Ascend 340's in the front and Axion QS8

[curtis]

Hi Cesar,

This is my opinion...so please take it as such. I believe dedicated surrounds were developed for placement issues. The proper placement and use of direct radiating speakers will sound just as good or better than when multi-pole speakers are used as surrounds. Although not quite apples to apples, but theaters do not use multi-pole speakers. If multi-channel music is in your future, then I am even in more favor of direct radiating speakers.

That said, I have heard the QS8's, they sound very good, and match the Axiom speakers I have heard, the M22 and M60. If you like the QS8's, you should definitely give the M22 or M60 a try. With M60's and QS8's, the demo I heard was very impressive.

QS8's with the 340's would work fine, but the timbre matching between the speakers will definitely be off, and front to back/back to front pans will not be seemless.

-curtis

[Larry.H]

well that just answered a question i was going to ask down the road.Now all i have to do is figure out 170's or the 200's

[gocel]

Thank you Curtis for your input. One more question for anybody that knows the answer. How tall are the 340 L/R spaekers with the optional pedestal that ascend sells. Thanks.

[curtis]

The stands are about 24" high, and the speaker is 21" high.....so about 45" high.

-curtis

[gocel]

Thanks again Curtis. I have followed a lot of your reviews and posts at different forums including this and I must say that I have learned a lot in the process. I want to thank you for your unbias opinions about different speaker setups, I know this will benefit a lot of people that are in the market for a new HT setup. Keep it going!

Best regards,
Cesar

[bikeman]

I also appreciate Curtis's input. The audiophiles that talk like they can hear grass grow really turn me off. Curtis keeps it believable. I hope he gets a kickback when I place my order.[]

David

[Quinn]

To expand on Curtis' post here is what Dave F. posted previously on this issue-

"During the old Pro-Logic days where the rear channel was simply a matrixed signal derived from the left and right channels, the need for ambient reflected sound was critical. Early Dolby THX standards even required this type of speaker.

With the introduction of discreet rear channels, the need for multi-polar rear speakers declined (as such Dolby THX standards were modified).

As Quinn said, it is now simply a matter of personal taste, there are advantages and disadvantages to both multi-polar and omni-polar designs."

[curtis]

I think Quinn just wanted to see his name in print again. []

Thanks for the compliments. No kickbacks for me. I do enjoy my speakers, and I can not say that I am unbiased, I would rather just be truthful with what I think.

I have been reading the speaker forums for about a year now, and have met a handful of people that are active on them. Some good...some not so good....and some that do not like me. The amount of untruths, contradictions, bad information, and flat out lies are incredible. The one that gets me all the time is someone that says how good something is without even experiencing/hearing it for themselves.....and writes it so others think it is good. That gets to me.

off my soapbox.....

-curtis

[Gregisme]

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Arial, Verdana, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Originally posted by bikeman

The audiophiles that talk like they can hear grass grow really turn me off. []

David
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">

post of the week. []

[Lou-the-dog]

I use the 170's for surrounds and like them ALOT. I have a difficult room as far as surround placement goes (TV and mains in one corner and my position diagonally in the other). I had to experiment with a few different surrrond locations to get the results I wanted. In my room, when watching movies, I found that angling the speaker towards the back wall helped fill the sound effects in a bit in my seating position. Although I haven't experimented with multi-polar speakers in my room I would tend to think that they might be a little less finicky in their placement. As a side note; on my 3803 receiver I noticed there is an accomodation to switch between two sets of surround speakers so you could have a multi-polar design for movie surround duty and a direct-radiating set for multi-channel music.

Randy