Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Home Theater A bit disappointed with my VP150???

I've had my VP150 and M22ti's for a about 2 months now and have gotten a pretty good feel for how they sound. I bought the 150 first and my initial reaction was it sounded great. After listening to a bunch of movies and cd's I can't help but be disappointed with the 150 when compared to the 22's. So my question would be is it possible that I have a defective 150 or does the 150 sound very noticeably different than the 22's and I just have a preference for the way the 22's sound?

I'm disappointed in my 150 because to me it sounds muted, lacking in the high frequencies, as if the 3 midrange drivers are overpowering the two tweeters and all I'm hearing is midrange. Dialogue and music sound a bit compressed/confined, theres no sense of space and air with anything I play through the speaker. When I play movies,music,and especially test tones, the tonal quality/balance is noticeably different to that of my 22's.

I have the 150 angled towards my seating position and it's only about 6-8 inches higher than my 22's and also quite close in width to my 22's as well, only about 2 feet in between all 3 speakers. I tried replacing the 150 with one of my 22's and the sound was nearly identical to the other 22. Movies and music were spacious, airy, and clearer, basically what I wanted and expected from the 150 . I think trying that ruled out the possibility of room placement affecting the 150...so I'm a bit puzzled right now. What could be the problem or is this just how the VP150 sounds compared to the M22's?

-Brian

Well Brian to each his own, but just offhand, i would experiment a bit more with the 'width' at which the speakers are placed.
I had my M60s placed about 5 feet apart and hence the Vp150 in the middle (probably about 2 feet from either M60, same as you).
Once i got my big screen tv, i had no choice but to push the M60s further apart. When i did that, i noticed the soundstage improved dramatically.
I played around with 'toeing' in the speakers as well, and again, there were fairly large differences in the cohesion of the soundstage if i toed too much or none at all.
I certainly have found the Axioms front speakers to be a bit picky in their placement but the biggest and best change still came from simply moving the mains further apart and causing more separation from the VP150.
An alternative that has been suggested as of late is to use an M2 or an M22 as a centre channel instead of the VP150.
Personally though i've found the clarity of the vp150 to be a bit less than the M60s but to me this is perfectly fine since i've found the M60s to be bright enough on their own and i expect the centre channel to be an enhancement to the 2 main speakers and not a stand alone performer. In my opinion, the centre channel should help to carry dialogue/vocals across the front and to fill in the soundstage in the centre. For HT this is sometimes also accomplished by not using a centre channel and just turning up the tv volume, although this obviously creates a crappier quality sound.

Brian, the M22 and VP150 use the same tweeter, and if the difference is as significant as you indicate I would suspect that one of the VP150 tweeters isn't operating. You mention "test tones"; if you have a CD or other source of, say, a 10Khz tone, play it with your ear to each tweeter. Try putting a pillow over(not touching)each tweeter to see if there's a difference.

Although I'm one of those favoring a M2 or M22 center mentioned by chess,the difference should be relatively subtle. What you report seems to indicate that something is wrong.

I too have noticed that the test tones sound different coming from my VP150 than from my M60s. I'll have to try again but I think the VP150 matches the QS8s. I figured it has to do with different response ranges. I don't notice it near as much with music. The Chesky test DVD-A (has DVD-V as well) has some tests with music slowly sweeping around the room.

If i put my ear right next to all of the drivers, I can hear that they're all working. I also put a spl meter right up to each of the 5 drivers and the meter reads the same volume for each driver. My guess would be that nothing is wrong with the speaker, but then again, I'm having a hard time believing/accepting that the 150 is supposed to sound like this...Most people, who have a complaint, say their 150 sounds too bright and I spoke to Joe over the phone while I was asking about a different problem and he said the 150 is supposed to sound clearer and produce dialouge better than the M22, which is exactly opposite to what I'm experiencing. If all drivers are producing equal level(are they all supposed to be equal??)sound is there really a possibility that something could still be wrong with the speaker?

For now I'll experiment more with placement, but I really doubt that it'll change anything since I already swapped the 150 with one of my 22's and it sounded great and nearly identical to the other 22.

-Brian

I think I solved the problem. I moved the 150 up more, so that the distance from each speaker (LF,RF,and C) to my listening position is equal. That helped a bit, probably widened the dispersion from the tweeters and reduced the reflections off my 22's, since they are pretty close to the 150. The biggest change occurred after I moved the coffee table out of the way, which sat directly centered to my 150 about 4 feet away, it's about 1 1/2 feet tall(quite large). I always suspected that it would cause a problem and after reading some posts, I finally decided to movie it and my problem is now solved. The 150 is sounding beautiful again since there aren't anymore nasty reflections from the coffee table, which I think results in midrange colouring, which is exactly what I was hearing. I feel a bit foolish now, but thanks guys for responding, I'm glad I can enjoy my speakers now!

-Brian

Wow, great post. I would have never imagined that the coffee table location would affect the sound so much. Guess its time to break out the doilies