Ramble on....I think after all the advice and such Ill give up on the M22 and at least go with a floor speaker..probably the M60
Don’t give up on the M22s yet. In my opinion when matched with a subwoofer they rival the M80s matched with a subwoofer the M22s are that good. I’ve compared them both paired with a subwoofers and found that the only thing the M80+sub had over the M22+sub was more impact/punch around the 100Hz to 200Hz range. I only noticed this with bass heavy music (most of which I don‘t like), and some scenes in action movies when played loud. Whereas the M22s actually seemed a little more accurate sounding and also had better imaging.
I went through the same rationalization as below in choosing to upgrade from the M22s to the M80s for my initial “mains” purchase.
I wonder how much better the 60s/80s would be..."
I use the stand argument to talk myself out of M22s and into M60s. Then I went and bought M80s.
However, if I had it to do over again I wouldn’t hesitate to buy the M22s+sub over the M80s+sub for the 12x20 listening area I had in a 20x20 room. And if I ever needed the use of tower speakers up front (larger room, more punch) I would buy the towers and move the M22s to the back as rears in a 7.1 setup or just use them elsewhere as outstanding bookshelf speakers.
Unless you plan to listen to 2 channel music w/o a subwoofer or intend to use a lower than normal 80Hz crossover with your mains then the M22s will give you much more “bang-for-your-buck.” If you always plan on using a subwoofer, even for music, crossed over at 80Hz then IMHO your pretty much just turning your tower speakers into large overpriced bookshelf speakers.
Build or buy inexpensive stands locally and the M22s become even more cost effective. Nothing against tower speakers I own 3 M80s but most people, probably me too, just don’t need towers and would be better served by getting high quality bookshelf speakers and a subwoofer or two.
