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Where is Fedex?! The M80s have been out for delivery since 9:40 am.

Yesterday I called Fedex because tracking info was not updated all weekend even though the XPA2 had arrived at the regional facility on Saturday and the rep told me the scheduled delivery of the XPA2 was postponed so I went to the grocery store yet quickly returned home after suspecting a ruse. Sure enough the XPA2 arrived a few moments later!

Do not under any circumstances underestimate the devious ways of Fedex!

Yes Fedex strikes again! Looks they only delivered one speaker!

Well called Axiom and the rep states, "They [Fedex] always say that [that there's only one package]. They don't have a clue where it is but we'll find it! Call us back tomorrow."

How amusing! Guess I'll demo one speaker and do a toe to toe comparison with the speaker it will be replacing!

Well that sucks.

Thats always interesting. I can't remember if you already posted this, but what are the M80s replacing?

They are replacing a pair of Polk Reference Series Monitor 10Bs circa 1989-92? Interesting so far the Polk sounds better, more open and less boxy, but I've had to balance the volume (turn volume way up for the M80) because the Polk is only 6 ohms. I've been very happy with the Polk 10Bs given a number of nameless upgrades to connectivity however I've noticed that Polk speakers in general haven't seemed to get great reviews, perhaps a $400 speaker 20 years ago might sound better than a $600 speaker now? I thought that the march of technology would demonstrate the superiority of the latter. Connection issues exist, more about that later but it makes sense to me now why AL recommends more watts for the 4 ohm M80s, the XPA2 was an insane amount of power for the Polks but does not seem excessive for the M80.

At the time of audition at Jason's (myrison) I thought the epic 80/600 setup or even the M80s/VP150/Qs8s no sub beat the Polks for musicality (although to me the bottom line is it's all about HT folks) but of course that was not a side by side comparison.

This is of course is a bizzare situation/speaker setup so any true audition/comparison awaits the arrival of the second speaker.

BTW I hired a handyman to fix the kitchen drawers that were broken and my wife thinks the Axiom looks prettier than the Polk so the plan for world speaker domination continues!

Hey SK, congrats on the arrival (sort of). When my speakers first came in, I received 2 M80s and one QS8 in one shipment, so I had a bizarre first audition as well, though at least with the 2 front speakers I could do decent stereo listening. How frustrating! (the rest did arrive the next day, so they weren't separated by much)

Jason

That's good news! It's funny, now that the fam is in bed just now I was listening to VH1 at lower volumes and actually now the M80 sounds better (more accurate than the Polk) and I suspect the reason the Polk sounded better on HT was that it was more dramatic in an exaggerated, but not necessarily realistic across all content, sense. Hopefully I'm on the right track, I suspect once I am listening to the M80s in stereo and can crank it up with a natural balance (no SPL meter) I will hear the potential I have sensed since the audition in realized form, thanks for the moral support!

I think your appreciation will certainly grow after you get the other and as you listen to them. I moved from some Polk bookshelf speakers to M80s, and at first I didn't know why I'd spent the extra money. The more listening I did, the more I realized just how much more they were capable of, especially at theater-like volume levels. I look forward to hearing more of your thoughts after you spend more time playing.