I'm putting together my first home theater/music setup in a fairly small - 12x17 living room. I recently ordered some M3s after reading great reviews on websites and in this forum. I really liked the sound so I ordered some M50s to replace some old handed down Realistic Optima 3 ways.
Once the M50s arrived I was really disappointed with how they sounded - really muffled. I'd read about break in periods so I've run them almost 24/7 for the last week. They did open up, but compared to the old Realistics, they still sound very muffled, almost as if there's cotton in my ears when I'm listening to them. I've played with positioning quite a bit, though my options are somewhat limited. I've got to crank the Denon 2803 they're driven by to get any real volume out of them and the image from them just seems very flat. Now I understand that the dual 6.5" just may not put out what the old 10" Realistic drivers did. So ordered some M60s after reading much more in this forum and they should arrive tomorrow, hopefully I'll hear a big difference in the mids and the imaging.
Now I also ordered a VP100 and again, was not overly impressed with it's presence. It does sound very clear, however not very deep. I'm used to listening to movies through the old towers so part of it is the adjustment to the surround sound format. I'm wondering if anyone has compared the VP100 to the VP150? Does the latter produce a significant increase in dispersion and bottom end?
I guess I'm really wondering if I'm going to have to add a sub or go the M80 route to get the bottom end and presence of the old speakers (if the 60s don't cut it), does it make sense to have towers up front? I'm having trouble justifying spending a sizable chuck of change to outperform what I thought were fairly basic old speakers. Should I just go with M3s or M22s up front and apply the extra to a sub?
Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
