Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Home Theater Surrounds or Subs first?

I can remember when I added my sub to my prologic system all those years ago, it really enhanced the feel of the movies and the prologic was not that great for surround effects.

Now that I have a 6.1 system, I find it hard to think about not having the surrounds, they immerse you into the movie that much more and your M60's should be able to do an admirable job with LFE till you can afford the Sub.

I agree with Shawn....
Go for the sub and pick up some of those 50% off, $30 Polks that Circuit City has periodically. They won't amaze you the way the QS series will, but they'll still offer something so the sound isn't all "in front of you".

Sub first!

I even used BOSE (God forgive me) for surrounds for a while.

I agree with previous recommendations to get the sub first - especially if you're mostly using your setup for movies. You can always pick up a pair of cheap speakers to use for surrounds until you can afford a good pair. While this isn't ideal, it will work. If you were mostly going to listen to multi-channel music, then I'd go with a good pair of surrounds first. Most music won't dip down past what the M60s can produce.

I agree with half of the earlier posts (never easy to decide is it? ).

I vote for QS8s now, sub later. Another reason being that the QS8 design is quite stable and shouldn't change much, as compared to the advancements and price drops in quality subs happening all the time. You'll probably get more sub for less $ later on when you are ready.

Get the surrounds first so that you can enjoy HT, SACD, DVD-A, DTS music. There are more sounds effects with surrounds than bass, not unless you watch a lot of action movies. Even if you watch action movies, bass note doesn't play all the time.

bottom line, you get more bang for buck with surrounds, but you will NEED a sub at some point. When that comes, you will FEEL the movie instead of HEARING it.

I would say since you have the M60s, go for the QS8s. I just got my system hooked up last sunday and i LOVE the QS8's. They are simply amazing, I didn't listen to any SACD, but I sourced my 2 channel CDs through the surrounds and man, it sounded just simply amazing.

For movies as well, they just dissapear into the room, like you don't even know where they are, you just hear sounds coming from the left and the right, its great.

I have mine sitting on some "Premo" soup cans to expose the bottom woofer (I think Bridgeman patented the idea). My friends argued that they thought Campbells cans would work better, I may have to do some critical listening to get to the bottom of this.

Hi ereed,

I'd second Hutzal's suggestion. The QS8s are positively uncanny at times at recreating ambience effects in movie soundtracks, even very subtle ones like phones ringing, bird sounds, crickets, and wind and weather effects.

You'll have decent bass with the M60s until you add the sub later on. (I think Bridgman used Habitant soup cans to support his QS8s,in recognition of Canada's dual heritage).

Did someone say can?