCK ON!

I am still a little concerned about the power issue/4 ohms given all my audiophile friends on here and at audioholics concerns so do not think I am not taking your advice cause I am and appreciate it all a great deal. I have learned a LOT in the past few months thanks to all of you...

on that note

CHEERS!

P.S. I just found this on yamahas web site under there "FAQS" page...

[i]Can I use 4 ohm speakers on my Yamaha AV receiver ?[/i]Yes, many Yamaha AV receivers are stable down to, but not below 4 ohms. We recommend that you use only speakers with a minimum of 4 ohms. Also, please make sure that the impedance selector switch is set to the correct position as recommended by the owner's manual.

I found the following in my manual... I do not exactly know what it means but I think this might shed some light on everyone else here who can actually interpret this!!! Please take a look

Setting the speaker impedance
Caution
If you are to use 6 ohm speakers, set “SP IMP.” to
“6Ω MIN” as follows BEFORE using this unit. 4 ohm
speakers can be also used as the front speakers.

If you look on page 109 of the RX-V863 manual it says something about this that is important... I can not decipher it and I tried for a really long time to cut and paste it on here but it did not work so UGH!!!

Hello

re: "...Most towers that I have seen and or tested have two or three subs to every one mid and or tweeter."

These speakers don't have "subs", they are just simple woofers!
Keep in mind that some of the finest loudspeakers available anywhere are simple two driver / two way designs. The 80’s are probably fine, but multiple drivers are not necessarily an indication of exceptional sound quality.


Keep that impedence switch at the 8 ohm setting.

I did not truly consider them "subs", just "woofers"... My point was that the "woofers" typically outnumber the mid-range drivers or tweeters by 2 to 1 minimum... furthermore, I was trying to make a correlation between the proportion of woofers to mid range drivers or tweeters due to the fact that I appreciate a little more clarity in the higher end rather than being muffled out by the low ended "woofers"... for instance I listend to some paradigm towers with two "woofers and two ports and only one mid and one tweeter... the sound was overcome by bass! BLAH

The Paradigm loudspeakers you referred to at the beginning of this thread don't actually use "midrange" drivers. They're bass/mid drivers in a 2 1/2 way system for the Studio 60's and a two way design for the Studio 10's.

If these speakers sounded bass heavy, it was most likely the listening room and / or speaker setup.
I would suspect that the Studio 10’s are bass shy in most environments!

Or as it seems some of the AVRs discussed lately only have a 6 ohm OR 4 Ohm setting, leave it on 6 ohm! Always! It has also been mentioned that on receivers with 4/6 ohm switches, sometimes 8 ohms needs to be selected in through the set up menus. So check if your Yammy has an 8 ohm setting available thru the menus.

MT, this has been discussed numerous times, including another thread here now, but again, despite the language in the manual, never set the receiver to the lower impedance setting(the higher one is always the default), regardless of whether it's termed 4 ohms or 6 ohms. This is a type of precaution required by the UL to help protect against overheating. It in no way "optimizes" the receiver for a lower impedance speaker, as some imagine, but in fact degrades maximum performance capability. It does this by reducing the voltage that the power supply section of the amplifier can output, and because of Ohm's Law when voltage is reduced so is current and power. The maximum power capacity is cut roughly in half, tests have shown, so although the potential for overheating is reduced, so is the potential for supplying power free from audible distortion or even clipping.

ditto what John said.

adcom 5500 amp enough power to run the m80s

It is for certain but I along with many others prefer the old 555. It's also cheaper. one cap change to remove the weirdness in the ultra low end on the mkii model costs about $3-$5 and I've yet to hear anything for tons more that beats it. Adcom put a 3.3 uf mylar square box shaped cap to block DC so the sound is affected, the amp is ever so slightly bass shy, but replacing it puts it in the class of the pass labs amps that cost 10x more. You aren't as likely to hear as much of a difference between how differently designed amps drive speakers with axioms because they do not present a difficult uneven load. I miss having easy to drive speakers like my m22tis

I would go so far as to suggest that any receiver that has a switch for 4 or 8 ohms, or states "compatibility" issues with low impedance speakers is a cheap design using either dirt cheap final output stage transistors or a power supply made to be very tiny so a ton of other junk could fit in a small box. It's like saying I am not "compatible" with benchpressing 400 lbs, when the reality is I am not strong enough or in good enough shape to. There is a difference!