Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Advice from Axiom Owners Axiom bashing

I sat on that one, didn't I...

I don't know, sat, bent over, lying down, it's all good

I'd like to add to John's post with some blindtesting that was done at the NRC by Paul Barton of PSB on this "brightness" issue in 2005. Like Axiom, PSB adheres to NRC principles (as well as Paradigms and Energy among others) and I've noted that some people have referred to all of them as sounding bright over the years. Its really more an attribute which some listeners prescribe to speakers with flat FR. I don't find any of those speakers bright sounding but I understand the concern.

In testing the Stratus Gold, PSB concluded that a significant group of blind test participants found that speaker as sounding too bright compared to one that had less response in the 5khz range. As a result he redesigned the Stratus to have a dip in response around 5khz. Whether it was a sonic improvement or not I'm not sure, but sales of the Stratus have been very good for PSB.

Thank you for the info. That is a shame that they have been letting quality slip. I remember being very impressed with the quality several years ago when it was fairly new. If it is poor quality then I don't want it on my home theatre then. Thanks for saving me a few hundred bucks. Now I can spring for a cheaper Hk reciever.
Thats really a shame when companies lose sight of quality when trying to cater to the mass market. On a side note, what quality digital compression is best when listening on the axioms. Is 192 bitrate mp3 good enough?

That's a question that's becoming almost as radioactive as speaker cable... It depends on how picky you are. I usually have my stuff (AACs, mostly) at 160KBps-220KBps.

I listen to most of my digital music via the ipod. I only have a 20 gigger, and I want to fit as much of my collection on it as possible, so I go the tradeoff route and rip everything at 160kbps VBR. When I'm in the mood AND have the opportunity for a "sit down and soak it in" listening session, I've got plenty of discs I can throw in the player for uncompressed goodness.

I've got music on almost all the time at home and I don't often find myself paying attention to imaging and crystal clarity of cymbal hits while chasing kids around the house.

Trade not my Axiom's for anything, unless someone wants to trade me for his $12,000 B&W Nautilis or top-o-the-line M&K's

Also check out the HK I hear they are having problems.
I had HK once and had to send it in for repairs 6 times in one year. No sh*t It was giving me a hmmm I treid everything ground loop etc cheater plug I even brought in a huge UPS from work and ran it off that still had the hmm. I took it to my mom new house still hummed. It sounded like a wasps nest. Finally they HK repiar guy sent me a new HK humm was gone , but I sold it asap and bought my Denon.