I'd had both, just sold my Newtons m80. I thought the Newtons were great. I started with a small home theater set up from CSW, then eventually upgraded to the Newtons series, using m8o's in the front. I thought it sounded great. Then I started putting together a 2 channel system, becasue when people were watching TV I could not use my stereo. That's when I discovered Axioms, through Goodsound.com
The Axiom m22 are so much better. The newtons had more bass, but when I did a quick comparison between the two speakers I heard so much more with the Axioms. I owned both set ups for about two years.
With a new baby in the house, getting ready to crawl, I realized I could not keep the newtons on their stands (the 2 channel system is in the bedroom so my m22 are safe since the baby will not go in there) and I don't want them just sitting on the floor. So I decided to sell them. They sold last week on Ebay.
I've secretly wanted to get rid of them and replace the with Axioms ever since I bought my m22, but my wife would have killed me. I thought they were decent for Home theater anyway.
Well since they're gone I pulled my Axioms into the livingroom this weekend, while my wife and baby were gone for the day. Wow! The m22 were incredible in the home theater set up.
I think part of it may have been because the m22 stands put the speakers at the perfect height. My Newton m80's were on stand that were a little low, so the tweeter was a little lower than it should have been. They are such huge speakers it's hard to find a solid stand for them.
With the Axioms you are going to hear so much more detail, whether it's with music or movies. The Newtons are not bad speakers, in fact when my 2 brother-in-laws heard them they went out and bought them. That was before I had the Axioms though.
I'm actually replacing the Newtons m80's with bookshelf speakers, that I can wall mount. My choices are M2 or M3. That's right I getting Axioms for the living room too. I actually sold the whole newton HT setup except the p1000 sub. I was not using the HT set up much, but I'm already thinking of eventually getting the axiom center and the surrounds.