Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Stereo Receiver to make M60s sound good?

It's the source material, as you have said you have found some SACD's that sound pretty good. I have burned all my music in flac and stream them to my 3808 and only the poorly recorded cds now still play badly. MP3s and Axiom M22/M60/M80 do not get along very well. What bit rate are you MP3s? I try to keep everything that I haven't ripped from cds, to at least 256k to keep the sound quality as close to original as possible.

I do know Axiom has for some owners, sent out resistors for the tweeters to tame some shrillness. They are very easy to install, maybe try giving them a call to see if you can get some, it may help.

Bobby, the 3808 and the other receivers simply amplify the voltages that come in from the source materials; when set flat they certainly don't in any way reduce any "shrillness" that may be present in some of that material. Neither do accurate speakers such as the M60s degrade their own quality by making the shrillness less audible. The usual way to partially compensate for poor material is to turn the treble tone control on the receiver down a bit.

You may have heard these comments before, but there's no good reason to change them, since they're still true.

I have most of my mp3s at 256k and above. How do you get flac to play on the 3808. When I put flac files in a directory to stream from my computer/NAS or whatever they don't show up, only mp3s and I think wav shows up also. I posted on another site in the 3808 thread about streaming flac files but no one responded.

Random thoughts:

**I'm wondering if all drivers are firing or if there's a bass-management problem... dropping the bass and making the speakers sound bright.
Bass seems to be fine, there is no lack of bass just very bright high end.

**What types of music do you listen to?
I listen to all types of music but mostly pop and rock.

**If your MP3s are 256k and above, they're likely fine unless poorly compressed...
I think the compression is alright, many I ripped from my own CDs. I use Exact Audio Copy and Lame

**Do you have a bright (barren, with hard surfaces) room?
I do have hardwood floors and vaulted ceiling (10 ft.) but the room isn't barren, full of furniture, etc.

the 3808 supports flac files natively. I am not sure why they aren't showing up...

Try plugging a usb drive of somesort into the denon with a flac file on it and see fi it plays... if so then the problem must be with the network.

Can you list some albums you think sound bad? thanks.

The M60 is actually a little more laid back than the M80.

I can accept that some find Axioms offerings bright, but not harsh. There is something else at play here.

Can you give us the titles and labels for the reference recordings you find harsh? Can you also describe the room they are set up in? Are you in an apartment or a house? Lots of windows? Do you have wall coverings or are the walls bare...

I think some room treatments would help in that reflective room. Try throwing a throw rug/remnant betweetn you and your speakers and/or panels on the side walls. Reflections arrive at your ears at different times skewing what you hear.

Also, compressed audio is not the best, even at that bit rate.

I did use Audyssey.
Here is a screen shot of the FL levels but it doesn't mean alot to me, maybe you guys will get something from it.

The top end in that screen shot is out of sync with the low end, a typical Audyssey curve. The 63hz and 125hz could be boosted to the same as 250 hz and drop the 16khz to zero. But first I would turn off Audyssey and see if you like it better with no EQ going on, I think you might.

If this is what Audyssey set the levels too, then I'd definitely experiment with lowering the 8khz and 16khz levels - they're definitely higher than the rest of the spectrum and that could definitely be the culprit for the harshness you're hearing.

Lame-encoded, 256kbs+ MP3's should sound good. Maybe not perfect, but pretty darn good. But if your source CD itself sounds bad, then the rip will sound equally bad (or worse). If all of your hundreds of CD's sound bad, then I don't see how the problem could be in the mastering of *all* of them. Quite true that some CD's are mastered better than others, but they're not all badly done. Your CD's aren't all from one particular label or something strange like that, right?

Some people say that receivers & amps make a difference in the sound quality. Others say that it does not. Vigorous and heated debates have arisen between these two camps. We're generally a kind and respectful bunch around here, so it doesn't happen much here. But if you take a stroll over on some other, more general audio boards, you will find such debates.

You'll find similar debates about break-in. Some believe that speakers, receivers, amps, cables, kitchen forks, etc all need a break-in period to perform at their best. Others think that it's just the incredible adaptability of a human mind. You listen to it long enough, and you either get used to it or convince yourself that it sounds good. We adapt. That's what people do.

From my own personal, humanly-biased experience, I *do* actually believe that amps (and receivers) can 'color' the sound. And by color, I mean the differences between muddied, warm, neutral, cool, and shrill. I've been in listening rooms where I've heard the same source material, played through the same speakers but from different receivers (operating in a pass-through mode - no bass/treble/EQ trickery) switched back-to-back. And they sounded different. And I don't mean that the $x,xxx receiver always sounded better than the $xxx one. Not always. A piccolo trill might sound more piercing on receiver A, where a bass drum was more defined and clean on receiver B, where a vocals sounded more alive & focused on receiver C, etc, etc. Power specs? Distortion ratings? Magic Pixies? I don't know. But, IMHO, there are slight differences.

Really though, you've got a darn good receiver. All Denon's, but especially the 3808, are pretty highly regarded by everyone. If it were something less, a better receiver might help. My old, unable-to-cope-with-4-ohm-M80's Pioneer receiver would start to sound like crap as you cranked up the volume. An Emotiva amp completely solved that problem. But your 3803 is a robust and powerful beast.

As you know, Axiom speakers are designed to be 'neutral'. A few say they lean towards the reviled 'b' word, 'bright'. You might just prefer a 'warmer' sounding speaker, like B&W's or AV123 Rockets. And in that case, it makes sense that a tweeter resistor might make you happier with your Axioms.

Good luck. I hope you find a good solution so you can get back to enjoying the music!

No harm in playing as you can always rerun and re-adjust.

Yeah, that curve looks incredibly wrong to me--way boosted in the treble. As Adam would say, "There's your problem!"

Also, 5 channel stereo kinda stinks--try using DTS:Neo 6 or Dolby Pro Logic IIx+eXTremeSTiUltra.

That will definitely give you a different sound. I'd also experiment with regular stereo, so you know what you're messing with when you turn on the surround modes.

Do you have your SACD player hooked up over HDMI?

It is certainly possible that you just don't like the way Axiom speakers sound. Such a circumstance is not an indictment of either you or Axiom.

I wonder whats going on in the room that causes audyssey to cut below 4kHz and boost above that?

Bobby, that rising frequency response isn't typical of the regular Audyssey correction. Are you sure that you didn't set the correction parameter to "flat"(which emphasizes the high frequencies more)rather than the normal "Audyssey" curve? A remote possibility would be a defective microphone reading the high frequencies too low and causing them to be boosted unnecessarily.

Also, as Ken suggested, don't use 5-channel stereo for normal music listening. The way to put the surrounds into action with 2-channel music material is to apply DPLII or similar ambience extraction processing.

I would try an all out equal across the board setting and go from there, if it sounds to bass heavy drop the lower 2 frequencies a couple, if it is still too bright, drop the upper two, etc.

Wolfman,

I had to give this thread a bump. Came across your post while poking around at work, and was amazed that someone else has the exact same problem I have. Same Setup, M60s and the vp100...receiver is an HK347 though. My complaint is the same...mp3s through computer via optical and cds via an Oppo 980 usually sound harsh. In my case, its generally the vocals that are noticeably off (I'm told the exact word is sibilant, but to me it makes singers sound like Sylvester from Looney tunes). I pretty much only listen to instrumental stuff now.

Did you get in touch with anyone at axiom? I'd be very interested to hear if the tweeter resistor option makes a difference.

Or you could be like me and pretend everything is just fine.

You'll probably want to do a sub crawl first thing. Basically, you put the sub at your listening position, then crawl around the room until you find the spot that has the best bass. Then put the sub there.

T minus 10

wow, your floors are made of glue!?!?!? ha, just the civil engineer comming out here... cement is like the binder or glue that goes into concrete. the floor is a concrete floor, which is composed fo cement, aggregate, and any admixtures. I can't help but correct someone when they call concrete "cement"