I caught this desease about January of last year. However, the sickness known as "audiophilia" has laid dormant for many years prior to the first symptom's appearance. My father had assembled a nice little system for himself about 5 years ago, followed by a seperate home theater system (at a time when DVD and 5.1 were unheard of by most of the population). As a result of the upgrades, I inherited a few decent components from a system he assembled in the 80's, consisting of a Yamaha pre-amp and solid state class A amp, along with a few other components. I used this stuff through college with a pair of "frat house" style KLH's that could play absurdly loud. From my fathers escapades in audio, I knew the sound from this was less than stellar, but decent by college standards.
Upon graduation, and a now steady paycheck, I felt it was time for a new pair of loudspeakers. I probably should have done more homework than I did, for on sort of a whim I bought a pair of Acoustic Research AR-9's. AR is now far removed from the company that Henry Kloss started decades ago, but they did not disappoint as the Yamaha equipment had never sounded better...and then I started reading.
I read (and still read) everything I can get my hands on. I bought Robert Harley's "The Complete Guide to Hi-End Audio" (a must read for anyone just starting out). I also read all of the e-zines I could find and went through all of the archives. Reading all of this stuff planted seeds of doubt in my mind about my own purchase (I still have yet to find a review of my loudspeakers). Shame on me for letting these people shape my opinions, or doubt them.
This is where we get to Axiom. Obviously, as everyone here knows, there is a wealth of printed word about Axiom all over the internet. Both from professional reviewers as well as everyday folks like yours truly. I have for a while now wanted to set up a second system in my bedroom. My roommate likes to watch TV alot, while I'd rather listen to music. I bought a pair of M3's just for this purpose, as well as a benchmark to understand the translation from print to sound, and validate the purchase of my AR-9's (being twice as expensive).
To be honest I expected the M3's to crush the AR's in many areas. What I found was that this was not always true. The AR's actually held up quite well against the very nimble M3. In the area of bass, what the M3 chose to present, it presented quite well. Acoustic bass has a great tightness and a toe-tappin' agility that the AR's couldn't match. The AR's on the other hand, were superior in the extentsion department (no surprise here as the AR-9's have a 10" side firing woofer). The nod has to be given to the M3 in the midrange. Voices have a smoothness that I previously had never heard, not even in my fathers system. The AR's were not unpleasant in this department, they just lacked that last bit of coherency. Both speakers handled treble very similarly. There is a good sense of air around cymbals and one of the CD's I used for comparison has what I think is a triangle being struck. It seems to ride over the rest of the music, and the M3 seemed to ring for a longer period and present it with it's own air, while the AR seemed only slightly less articulate.
The M3 has at all over the AR-9 in terms of imaging and soundstaging. I've always had trouble pinpointing depth when listening to the AR's. No wonder; there really isn't any, at least not when compared to the M3. At one point in Leon Parker's new CD(a great jazz percussionist), background vocals appear, and this time, they really were in the back. They appeared distincly behind other instruments occupying the foreground. That was a revelation to me, and made me smile.
Both loudspeakers presented music with similar tonal balance, with the AR's being able to handle macrodynamic swings easier than the M3, which is no real surprise. The extra few octaves of bass the AR's presented helps alot on rock recordings, or anything beat heavy. In jazz and classical, I never felt the M3 was missing anything. Being that the AR-9 is bi-wirable, and the 10" woofer is crossed over at about 100Hz, I did a little experiment where I drove the woofer section of the AR's with the M3's running full range. There was a bit of a jump in the midbass as both were producing sound in the 60 to 100Hz range, but overall it was actually pretty pleasing to listen to, and i could see the benefit of a subwoofer, properly positioned and crossed over.
After all this, I can breathe with a sigh of relief; the fears of my AR's not living up to their purchase price put to bed by not being completely embarassed by the M3. I gained a little perspective in this exercise. Trust your own ears. I liked the AR's before I started reading. Their sound never changed, so why should I like them any less just because I read things about other speakers. I do enjoy them, and I will continue to do so. But now, I have another pair of lovelies that bring me joy in another room. My heart is big enough for both.
My apologies for the length of this post, but seeing as I don't really have any audiophile friends (except my father) around, there was alot I wanted to get off my chest.
By the way, in this bedroom system of mine, I'm pondering playing with some tubes. Anybody have any experience with Antique Sound Labs Wave 8 monoblocks or the nOhr SE-9 integrated. Any input would be great.
