Mbl Magic?

MBL isn't the only manuracturer who gives these characteristic high priority.

Yes this wide even dispersion charateristic was demonstrated by Dr. Floyd Toole in listening tests in the 70's as sounding most pleasing, natural and life-like convincing.

MBL's will work well placed well out into a room. They won't work as well up against a wall because of the strong rear radiation - so be careful about placing them in a small room without treatments -if you have the space then these are a great choice. There are a great many good conventional speakers with wide dispersion although sadily most two ways will "beam" in the upper midrange and therefore fail to sound convincing there you can somewhat overcome this by listening in a close near-field position).

Revel Studio 2 and Dynaudio Sapphire lare extremely good. Kharma's and other speakers with the accution mids and Dunlavy's Iv and V's are also worth checking out.

My guess is that "dynamics' may have something to do with your observations too. Real instrunents are actually very loud but they don't sound loud.

Good Luck in your search.

Ohm Walsh series can be had for much less than MBL and may share some of the unique qualities many admire with MBLs and other omni-oriented designs.

Pedrillo,
One of your questions concerns the "why", and that I cannot answer without getting into speculation about the engineering that I am not qualified to discuss.

However, about a year ago I replaced most of my system with MBL 111E, MBL 8011AM mono amps, and MBL 5011 line stage preamp. All at once, I retired Vandersteen 5 speakers powered by Ayre V1 amp and Ayre K1 preamp. I felt it was important to pair the MBL speakers with MBL amplification, since the speakers are power hungry.

I mostly listen to classical orchestral music and some jazz, and I attend live concerts often. The sound of live music is my reference, and attaining realistic reproduction of a full orchestra is quite a bit more difficult than reproducing a small jazz ensemble. In my experience, this MBL based system has made me truly happy. Prior to this, I had spent much time and money attempting to reduce the level of my un-happiness. The improvement is not incremental, it is a qualitative leap. This system now has a sense of life and energy that I experienced only once before, when my speakers were Martin-Logan Quest, but those speakers had a serious lack of coherent bass. I have been told that Martin-Logan's latest models are much improved in bass response, and they certainly are less costly. However, if you like their sound, do not skimp on amplification as electrostatic speakers are power hungry as well. I recommend at least 100 wpc and be certain the amp can deal with the speaker's wide impedance swings.

However, the MBL combination has no significant faults that I have found in a year of listening, and I am likely to gain additional realism by improving the front end (turntable). For the first time ever, I can come home after a live concert, put on an LP, and not hate the comparison. Most highly recommended.

Jtwrace, you know me all too well. Yup I like the SoundLabs a lot. My bipolars actually copy the radiation pattern of the A-1 over much of the spectrum, at least in the horizontal plane: 90 degrees, front and back.

Assuming the upper end of our hypothetical price ballpark is the MBL 116, others contenders include the Wolcott Omnisphere, Duevels, big Shanihians, Genesis 5 series, and in my opinion even big Maggies.

I agree with Shadorne that the MBLS (as well as other omnis, dipoles, and bipoles) should be placed far enough away from walls to give an adequate time delay before the additional reflected energy starts to arrive. If such placement isn't possible, you're probably better served by monopoles. The tiltback of the Shahinian's drivers helps to delay the arrival of the reflected energy by bouncing it off the walls at an upwards angle, so these are probably the most small-room-friendly speakers in this general category.

Duke

Maybe I am on the only one on the planet who is not crazy about MBL?

I took on an assignment in Singapore 2 years ago and have listened to MBL 116 & 101E several times since I was seriously considering 116 back when Euro was weaker. I do like the enveloping soundstage, the "ease" & "relax" presentation with tremendous amount of detail, and ample bass. But it's the "ample" bass when coupled with MBL amps that stopped me from getting a pair. I found the bass not catching up to the rest of the spectrum, was slow and muddy at times. This was true for both 116 and 101E in medium and large room, respectively. Dealer mentioned MBL amps are tuned to sound fuller and warmer unlike American amps which are fast and quick. I could not do any A/B comparison, so I have no way to validate his claim.

Also, the lower efficiency does "restrict" the jump factor that makes horn speakers attractive to many audiophiles. I used to own Dynaudio Confidence 5, a superb sounding speaker with midrange to die for. Though it has very low effciency, it has slightly better micro dynamic than Sonus Faber Extrema which I owned for years. Either one lacks the "jump factor" unless you feed them 300+ watts and 300+ tube watts are hard to come by not to mention the operating cost.

I believe MBL can be made to sound good or excellent but at the cost of very expensive gears behind them and more. To me, that's a very expensive investment just to make 2 speakers sound good while there are other approaches that can equal or surpass the end result at fraction of the cost.