Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Home Theater QS8 vs QS4

The room is 22 x 34 feet now because I removed two walls around the kitchen and made a cabinet island for our stove so we now when friends are over the person cooking does not feel left out. A good side-effect for me was I got a much bigger and more rectangular room to work with for theater instead of the lousy “L” shape we had before.

As for colors I would have to order three different colors because my wife has white for the family room, light-tan for the kitchen area, and forest-green for the dinning area. I wish she would just use the forest-green in the whole large room instead, but I am not the decorator, she is. And she is thinking of changing them in the future so I think black would be the best for this situation; no, yes?

Mark,

It might help you to look at how I laid out my QS8s. They are about 12 feet away from my sweet spot at the couch. And I sit 8 feet away from my fronts and centre. For reference, my room is 4,000 cubic feet and has a 7 foot 2 inch ceiling.

The QS8s sound absolutely wonderful with DD or DTS compared to the direct radiating speakers I had before. The speakers really do disappear. Very often when we're watching a movie we'll get freaked out because we hear noises behind us that can't quite be pin-pointed (I distinctly remember the Blade trilogy having this effect)...very different from the direct radiating speakers. I can't comment about PLII and Neo because I haven't quite figured out how to tweak these modes yet. And I can't comment on how these modes sounded on my old speakers because I never used PLII and Neo until I got my Axiom system.

I would agree with others that the QS4s are too small for your room. But the biggest problem I see is the cross-over. The QS8s are optimally crossed over at about 85Hz so 80Hz is a very good setting (that's what I have mine set at).

BTW, my wife is very happy with the look of the Axiom speakers (even when they are naked) and she thinks the QS8s look great on the wall. Of course when you have walls that bare, anything on them tends to make them look better .

Good luck with your decision.

I would also recommend the QS8s with a room that size. The direct speaker in the rears can work well but only if you have the space to play around with their positioning. Most people have little 'easy' space behind their primary seating area.
The QSx speakers are simply fantastic for blending into the room, aesthetically and acoustically.
See my thoughts way back when on M22s vs QS8s for surround usage.
link here

Mark, welcome. On your side walls/back wall question on the positioning of the back surrounds, first let the point be made that in a 7.1 setup the side surrounds should be directly to the side(not farther back)of the listening position, maybe 3' above ear level. Then, the back surrounds should be separated about as much as your distance from them. Usually this would call for mounting them on the back wall, but if the separation requirement can be met with a mounting far back on the side walls(almost at the back wall)this works well too.

"As for colors I would have to order three different colors because my wife has white for the family room, light-tan for the kitchen area, and forest-green for the dinning area. I wish she would just use the forest-green in the whole large room instead, but I am not the decorator, she is. And she is thinking of changing them in the future so I think black would be the best for this situation; no, yes? "

you can order them with a custom finish called "paintable finish" This will allow you to paint them different colors.

You still have to deal with the grills, though. I suppose you could do black grills, but with the QS series, I'd probably just go with all black speakers.

Guys, You all are wonderful to jump in and help. Thanks!

So I think now I have a good idea what to do...

• 4 Black QS8s, black grills
  
• side surrounds on side walls at approx 90 degrees
  
• back surrounds on back walls at approx 150 degrees

Should sound great! Now to figure out how to pay for them!

Ok I got my first pair of QS8s and they are very cool looking. I have not gotten time to mount them yet. The wife was shocked how big they where compared to my AM3 8O$E which were cubes about 3" x 3" x 4" satellites. I will let you know how the install goes and how they sound.

So, you'll do an A/B test between the QS8s and AM3s and tell the world what you think, right?