Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Home Theater Overall sound -VS- Quality of sound

i am a perfectly new member to this message board, but have been reading it for a few weeks now. i have been sold on the axioms, and i am fixing to make my order.. with that comes my problem, and my question..

i have a large room, 25' by 30', but the listening couch will be in the middle of the room, approx 10-12 feet from the tv.. now, here is my dilemma.. due to the size of the room, i need a lot of sound to fill it, so my budget will allow me to have the 150 center, and the M60's in the front.. but that will only leave me with enough money for the QS4's as my surround speakers.. if i drop down to the M50's on the front, then i would be able to afford the QS8's.. so there in lies my question, which would you do?? i already have a vega LW-12 sub, so i dont think lack of low end will be a prob.. will the M50's be able to fill the large room with a fair amount of mids?? will i be dissapointed in the QS4's?? will my wife just let me spend whatever i want??? DOUBTFUL..

please give me any advice avail as to my situation. do i sacrifice overall sound by dropping to the M50's.. or will the QS8's, make up the difference?? HELP, i am losing sleep over this..

thanks, bigjohn
san angelo, tx

Get the M60ti, VP150 and QS8's. If you get the QS4's you may like them, but you'll always wonder "what if?".

It's only an extra $160. You can save up that in a couple of months can't you?

If you hadn't already decided this, order them through the outlet. That alone will save you the $160.

Good luck, and please let us know what you think once they arrive!

I agree with spiffnme here. Factory outlet is the way to go. Also, you don't have to buy everything all at once. You could get the M60s and VP150 now, then put a pair of QS8s on layaway.

the outlet is no longer on the axiom main page?? did i miss it or something??

Here you go...

Outlet

You can get to it through the store.

Or just click here.

Ha, ha...too slow.

Another vote for the M60ti/VP150. I like my M60tis so much I think a 2.1 config with just M60s and a sub is preferable to a 5.1 config with lesser speakers (at least for music, maybe not HT). You can always grow a 2.1 config up to 5.1 later, using the M60s as a foundation.

That said, the factory outlet price on the M60/VP150/QS8s should fit your budget.

Once you have a quality surround system, I also suggest getting an SACD or DVD-A player and some multichannel music. Lacking this at least try a few DVD-A discs (which usually have a Dolby 5.1 track) on your regular DVD player to see what it's like.

I think it's worth pointing out that you may consider standard design bookshelf speakers for the rear: M2's or M3's. I suppose this puts me in the minority, but one reason I have shied away from bi-pole / quadropole or other types of surround speakers is that they are only optimized for movies.

SACD and DVD-audio formats are mixed differently than DVD video, and are intended to be played back over five or six identical speakers, all aimed directly at the listener. Of course not many people have a dedicated DVD-audio / SACD listening setup, so some people just comprimise between the standards. I have standard rear speakers and plan to mount them just a foot or two above ear level, aiming close to the listening position, but horizontal.

I'm sure directional speakers won't fill your room as nicely in the rear, but as long as you keep them out of the listening plane you can make them pretty diffuse, and you will be better-equipped for hi-res audio. Plus, you can put the money saved toward a future rear 1 or 2 speakers to really fill in the sound with 6.1 or 7.1.

Yet another consideration: you could just buy the front three speakers first, and live with that for a couple months. This will give you a chance to weigh your needs.

-Cooper

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Lacking this at least try a few DVD-A discs (which usually have a Dolby 5.1 track) on your regular DVD player to see what it's like.

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Not all DVD players will play back DVD-Audio discs. Be sure your DVD player is DVD-A compatible before you go out and buy a DVD-A title. There are some DTS music discs that will indeed play on any DTS compatible player though. (Most DVD players can handle DTS these days)

While it's true not all DVD players will play DVD-A *tracks* on DVD-A discs, virtually all DVD players will play the DD 5.1 compatibility track included on most DVD-A discs. So as long as you have a regular DVD player and a receiver with Dolby Digital decoding, you can play most DVD-A discs in this manner.

Now some would argue that's not getting the full benefit of DVD-A's high resolution. True as far as that goes. But my counter argument is the DD 5.1 sample rate is already above CD, plus on modern receivers you get full digital management of bass, level, speaker distance (aka time arrival), and in some cases parametric or graphical equalization. With DVD-A tracks (or SACD) you get high sample rates but give up all the fancy receiver stuff, so it's two steps forward and one back. More info:

Dolby on DVD-A

All that said, it definitely makes sense to double check that any DVD-A disc you're contemplating has a DD 5.1 compatibility track, if you only have a regular DVD player.

My view on DVD-As may be rather similar to Joe's. I'm not very excited over the "higher resolution" aspect and suspect that the advantages lie instead with the multi-channel surround, re-mixing, re-mastering, etc. Last year on another board I read an explanation of this by "soundhound", an engineer and motion picture music editor which tended to reinforce my thoughts. I linked his discussions in my reply in this thread. So although the higher resolution is certainly there for instruments to measure, it may not be there for our ears(which frankly suck in comparison with the instruments)to hear.

Oh boy. You guys are tough! Having listened to DVD-audio off a cheap DVD player with mediocre DACs, my Panasonic RP-82, I would say that there is a certain quality that is beneficial, a smoothness to the sound. Most audiophiles say it combines the benefits of vinyl & CD. My CD player still has better DAC's, so my CDs sound tighter and more accurate, but not quite as smooth.

That having been said, after reading many different reviews on hi-res hardware and software in Stereophile, it appears that a DVD-A disc originating from older recordings will sound mostly the same as a CD version played on a good CD player. Quality-wise, the real benefits will come from new recordings, as has already been demonstrated.

In terms of what the mass market will buy into, I agree that people don't care about sound quality, and will be sold more on the extra DVD-A features: graphic content including lyrics and photos, multi-channel music compatible with a 5.1 system, and surround sound in the car. There's also the chance to record at CD bitrates, plus MLP compression, yielding many many hours of content (perhaps up to 15 hours?). Think about the chance for mega-compilations at a cheap price!

-Cooper

I've often wondered, even way back when DVD was a new technology, why don't the record companies release "box sets" on one disc?

I'd gladly pick up a audio only DVD disc with multiple CD's worth of music on it. To be honest I own very few "box sets" because I friggin' hate the boxes. I want my CD collection all together. Those dang boxes are too big.

Well, for one, you can only play said box set on a DVD player. You couldn't take that same music to your car or your boom box / clock radio / discman. The market is much smaller for a multi-CD sized audio-only DVD.

Besides, some people love those boxes and all the extra material they usually come with.

Along the same idea, I've often wondered why car audio is so far behind.

CD players in cars are JUST now becoming standard. Who the hell listens to cassettes anymore?

DVD is great, but it seems like its potential has been pretty wasted. DVD as an audio only source is something that I was really expecting. It just never happened.

If they get rid of tape players in cars, then I sincerely hope they start adding a mini-stereo aux input jack. I don't want to resort to using an FM transmitter to play my MP3s in the car. Right now I use a tape adapter with my iPod. (My car has a tape and CD player.)

You could do what I did which is to have a 7.1 system with dipole surrounds and monopole rear surrounds. I have the surround channels from my SACD/DVD player hooked up to my rear surround pre-ins on my receiver, so I get movies through my dipoles and multichannel music through my monopoles. You have to have a full set of 7.1 pre-ins, which not every receiver has.

Mark

In reply to:

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Who the hell listens to cassettes anymore?

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Books on tape make rush hour traffic tolerable.

You have a very good point there. The selection of books on CD is nowhere near as large books on tape, yet.

WOW! You said, "Suck", JohnK. You been hangin' out after hours with the folks you're prosecuting?

Yeah, Mark, pretty soon I might be throwin' mighty fines left and right.

Mighty fine of you to say so.