This is my home theater it's almost complete and I'm starting to look for speakers. Iwas thinking of going with the M80/EP600 7.1 system with Qs8's and a 150 for a center and was wondering if anyone had any input. Is this overkill for the size of the room?
forgot to show the center and sub in the pic but you get the idea. BTW its a front projector system.
Thanks

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Also the room has a 9' ceiling

No, it's not at all over-kill. It looks like you will have a very nice room. You may want to move the couch in the centre a little closer to the front to enjoy a better soundstage from the 80s. Try to form an equilateral triangle between you and the speakers.

If you are interested in good bass at a small sweet area, get the 600. If you want more even bass around the room, get two or more 500s.

You may want to consider adding a raised floor and putting the couches that are against the wall on this raised floor so that you can have elevated theatre seating.

Certainly not overkill. Can it ever be overkill? Looks like the main seat for the HT is about 15-16' away I would even suggest a M80 center if the screen is going to be high enough otherwise dual M2s or dual VP150s on e above and below the screen to really anchor that center channel home.

Looks like it is going to be a wonderful place to enjoy some R&R.

Jason,

That hairdo looks great on you .

Thanks, trying to go for that Alan Lofft look I thought it appropriate considering my usual state of mind.

I was thinking of the raised floor but it's a multi-purpose room and the WAF got in the way when I mentioned it. I will also have a small workout area in the back of the room. I am thinking of going with the AVR-4308CI from denon to power the system.
Do two Ep 500's realy keep up with the 600 because the price difference is not that large this might be a good option for me but where would you place them. unfortunatly I have already drywalled and cant put inwall wiring to the subs.

Is sound quality effected by moving the main seating position ahed of the side surrounds b/c they are already wired to the position shown.

I don't know what a 500 sounds like compared to a 600 because Robb (Hutzal) won't let us listen to his 500 .

However, I can tell you to not even consider multiple 400s. Although they are great for music, they won't rock you during movies.

The 500s won't be difficult to place in your room. It looks like you have lots of space. You will have to experiment. As for the sub cables, these are not too unsightly and if you have the space, you can tuck them under the baseboards like I did.

2' forward and it should sound no different with the QS8s. And the subs will work great in tandem, you will have less bass localization with dual subs. 2 500s would work better than 1 600 from what has been said about dual subs. The extra wire can always be run under/behind the baseboard.

Mojo keeps beating me to the punch!

Dolby and DTS say that the sides can be +/- 10 (20?) degrees away from the normal. You'll have to experiment to see how it sounds. And remember that you can always adjust the channel gains and time delays through your amp to compensate.

Basebordes will be the last to go on for that exact reason. do you have any pic's of your setup I always like to see what other peoples setups look like for ideas.

As for the extra M80 for a center I dont think it will fit. But how would you wire 2 vp 150's and place them for best sound.

Just connect the extra VP150 to the planned one and mount them above and below the screen

thanks for the input guys, lots to think about. If anyone has heard or gets a chance to hear twin EP 500's in a simalair setup let me know how they sound. I love deep bone crunching bass in a theater and just assumed the 600 would be better because they go Sooo Low did'nt think a 500 could keep up even though they have impressive stats as well. Two 600's are starting to get out of my price range and they take up alot of room.

I have the 500 and it is carthilage crushing. It depends a lot on how many seats you need to have perfect bass. If it is just a few that are closely located, one 600 will probably do exactly what you want (I wish I could have physically had one in my appartment). If you have many seats, you COULD need 2 or 4 subs to homogenize the bass fields, but there is not garentee that you will.

I was originally thinking of getting a horizontal 600 and putting it under the screen and the vp150 on top of it, but with all the talk about speaker placement I started to think this would limit placement options. so again Im up in the air on the sub issue. could you pair a 600 and a 500 without issue? just grasping at straws here.

I don't think there would be an issue. They are really twins, with the 600 reaching one or two hz below and a 3db more output. How many seats do you have? And BTW, it is more likely that you will get better bass from the side or the back. The front is often too crowded.

As an example, I finally moved my 500 behind my couch. Perfect musical bass (the most important for me; cellos and double-bass sound just amazing) and it acts as "bass shakers" when T-rex decides to make a run for a jeep!

Starting to lean towards two Ep 500's and hope I dont get the upgrade bug. EFalardeau how big is your room?

With 2 EP500s you won't need to upgrade. To go beyond that much power you would have to spend, I would say, double the cost just to get a marginal improvement over them, based on reviews of subs that extend lower and have more SPL.

When discussing subs good posts to look for are from Jakeman or Craigsub who do extensive testing and auditioning.

I couldn't find a certain post that listed the combinations that Jakeman considered good to better but I did find another that covers some of your questions. Post on dual EP subs

I believe Jakeman has mentioned a couple times that he preferred 2 EP500's over a single EP600 though. Good luck and hopefully one of them will chime in.

Thanks for the info HAY good stuff.

Do the ep500 and ep600 have outputs on them so they can be hooked up even though my amp only has one sub output? One would think so but I'm sure someone out there has the answer for me.

I believe they can be daisy chained, yes.

Thanks kcarlile. I think I might place my order tomorrow before the Canadian dollar price change takes effect and the free finish upgradeis over. Love the high gloss cherry. One problem is as I have mentioned before is that I am in the middle of construction the drywall is up but there is no carpet and I am worried that I will get a bad first impression of the speakers and send them back after 30 days. Obviously this is not my intention but with the dollar and the free upgrade I just cant pass it up. Anyone care to chime in on this is the lack of carpet on concrete going to make this system sound too bright or otherwise.

To confirm the EP500 and 600 as well as the 400 all can be daisy chained. For that matter I think all the Axiom subs can be.

As long as the speakers are not close to the ground you should be OK. My M22s resting on my hardwood floor are no brighter than they were in my carpeted HT room.

Thanks Jason,

Going with two ep600's that way there is no wondering how an upgrade would sound untill axiom builds a ep700!! Also the M80's with Qs8's and a 150 for a center. Do the 150 have different binding posts than the rest? I think I read that in the Audioholics review of this system.

Not as far as I know. Our VP100 has the same posts as the rest of our speakers bought at the same time (all Ti models, other than the M80v2s)

Must have dreamt it.

Again one more confirmation, the VP150 has exactly the same binding posts as the rest of the line up(at least its the same as my M80s). The reviewer might have received a mixed set when Axiom was changing over to the current version they are now using. My 2003 vintage VP100 has knurled brass? round caps on the binding posts opposed to the plastic hexagon nut they use now; my M22s(also 2003) have a brass hexagon(I think, I am at work and this seems right at the momment) cap on them, so at some point they made some changes.

Looked it up and I was'nt dreaming. The review was from January 29, 2003 titled "Axiom Audio Epic 80 Home Theater Review". It is an older review so I guess they must have changed them to the same binding posts as the rest of the line since then.

Other than the comment on the binding posts of the 150 they loved the axiom's.

I was right, the M22s and my QS8s all have the hexagon gold plated nut and the VP100 is round knurled gold plated cap. I would bet the VP150 also had the round caps, not nearly as nice as the hex caps to tighten up, especially with 12 gauge wire.

Re: fear of bad impressions while waiting for carpet.

My M60s were the first things I unboxed so I would have unpacking tunes. They were set up in a large room, open to some other rooms with wood floors and zero furniture. The room sounded like the big empty room that it was, but I certainly didn't get a bad impression. Even in a big empty room I knew right away they were miles better than anything I owned before. The box-like sound went away once we added furniture and stuff. Aside from a rug under the coffee table, I still have no carpet and do not find them bright.

I will be putting carpet in my dedicated HT room when it's built but only because I'm going for closer to perfection in there, just cause I can. I'm still happy with my two M60s setups now. Stereo living room and 5.1 TV room, both with wood floors.

Thanks for calming my fear of a bad first impression. I will also try to have most of the furniture in the room so it is not so lively.

Well I took the plunge and put in an order with axiom for the Epic 80/600 in a 7.2 system .

2 - M80's
1 - VP150
4 - QS8's
2 - EP600's
All in high gloss cherry.

WOO HOO!!! This systems gonna ROCK!!

Cant wait till it gets here. They said it would be here before Christmas.

I Decided to go with the EP600's because it seems that every time I buy something I always Skimp just a little and end up wanting more, So this time I went all out. I also ordered speaker wire banana plug's and sub cables all at decent prices hope they are all good quality.

I will post some pic's when it all arrives.

Thanks to Everyone for all the help in making my decision you were all very informative and I hope to be part of this community for a long time.

That's quite a system you got there!
Yes, their cables and plugs are very good.

Hey, life can get busy around christmas and your 25th b-day

wow, two EP600's, thats freakin crazy man!!! I hope you can place them without any trouble!

Try to place them on opposite walls in your room, this will get your the best uniform bass in your room.

Wow! Congrats. 2 600s makes you twice as much of a man as me .

We'll make it there eventually, Tex. It's a male enhancement in progress.

I talked to the axiom rep (John) about placement and he said that the Ep600 in vertical form takes up no more floor space than a Ep500 so I went with two vertical's. I will start with one in the front left corner and one in the rear left corner and experiment from there on.

BTW Hutzal checked out your theater nice setup. What kind of screen is that and how does it perform? What are you using for a projector?
I'm sure my initial setup will be much the same as your's was as I'm not quite done my basement. Love the first Qs8 stands very Original. MMMMM chiken noodle.

Just make sure to use your legs when you lift them to move them around! On a serious note, you may want to use Alan's trick to put the sub where you will sit and then move your ears around the room.

Yea, I need to do more research on speaker placement. looks like I have about 3 week's to learn all the tricks.

But for now it's back to work on the basement.

It's a DIY screen project that went horribly wrong. Its a 92" screen made from blackout cloth stretched over a home made frame. Problem is, I stretched the cloth too much, and it bent the frame, making it really hard to get a proper "squared" screen on the wall. it looks straight on the photo's (kinda) but it really is not straight at all! It cost all of $40 tho, so I can't complain, the Z5's image is so stunning I just don't care about buying a $300 screen, its a waste of money. Look on the internet for DIY screens with blackout cloth, it really is very easy. I can give you a breakdown of the process if you want. Give me a pm.

I am using a Sanyo Z5 720p projector, seated at 10 feet away, I can't even see SDE, it really is an amazing value projector.

I'd be interested in hearing you views on the difference the 2nd 600 makes. I have a 4000 cubic room with a single 500 and really don't miss any bass. Of coarse I don't know what I don't know. I mean, I don't know what a 2nd 500 would sound like. But the single 500 is enough to crack drywall.

I am betting you won't get more bass, or better bass, maybe more even bass.

I bet with 2 600's you could start your own little earhquake though, that's always fun!

Paul

I wonder how the sub crawl applies to dual subs?

Alan wrote something about this last month, I think.

Having more subs isn't about getting more bass (all LFE should be calibrated with the rest of your system). The advantage is uniform bass across the room, less bass nulls and more even LFE in all seating areas.

If I had the money (and the approval) I would also get a second EP500 in my lttle 1900 cu.ft. room!!! But I don't have a death wish

I don't remember it pertaining to dual subs only a single sub.

I would guess you would do the sub crawl as usuall and then go directly opposite that placement to even out the sound/feeling.

I was wondering this myself?

Strap one to your back?

Oh wait, that's not helpful, is it...

Been working hard on the basement lately to get ready for the new speakers took some time off to post some pictures of my progress to date.

the before pics

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Framing

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And, now

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I will be replacing the retro furnature when the build is complete although the brown chair is quite comfy you kind of become a part of it after awhile.

Cant wait to get it muded, painted and carpeted oh and of course cant wait for my system to arrive. I think I'll take it for a test drive downstairs just for fun and then set it up upstairs until the work downstairs is complete

Well the system is here and all I can say is WOW! the M 80's sound incredible! Music I usually dont listen to much or enjoy all that much has me wanting more. I am a hard rock fan and although I enjoy all sorts of music other than most country, rock is my music of choice. Last night I threw in one of my Wife's CD's (Norah Jones - Come away with me) when the first track (Dont know why) started to play my jaw nearly hit the floor all I could say was WOW! these things sound freakin amazing! it was as if Norah was in the room with me, her beautiful voice filled the room and every note on the piano sounded perfect. As I said before they had me wanting more, Female vocals sound incredible on these things. On the Dave Matthews Band album Under the tree and dreaming the accoustic guitar on the song Satellite sounded so real it was as if I was playing it myself, if you cant tell I'm very excited about these speakers.

As for the home theater goes I think Audioholics had it right in their review of this system when they dubbed it a theater killer. Although I am still tinkering with settings on the 4308 and my DVD player I am very impressed with the sound produced by this setup the Qs8's produce an amazing sound field. I just watched Transformers and they had my head spining. You know it must be good when you look over at the wife and she's got as big a smile on her face as you do, Need I say more!

The EP 600's sound equaly as good once set up properly they would shake the whole house and yes their is a notable difference from one to two weather the 500's would be as good as the 600's I cant say as I have not heard the 500's. I have had some troubles with the subs that are not resolved yet. I had a breaker pop that the subs were on and now I have no sound from them. I have posted on this in the Technical Questions Area.

and now for some pic's
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After doing the sub crawl and moving the sub's
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Well thats it for now hope to get my sub problem figured out so I can get back to playing!

Later

Congratulations. Do we know what we are talking about or what?

It's going to be a PITA, keeping those glossy speakers clean during construction!

Dual 600's I am jealous in more ways than one.

EXITING!!!
I'm jealous you are so far into the project. I'm still waiting for our annual team share award to arrive so I can get started on mine.

Kind of good though. Every time somebody posts more pictures I get new ideas.

Lookin Good!

Your theatre is really coming together, looks great.

I have to ask it....when is the TV getting upgraded? All those great speakers, the 4308 and the tiny tv? Having said that, everything looks great!

WOW! That is a terrific system in what is going to be a really nice room when it's done. It's always a much appreciated joy when someone gets their new speakers and then posts, as you did, how pleased they are to find that their expectations were exceeded. We know what you mean.

That high gloss finish is something else. I'm chuckling at the refections on the walls in this picture.

I knew someone was going to comment on that. I plan on getting a front projector once the Mudding is done. I was looking at the Panasonic PT-AE2000 and a 120' screen from Carada.

The speakers will be moved upstairs while the mudding takes place to try to keep them out of harms way.

I'll say it again thanks to all who have posted, allot of great info on here keep it up. I plan to stick around here for along time and hopefully with some experience even add some info here and there

I second Jack's 'WOW' ... you've done a very remarkable job with the designing and building of your HT room, it's going to be a beaut whenever it's finished. The high gloss on the speakers looks awesome, I'm envious.

This must be a regional thing. What's "mudding"?

Drywall joint compound

Thanks. I have only heard that referred to as "seam filling" but was assuming that's what it was.

Our PEI red mud would be very hard to paint over. heh heh

What is mudding? It is when a bunch of naked women come over and roll around on your floor while you crank your Axioms. ha ha lol

Just kidding, don't you guys use Drywall in Canada? How else would you cover the seams, not beer eh...

Its what I call the drywall putty used with drywall tape to fill in the seams and screw holes. Thats what most people call it here. What do you call it?

Edit "Didnt see the other posts I like the lasd one "

In Calgary we call it mud too, not sure whats up with the East Coast...

We just stuff the cracks with used potato peelings and sand them down using a frozen Perch. The trick is to get all the sanding done before the frozen fish wakes up. After that, it's more of a texture spackling.

Actually, as mentioned, we call it "seam filling". To be honest, others around here might call it mudding and I just never noticed.

Just for fun, I checked in our phone book. All the drywaller adds mention "seam filling" but no "mudding."

Regional thing for sure.

I don't think your going to find it in our yellow pages either referred to as mudding. I think that is just another nickname that is popular by people in that trade. Kinda like the terms "intercourse" and "getting laid". lol

Sorry, I just watched SuperBad last night and it was SuperBad.

Just out of curiosity, why do you have the QS8 cables come out of the wall so far below the speakers instead of behind them so the wires are hidden?

Lay'n pipe

Interesting you mention SuperBad in a PEI related conversation. Martha MacIssaac, who plays Becca, is probably the first person from Prince Edward Island to star in a popular Hollywood feature film.

I didn't know this until this weekend when I also watched the movie and she looked so familiar I had to look her up on IMDB.

she's got a nice set of woofers on her

Good one!! Thats hilarious had a good belly laugh going there.

Poor planing . Originally I was going to go with B&W's or JM labs 800'S with stands. I had already put the drywal and outlets up when I decided to go with the axioms. To tell you the truth I would like to place the rear speakers higher on the wall but the window was in the way and the wife won't let me drywall over it. Who would want stupid windows in their house anyway they just let the light in and ruin the picture in your theater.

it should be easy enough to replace the wire outlets...right? it's not like they're misplaced by 5 ft. I think you would be much happier with the outcome overall. Just my 2 cents. Also, I think the wife would be much happier not having to look at the wires.

and we all know that if the wife is happy...our life is much easier.

So true!

If I get some ambition I may just move them although I'm not sure how I would cover up the existing holes? Right now I'm having a hard time leaving the couch I even had a hard time pulling myself away to post the pic's.

To cover up the holes, you cut some drywall that will fit in the holes and then you screw some pieces of wood inside the hole to act as backing for the filler drywall pieces. The wood is wider than the hole and you screw through the existing drywall to support the wood, Next screw the filler pieces of drywall to the backer boards and then tape and mud the seams around the hole. Next comes some sanding and painting, voila, hole gone.

Another alternative way to patch the hole if they're the size of an electrical receptacle or smaller..

Measure the hole and say it is 3" wide by 4" high get a piece of drywall that is 5" wide by 6" high.

Measure and mark out the hole on to the back of the drywall piece.

Score/Cut from the back of the piece around the marking and make sure not to puncture the drywall paper on front.

Pull off the drywall so you have the patch for the hole with the extra 1" perimeter of paper. This paper will be used as the tape and will help hold the drywall in place. The paper may curl slightly depending on how long it is around the border, which you can trim, but the compound/mud will keep it flat during install.

Get out your drywall compound/mud apply some to the wall or drywall piece and slid in to place. Apply your first coat lightly to reduce amount of sanding and apply 2,3 4 coats as needed.

I've used this technique numerous times in my bassment due to wire runs and it works really well. I'm not a trade man and taught myself to do drywall mudding repairs after watching many people doing it. The main thing is patience and not to overwork the compound/mud. Light coats will make sanding easier, and sanding will make your patch look good. Don't worry too much on how it looks the first couple coats until sanded.

It took me about 4 patches to get used to the idea of not making it look perfect while applying the compound/mud. Good luck.

I will have to try that next time I need to patch up a hole.

Thats a new technique to me too.

holy crap! I cannot even grasp the theory that you are trying to explain! Sounds like a Mr. Show skit! Sounds like...blah blah blah..slap some shiz in there...blah blah blah voila!



the other option is to buy a dry wall hole patching kit from (insert hardware store here) for about $10.

Or a Red Green plan. Not enough duct tape for that, I suppose.

The way that Jason is explaining is the exact way I have repaired drywall, it's very simple ... it's the finishing part that can test your skills.

Here's one article...Repairing Drywall

.

I was hoping I was clear but pictures do help...I googled my way and found this.
Drywall Patch

Lots of pics on the site to show you step by step what I was trying to explain. Hope this clears it up.

Just realized this wasn't directed at me, but at least there's more instructions here if you need them

WTF two months and no updates? Get your a$$ in gear JC.

you wouldn't belive how hard it is to get a contractor to drywall in regina right now and once you get an estimate it is another 1 to 2 month wait before they come to do the work. as of right now it looks the same as it did in my last post.

drywall is easy, you can save some big $ if you do it yourself!

Call me chicken but that is one thing I dont want to tackle myself. The finishing can make or break the job and the way I do things it would probably take me another two years to finish.

Yah, cutting and screwing in the drywall is easy- mudding and taping the seams can be a bit tricky. REally it is no big deal though-

However, the worst thing that could happen is that you would end up with more drywall mud on the seams then you need and have to do a lot of sanding to smooth things out.... The end result would probably come out fine.

Hopefully you can get a contractor in there soon though!

Yes I would You can do the drywall, it is very easy and it would make the taping job quicker. I know around here, if it is already drywalled alot of the tapers will come by at night for side jobs and voila it is done, but it still takes a few months for them to fit you into the schedule.

Drywall is hung just waiting for tape and mud. I imagine its also hard to find a contractor in Calgary seems to be a shortage of them lateley housing is booming like crazy here.

So I have heard, All you Saskatchewanites heading back from here and now looking for a bigger home.

Ya, it is crazy here as well and has been for 10 years now. I can remember when we bought our house coming up on 11 years ago and the price listed in the show home went up by $50,000 in the 6 months it took them to build our house, they even had to delay the build a little while they tried to get more staff. Things have just worse from there. 1-2yr wait times for builds. I have heard it is getting better now that the city has slowed to a more sustainable growth, but tradesmen are still in very short supply.

Drywall is only difficult as it doesn't look that good until the end. If you're a perfectionist like me, it becomes daunting as you always want to overwork the mud and try to make it perfect on the first application. It's usually around a 3 step/coat process.

You should try to attempt in a spot that isn't on a main wall to see how you do. Also, spend the extra money and have the low dust mud. This stuff will not stay airborne and drops quickly to the ground.

The first couple areas I ever did I noticed after the fact that I needed to sand the edges of the mud better to make it seemless along the wall. I noticed this at a few friends places as well on their jobs. Most often you will need to primer the wall when finishes to be able to notice certain flaws.

Good luck if you try it. Another option is to head to a work site in the afternoon and talk to the drywallers. Offer them some cash to come do your place and a case of beer when they're done It's worked well for a few people I know.

Is it done yet???

Just a quick question about the framing in your basement.It looks like you nailed 2x6's to the floor for the room layouts then hung the wall's from the floor joist's.I have never seen this before.

It's cause the city he lives in was built on a swamp and the floors are prone to heaving. This design gives some room to allow for heaving (the space between the bottom plate and bottom of the wall) without stressing the walls.