Hello.

My listening room is 19' x 15' with a 12' cathedral ceiling. There is a 8' wide opening to the dining room and kitchen on one side and a 5' wide opening to a small foyer and hallway on the other side. This will be for stereo only listening. My receiver is a Denon DRA-395 stereo receiver rated at 80 watts x 2 into 8 ohms, 20Hz - 20kHz, <.08% THD, 4 ohms stable.

What would you suggest? Please don't let price be an object of consideration because any of the Axiom floor standers pass the wife approved budget test. ;-)

Thanks,
Darren

If you prefer detailed, forward sounding speakers...M60ti or M80ti. (Though the M80's might want some more power than your DRA-395 has)

If you prefer a little bit more laid back, mellow sound...M50ti or M40ti.

i agree with spiff.. 60's or 80's.. in addition, the 80's are 4ohm speakers, so while being efficient, i think you are lacking the wattage to really make em shine. i reckon you could get the 60's, and fill that room with PLENTY of sound!!

bigjohn

You would be ok if you were to deceide on the M80s too.The Denon is 80 watts @ 8ohm but into 4ohm it should put out more than 100 watts per channel.That would be more than enough to run the 80s pretty darn good.

would that cause his reciever to clip out??? I have thought of getting the 80's but I fear that I would need another receiver to properly drive them.

The Denon is stable under a 4 ohm load.Over driving the receiver is the only way to make it clip,ie running out of useable power.It should put out at around 120 watts @4ohm.That should be enough to run the 80s at quite loud levels.

thank you for clearing that up.

My impression was that as stated above, my 80 watts per channel amp in the receiver at 8 ohms would turn into an approx. 120 watts per channel amp when mated with 4 ohm speakers. Is this not enough? If not, what is enough?

Throwing out the question of the receiver, (I will have the speakers far longer than the receiver) would my large space of over 5000 cubic feet need the M80 or would that be overkill. I currently have definitive tech BP6B that have two 5 1/2" midrange/bass drivers and two 1" tweeters and it is not cutting it in this space.

One thing that I never really see mentioned is that the M80s are also more efficient, outputting a higher level per watt than the 60s.

I would say that as long as the Denon is fine with 4 Ohm loads, the fact that it might be rated for a few less watts/channel makes the M80 even more attractive!

If price is not a big consideration; and you have amplification to drive 4 Ohms; and you have a larger room, I can't see the M80 as overkill at all. I think it would be the preferred model!

That's an important point. M80s can HANDLE more power than M60s but they do not REQUIRE more power than the 60s, ie they will play just as loud (in fact a bit louder) than M60s with everything else the same. The only reasons we talk about equipment with the M80s is (a) many amps don't perform well at high levels into a 4 ohm load, and (b) if you have crappy electronics you might be better off spending the price difference between 60s and 80s on improving some other part of your system.

As long as your receiver is good with 4 ohms (folks, do we know the Denon stereo products are also OK with 4 ohms or could it just be the AV receivers ?) then you're good to go with the M80s.

How far will you be sitting from the speakers normally, and do you have room to keep the backs of the speakers 1-2 feet from the back wall ? As long as you and the speakers will NOT be packed into one corner of the large room then M80s are definitely the way to go.

I think I would normally be about 12 or 13 feet from the speakers and not up againsta a wall. The back of the speakers would probably be about a foot or two away from the wall as needed. My back of my current speakers are placed 18" away from the wall due to their bipolar nature.

I would say 12 or 13 feet away from the 80s would be fine.I have mine 13 feet away from the listening postition,8.5 feet a part 2.5 feet from the side walls and 18 inches from the rear wall.In this set up the 80s sound great to me.Plus I have them toed in just slightly.

M60s or M80s would be good choices. If you opt for the M60s you could almost get a good sub with the price difference. Maybe get the wife to allocate $100-200 more and get M60s with an SVS sub?
You may want to arrange a demo session with an Axiom owner as well (unless the idea of return shipping charges don't bother you).
Good luck.

At this time I have a stereo only receiver so I would have to buy the SVS sub starting at $600 ($700 after shipping) because the PB10 does not have a internal crossover. That would put the M60's and a sub up to $1600 and out of my budget. The M22ti and a sub would be in my budget. I don't know if I want to step down that much though. Would the M22ti's fill up my room? I certainly don't want to make an upgrade that is not really an upgrade.

Darren, you don't necessarily have to have a sub with an internal crossover to use with your 395, and as I pointed out in a thread a few months ago, the PB10 would be usable. Since the 395 has a sub out(unfiltered, full-range)you can connect it to the sub in by using a low-pass filter at the sub, such as the 70Hz low pass from Parts Express.

As was mentioned in Colleen's thread(and then linked by Rick), PE also has high-pass filters which she could use. However, her 685 has no sub out, but does have main-ins(that's the key, rather than pre-outs) which she could plug the filters in to. Your 395 situation is the opposite, so you could use a low-pass filter on the sub, but not the high-pass filters on the mains.

If you use the M80's for stereo listening, then do you really need a sub ?

M80's should go flat to 35Hz. Do you need to go below that for music listening ?

2 words:

pipe


organ





Everything's better with a good sub.

Yeah, but to be honest, how often do you listen to pipe organ music? Chances are only in the first days after a) the purchase of new speakers or b) the purchase of a new sub.

It's kind of like that japanese drum cd that Peter has. Admittedly, it does sound really freaking cool, but it's more of a "show off the equipment" thing instead of a "I really like this music" thing.

That said, everything is better with a good sub.

John,

Thanks. I think you just saved me $300. Nobody tell SVS.;-)

I just ordered the 70 Hz low pass crossover from Parts Express. I am going to check out how it works with my current (crappy) sub. The crossover on my current sub is very poor. It lets alot of high frequencies leak through to the sub. If I run frequency sweeps with the sub's crossover set to 50 Hz, the sub is still playing strong at 200 Hz. It is noticeably weaker at 200 Hz than if i set the crossover higher but IMHO it is way too much to be able to get the sub to blend.