Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Home Theater rear speakers in a 5.1 setup

If you get stands it will give you some flexibility to experiment with positioning a little which is what I suggest for anyone who has the chance. If you have corners behind each side of the sofa you might try putting QS speakers right in the corners so that the tweeters are facing along each wall. I got really great results doing that in my apartment. It did make the bass a little boomy around 80-90Hz so I just set the crossover to 100Hz with no problem.


That’s almost the same as my apartment was 16x12x8 so I can say the speakers you have selected will work in a room that size however you might want to consider a different approach. For reference the speakers you are looking at 2xM3, 1xVP100, 2xQS4 come to $868 USD from the factory outlet.

If you plan on using a subwoofer all the time including music I would consider the following. 3xM2 (L/C/R) and 2xQS8 which comes to $840 UDS. The reason I suggest these is that having 3 identical speakers up front is considered ideal for a seamless soundstage and the QS8s are from what I’ve read noticeably superior to the QS4s. IMO the M2s sound identical to the M22s when crossed with a subwoofer at 80Hz in my present 21x13x8-12(vaulted) room and the M22 is a fantastic speaker. The M2 is not much taller than the VP100 and should fit under most displays. Also the M2 is a more neutral speaker while the M3 has a slight bass hump to simulate deeper bass for use w/o a sub. Not to say it won’t work great with a sub some people love it.

The M2s save you enough money to upgrade to the QS8s which will serve you better when you eventually mover to another larger room should you choose to build on your investment rather than replace your speakers later. Which is that other point in changing is creating a more viable upgrade path. The M2s and QS8s have the same driver complement as most all other popular Axiom speakers (M80, M60, VP180, M22) and will IMO better integrate with them if you upgrade later. For example, should you move to a larger room and which to upgrade to the M80s and VP180 the you could move two of the M2s to the rear to serve as surround back speakers. You could also then buy one additional M2 pair it with the third one you already had and use them as wide or height speakers in a 9.1 configuration.

Not that you couldn’t successfully use a pair of M3s as surround backs but the VP100 might not be enough in a larger room and I’m not sure how much you could sell a single used VP100 for. Plus by upgrading to the QS8s you have a more capable surround speaker for any size room but also one that will be much better in a larger room.

Also the factor outlet speakers are fine. 13 of my 15 Axiom speakers have come from the outlet and I’ve never seen a problem with any of them. Some people have reported very minor cosmetic issues but that’s all.

Sorry so long.
Cheers,
Dean

P.S. Build your own stands or purchase something locally and save some money. Even QS8 stands can be made or if put in the corner shelves could be cut out to allow for the bottom firing diver. That’s how I’m doing the ones on my back wall if I ever get in gear again

Vic, as Randy(sirquack)pointed out, I said nothing about 2' from the walls. Since your room is only about 13' wide, you need to use all of that in spreading the surrounds, so they'd be just about up against the side walls. The 2' I mentioned was just a suggestion to have them about that much farther back than being directly alongside you. Since you've said that the couch won't be up against the back wall, you should be able to move the surrounds back about that much.

As Dean mentioned, it would be good to use three vertical M22s across the front.

Dean, it's unclear whether the Factory Outlet still exists as such. It was announced Sept. 1 that the auction site was replacing the Outlet, yet there's still an Outlet section with the usual listings.

Edit: I note that the newletter said that the Outlet was closing 9/13. Curious decision in my view.

Thanks for pointing that out John, somehow I missed that in the last newsletter.

As you noted the outlet is listed but just in a drop-down menu now. However, I did play around with it which is how I came up with the prices I noted.

IMO Axiom doesn’t have enough “factory seconds” to make the outlet work as such. I’m still convinced that if no B-stock became available in the stated time frame they shipped A-stock so maybe they are just making it more specific to just handling true B-stock by putting it up for auction with some sort of minimum bid.

Might have to see if there is anything I need to order tomorrow.

I bet this will cause some consternation since a lot of people especially on other forums recommend the outlet but don’t frequent here much and won’t get the word. So people will show up here looking for it and yet another customer service issue will ensue.

Dean, I've also suspected that was the situation when the Outlet needed more supply. However, it's seemed to have worked quite well and been very popular. Whenever someone was having a budget problem we were able to refer them to the Outlet; now the auction process will be considerably more uncertain.

Yes the stability of the 10% discount is quite appealing. The randomness with which B-stock shows up from most other manufactures has always made using that option less desirable elsewhere.

Yeah, I think you are correct JohnK. With the auction you might be able to pick up a pair of speakers much cheaper (Axiom direct and not used) than what you would be able to get at the outlet, but if you are looking for an entire matching b-stock 5.0/7.0 setup, the auction will unlikely be able to provide that service. It would be a shame if they got rid of the factory outlet option.

I'll second this suggestion. I have two M3s in one room as fronts and M2 as center, but if I had to do it over, I'd use M2s for fronts (with sub), instead of M3s, for the reasons Dean gives.

Hi there, new here - but I just ordered from the outlet on Friday. Reasons are I wanted to get a whole setup all at once and not a big fan on bidding on stuff anyway. I guess today is that last day the outlet is gonna be around? Anyway, looking forward to getting my new Axioms.

That is a question you would have to ask Axiom directly. I know that it has been said that the auction was replacing the trade up program they had previously but I don't think anything has been said about all b-Stock being sold directly through the auction. It seems the factory outlet is running as it always has been, offering b-stock product (stock finish) with a wait period of 3-4 weeks. The direct items from Axiom in the auction setting are always in-stock and sometimes fall under custom finishes.

Enjoy your new toys.