Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Advice from Axiom Owners M60, M80, Studio 100, 1909, 2808 Shootout ? ? ?

For a shootout like that, I bet you could talk Alan into letting you borrow one of Axiom's switches....

I always wanted to do a blind test with those speakers. It should be interesting.

In the "better door than a window category" I'd need for the top 1/3 of the cabinet as well as the tweeter and mid to be extremely transparent, as it would be in front of my 73" DLP screen ;o) I certainly can do a test with an M60 as center for others. I really would like to gather a few listeners to bounce ideas off of.

Adam,
Cool. As we get closer, maybe Ken will know if he can squeeze it in. Do you or Ken know of any other Bay Area Axiomites, or Paradigmites for that matter. ;o) Other than you and Ken, no other east bay (and east) ever got back to me.

I do have a friend in My ski club who considers himself quite an audiophile. I might see if he would want to come.

Ooooooh. That would be cool to have one of those dial switches with the led showing speaker 1,2,3,4. :o)

Hey Tom, we'll have beer, you can bring the squirrel nuts.

That would be pretty cool to get some Paradigm owners in the mix as well, doing a blind test.

Someone should see if Tharkun would be interested.

Randy just mentioned on another thread to someone, that when setting up his new speakers, be sure to have a Radio Shack SPL meter. How would you use an SPL meter along with Audyssey? Would it just be to corroborate Audyssey settings?

Phase I:
Thinking ahead to comparing 2-3 pairs of fronts in early April, any thoughts on what procedure I should take with regard to Audyssey and swapping between M60, M80 and hopefully Studio 100's? Whereas borrowing a speaker switch sounds cool, to get as fair a comparison as possible, I really should have the 'hooked up' in the best location by themselves. If I line them all up, the pair on the outside would benefit from the extra width, and would the center pair be hindered a bit being sandwiched in between? It would be quick swapping banana plugs, but hard do 'blind' test when you are moving the speakers. My memory is bad, but not that bad yet... what was I saying?

Anyway, just looking for ideas/scenarios for a good test where the differences are the speakers, not influenced by their orientation.

I guess as far as Audyssey, is concerned, I only need run it for a full surround test, not the stereo comparison of the fronts. For the surround test, as a starter, I had better, if not physically mount the 4 QS8's, should have them in place at best my guess to a final position, for the testing.

Phase II:
After a pair of fronts is decided upon (hopefully ;o), to test for the positioning of the QS8's would I need to re-run Audessey with each major or minor position change of any of the surrounds? For this testing process would I be able to use the RS SPL meter to do a quick manual revision to Audyssey?

Or maybe the surround placement test needs to be done over time. Where I one location, for a few days, then move to new location, run Audyssey, and listen again for a few days?

Any thoughts from you HT setter-up-erers?
Thanks

I think for comparison purposes, you would want audyssy turned off, and you would also not want to be running any surround modes.

Dave, Audyssey generally does a good job of level matching the speakers. Still, I go back through the manual set up with my SPL meter and make minor adjustments if necessary. I just got my HT set up in my new place and didn't even bother with Audyssey on my Denon 3808 (I don't have the recent upgrade) and just used my SPL meter to level match.

Also, Audyssey was pretty accurate measuring distance. This time I just used a tape measure. I'll run the program eventually to see how far off my manual settings are.

Pat,

Funny how, after using Audyssey on the 1909 lately, I totally forgot that I used to do it manually with just my ears, and with pretty unmatched speakers. Can you imagine?