Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Advice from Axiom Owners Onkyo NR3008?

Yea Grunt,

Today I actually read one of your older post about your experience with DSX. That's what got me motivated to hear the wides. (great write up btw) I'm using some older Boston Acoustics A70's (late 80's) for the wides, but they still sound great.

Hopefully, next week I can hook up my Samson studio monitors for the heights. Hate using different brand speakers, but right now I have no choice. I will have to get some M3's or M22's soooon!

Dana

I’ve tried both M22s and M2s for wide and decided on using the M2s since I couldn’t tell the difference between them in the wide role. I also found that QS speakers worked much better for me as height speakers than when I tried M22s so I went with QS8s for heights. However, most of the time I use the wide speakers since I can’t use both wide and height at the same time with the 3007.

Hi,
I recently (last week) added height speakers to my dedicated home theatre room. I'm using a pair of Axiom QS8v3 and they are fantastic. For ambient sound (unless you are in the perfect spot and even then) no direct radiating speaker can compete and deliver that level of stunning performance.

Hi Jc,

Just curious, are you also using wides in addition to heights?

Dana

Dana not to answer for JC but I find that the Wide speakers come into play more than the Height speakers do. This is also what theory dictates, that our hearing is more sensitive to sounds coming from the front sides than above. However, real world I think it’s somewhat more room/seating dependent.

I’ve done a huge amount of testing of both wide and height using specific scenes and also just watching whole programs and found the following. When they come into play both height and wide sound almost equally good with the slight edge going to height because of the extra 3-dimentionality of the sound. Probably due to my front speakers being below a very big screen and also having a vaulted ceiling to help spread out the sound from the height speakers. OTOH the wide speaker really fill in the gap between the mains and surround speakers in my present room which is longer and narrower than my last room, which didn’t have this sort of sound gap.

The reason that when in use the heights win for me is they have more of a “Wow!” factor. Like in the scene in LOTR FOTR at Balan’s Tomb in the Mines of Moria where the bucket falls down the well. The echoes coming from all directions especially overhead are so realistic its scary. Other scenes with ambient overhead sounds like wind and rain can also sound quite impressive. However, these types of scenes just don’t happen that often so the wide speakers end up coming into play much more often, literally in almost every scene.

Originally I preferred using the height speakers but that was because I was doing the testing with material they excel at. When it came down to just watching things I found that I when I switched from wide to height during general listening/viewing I quickly noticed that the wide speakers were missing. OTOH, when I switched from height to wide I really didn’t miss the height speakers because they just didn’t produce as much effects as often as the wide speakers do.

I would love to be able to run both at the same time but from the point of practicality the wide speakers in my room win hands down.

Dana,

I don't have "width" speakers: my room is not wide enough but if I could I would certainly have some. Luckily, my pair of Axiom M80v3 already creates a soundstage with boundaries which far exceeds than the actual ones of the room.

Thanks for all the great info guys!

Looks like QS8's are the way to go for heights. Probably wides too...

Geez, I need to save some coin now...
Probably be better to just drive by Axiom and throw my wallet in the building...

Dana

I haven't... 

After talking to the Emotiva people about the UMC-1, I decided to give it a try.  I waited long enough for the stupid thing, might as well give it a shot. They answered my questions and concerns well enough. I am about a week into my 30 day evaluation.  So far, I am pretty impressed with it.  No operational complaints and the sound quality is pretty amazing. Stunning, really. If it gives me any trouble I'll send it back and get the NR3008.  But so far, I'm happy. 

The NR3008 still looks exceptionaly impressive.  I just came to the conclusion that i really don't need half the bells and whistles.  I'm either uninterested or its already duplicated by some other device in my system.  So i see no need to pay for them again.  And my room isn't big enough to effectively support even a 7.1 system, let alone 9 or 11. ;-).

And prices in the NR3008 seem to fall $50 each week, so I figured I might as well try the UMC. If it fails, then I can take advantage of the post Christmas sales on the NR. ;-)

I hope it works out for you. I am looking forward to the final review after you have more time with it if you keep it.

That's awesome Peter!

Good for you. Yea, can't wait for a review of your UMC-1. Let us know what you think of emo's room correction too! Enjoy!

Dana