I am in the process of upgrading my HT equipment and need some advice. I will eventually be upgrading my audio to 2 ea. M60,1 pr. QS-8, 1 ea. VP150 for my 5.0 setup. Yes you noticed that there won't be a subwoofer as I live in an apartment.

Questions:

1. During my first buying spree, I will be buying the M60's and the VP150. I plan on moving my *cough* Bose *cough* 601 series 3 to use as temp surround speakers so I can get rid of the pesky *cough* Bose *cough* wedges that are my current center and surrounds. Is this arrangement going to drive me sonically insane?

2.After I purchase my QS8's and upgrade my receiver, are the M60's going to be able to provide sufficient bass to allow me to skip a subwoofer? I realize that this question is subjective, but I really don't have the option of running a sub in my apartment building.

3. If there is a question of the M60's bass abilities, and I decide to move up to M80's, is a receiver like a Yamaha RX-V2600 going to be able to drive the M80's given their 4 ohm imp?

My head hurts.

I ran much worse speakers than your Boses as surrounds in conjunction with M60 and VP100, with no problems. You probably won't want to play a lot of music in 5.1 but I still prefer stereo anyways.

If you are running without a sub, you will want a receiver which can route LF signal from center and surrounds to the mains. I'm pretty sure that all Yamaha receivers will do that (my HK will not) but check.

I'm a bit rusty re: which Yamahas are good at 4 ohms. I *think* the 2500 and up are OK but not 100% sure.

M60s put out a surprising amount of bass. Maybe combining M60s with "buttkickers" or whatever they are called (under the feet of your couch/chair) might be a good apartment-friendly combination.

You can get a bit more and deeper bass out of M80s but at some point you are going to have the same noise problems as with a sub, but with less ability to "turn down the deep bass". My thought would be to go with 60s and save the money for a sub later.

Hey Mayhem, welcome to these parts

I love my m60's and I think they have great, tight, accurate bass... I can't count how many times they have brought a huge smile to my face. The specs on the 80's show slightly lower numbers, but it is very close. I believe without a sub, you'll want your receiver set to Large for the mains so they get the full signal. You may find your neighbors in the apartment think you still have a sub. Some Yammy's have had issues with the 4ohm 80's, not sure about the 2600.

There has to be someone out in the LA area that you can audition some 60's. Have you checked the "Hearing Things" forum and the "Audition in your area" thread, page 1?

Randy

Here is the California list, I'm not familiar with LA, some of these may be suburbs? Spiff has 60's and he is always on these forums. Try sending anybody a PM message...

California

Antioch - (4)M80, (1)VP150, (4)QS8, (2)M3, (2)M22ti (koiman)
Campbell - M50s (Stbean)
Costa Mesa, CA - M2i, VP100, EP175, QS4 (atreu59)
Fremont - M22, VP150, QS8 - (gnrajagopal)
Fresno - M60s (richeydog)
Grass Valley - M60s (mamzh)
Long Beach - EP600, M22, QS8, VP150 (LongBeachBear)
Los Angeles - M60, VP150, QS8, M2i (Spiffnme)
Menlo Park (SF Bay Area) - M22s, VP150, QS8s (oldskoolboarder)
Monteray - M60s, VP150, QS8s, EP350 - (jordanz)
Oakland - M22, VP100 (Pmbuko)
Oakland - M50s, QS4s, VP100 - (kcarlile)
San Marcos - M80s, VP150, QS8 (ZeN)
Irvine - M22s, VP150, 3 QS8s (snippy)
San Ramon - M80s, 3 M2is, VP150 (simboticus)
Tracy - M80s (front, center, & rears) QS8s (surrounds)EP600 (Tharkun)
Tustin - VP150, M22s, QS4s (4) - (Aetherhole)
Newport Beach - M60 + QS8 + M2 (2x6spds)
Nevada City - M50s, VP150, M22s - (md55)
Union City - M60s, VP150, QS8s - (twelly)

Hi all:

Thanks for your replies, it is appreciated. I'm not to worried about not having deep bass, I don't have it now with my 601's. It sounds like I will be fine with M60's, I am apprehensive on running 4 ohm without using seperate amps, something completely out of my budget.

While I live in Los Angeles, I am down in the OC every weekend at my g/f's, so both of these auditioners would be within range with the proper setups. I'll drop them a PM for an audition.

Los Angeles - M60, VP150, QS8, M2i (Spiffnme)
Newport Beach - M60 + QS8 + M2 (2x6spds)

I understand that Axiom will also let me audition the speakers in house for 30 days (with me being responsible for return freight), that would be an excellent real world test.

Thanks again!

Denon's and HK's will drive the 80's with no problems. There may be other AVR's that will also. As you mentioned, seperates would also be an option.. 2X6 or Spiff are very much AV guru's, they can help ya out I'm sure...

Randy

ps: got your PM on AVS forum

Playing forums tag

I'm prob gonna stick with the M60's, I am more comfortable that a receiver in my price range (i.e. Yamaha RX-V2600 or Denon 380x series) will be able to drive the 60's easily vs. potentially not having enough umph to drive the 4 ohm 80's. From everything I have heard, the 60's seem tight on the bass, and should the living sitch change, I can always add a sub later.

Thanks all for the input

Most Denon models will drive 4ohm speakers with no problem, so if you ever do get Axiom Upgradeitis, you would be set

By the way, you'll love your Qs8's and VP150 probably more...

Much as I like HKs, I wouldn't recommend 'em for this application. The HK bass management is great but it doesn't seem to be able to route LF from center and surrounds to the mains. Lord knows I tried...

I took a quick flip through the Denon 2805 manual and it doesn't seem to do this either -- manual says that all the LF from center and surrounds only go to the sub.

Any other receiver suggestions, folks ?

I have the 2805, couldn't he just set the mains to large to get the full range of LFE? I'm guessing what your getting at Dan is that if he has no sub, then he would not have a crossover to set to route the low stuff from the Q's and VP, since the subwoofer would be NO on the receiver? Hmm interesting.

For HT applications, I'm not sure it would matter much anyway, as I don't believe a lot of LFE is sent to the Center and Surround channels anyway, correct me if I'm wrong?

John and Randy, maybe we're again getting tangled-up in the semantics of ineptly written/translated manuals. If a receiver couldn't send low bass info(including LFE)from the "small" speakers and LFE channel(a separate channel, none of it being in the mains, center or surround channels) to the mains set "large" when there wasn't a sub this would seem to defeat the purpose of bass management. Looking at p.35 of the 2805 manual it somewhat clumsily states: "When the subwoofer set to "NO", the bass sound is output from the speaker set as "Large"." For the 630 at p.24 when the mains are set "Large" and the sub "None": "When this option is selected all bass information will be routed to the front left/right "main" speakers."

You might be right about the Denon -- I skimmed through the manual but had missed the text you referred to.

Re the HK630, the manual *says* that but the receiver doesn't seem to *do* that. I found some DVDs with LF content on the center and surround channels (lots of DVDs have LF content on the center channel, fewer on the surround) and the bass did seem to be lost completely (as opposed to just being less) when I ran "sub None". LF content on the mains came through just fine.

I guess I could do some more testing by using the 5.1 discrete RCA inputs and feeding a full-range stereo signal into a couple of the channels, but I was pretty sure that the operating mode described on p.24 did not work on my receiver. Since all the routing is done in the DSP code it didn't seem like the kind of thing that could be defective, so I assumed it was just an artifact of translating the manual from English to Chinese and back again

Mayhem, welcome!

Don't worry about the 601's as surrounds. I was using a pair of Alpine 6x9's that were better than having nothing at all. You'll be fine - plus, remember it's only temporary!

Because you are in an apartment and won't be listening at insane levels, the Yamaha will be fine with a 4ohm load. I have a much lower model than the 2500, and it was fine with both the 4ohm M80's AND the 4ohm Alpine's.

And yes, when listening to DD or DTS, the Yamaha has a setting to route the LFE channel to the mains.

Shawn

Thanks for the input everybody, I have a possible audition of an M60 setup next week. Assuming I like what I hear, I will be buying after I make the obigatory trip to the local higher end stereo store to hear other options.

Given what I have researched, I will probably be ordering the M60s and VP150 next week.

On a slightly different topic, does Axiom have lead times on their non-seconds products?

Mayhem,

No, if you order by 12:00 noon Eastern time, we ship the same day. Otherwise, all orders ship the next business day.

Custom finishes are in a different category. For those there is a 6-week lead time. It's often less, but that's the wait time we specify.

Regards

Thanks for the info

From the manual, on the 2805 if you have no sub and set the fronts to large the signal goes full range to the fronts.

http://usa.denon.com/AVR2805_DFU_ownersmanual.pdf

I know that I am late to this thread. Sirquack must have been at work again today, that is why he was so quick to respond (Just kidding Randy).

Not much else to say but I really like the bass level of the M60s. Sure, it isn't thumping like a subwoofer, but there is really good range there. I was very happily surprised when I had my M60s set to "large" Of course, that meant less info sent to the subwoofer sometimes, but it was nice to hear what the M60s could do.

Hey Sirquack... Do you know any Windows/Server Admins? We lost our best guy today, and we are looking for someone with really good skills. PM me if you know of anyone.

Actually I did take today off Nickster My wife had an interview with the Iowa Board of Education, she is in the top 5 to get that title for 2005...

I'll keep the Server Admin job in mind, wish I was up on some of that stuff, maybe I could apply It has been awhile since I was planning on becoming an MCSE.. I'm busy enough being the System Admin for our Enterprise Content Management Solution....

Bridgman, are you out there? I emailed tech support at harman kardon and asked their opinion <rolleyes> on bass management for the hk's. And this was their reply:

Hi Michael,

You are correct. The AVR230 bass management will do exactly what you
expect it to. The LFE and bass information from the speakers set to
SMALL will be redirected to the speakers that are set to LARGE. I am
sorry about the confusion.

I hope this helps.

Sincerely,

Joe Chinnici

Internet Support Specialist
Thank you!!!


-----Original Message-----
Subject: AVR 230 Questions regarding Harman Kardon Products


I have a question about bass management regarding the avr-230 that I
own.

With the center and surrounds set to small, the mains set to large with
subwoofer OFF....does the lfe and bass (below the crossover point) from
the center and surrounds get routed to the mains?

The manual is somewhat confusing and I would appreciate a proper
explanation.

Thanks,
Michael


I'd be curious to see what test results you come up with if indeed your planning on doing so.

Hey, thanks for checking with HK. I will definitely give that a try again and report back on what happens. Good thing I have the M60s hooked up to the HT now, don't think I could survive another "shift all the speakers between the floors" maneuver

I thanked spiffnme in the audition thread, but I thought I would thank him here also for the audition of his setup sans qs8 and sub in a config similar to what I will be running. Amazing speakers. Thanks again Craig!

one option you could have is to get an 8" sub.. just for a little more fill than the 60's offer, i also have the 60's but have never used them with out a sub, so i cant give an opinion