Small room, "budget priced" speaker advice, please

Mapman,

The most unique thing about the Vandy's, AFAIK, is that you have the grill cloth "sock" stretched around four corner dowels, and inside is the closest thing to bare speaker guts you can get. They call this a baffle-less design, and it's supposed to eliminate edge diffraction effects; there's no "box," in the conventional sense. Also, the speaker elements are supposed to be time and phase-aligned.

They have lovely bass response — well recorded electric bass sounds like a string instrument, and not low-level mush. When I bought that first system, I carried around my vinyl copy of James Taylor's "That's Why I'm Here" from audio shop to audio shop (this was back when I lived in the NYC area). I listened to the title track over and over and over again for two great audio moments. First, when JT sings the line, "It seems me and Melissa, well we fell out of love," Leland Sklar enters with this swooping bass glissando. Done right, it has "air" around it. The Vandy's got that right. Also, when JT sings "I'm back in touch with my long lost friend," there's a moment when you swear you can hear the wall in back of his head, and his voice is eerily "there." The Vandy's did a good job with that, too.

The Vandy's are not a conventional box design.

The Ohms and Vandies share a couple of characteristics I can think of.

First, driver surfaces are decoupled from the cabinets. Second, both strive for phase coherence, Ohm by using a single driver for most of the audible range and avoiding a crossover in the critical midrange.

Do you think at this point that the Totem's or other box designs you've auditioned in your price range can do what the Vandy's can to your satisfaction?

Mapman,

I dunno about the Totem Arro, because although there are two Totem dealers here in Austin, neither stocks the Arro! So I'm extrapolating from the Dreamcatchers that I did get to hear, and from the copious rave reviews I've read. Everybody seems to agree that their imaging is phenomenal, albeit in that "etched, precise," "great stereo" kind of way. So I'm running on some guesswork and second-hand advice, here!

Well, you probably have a win scenario at this point no matter which way you go. You obviously know what your looking for when you hear it.

Mapman wrote:

"I was wondering if you know whether the Ohms you heard were original (series 1 which first arrived in the early 80's), series 2, which I think started in the early-mid 90's through ~ 2005 or 2006, or series 3, which have only been available for a couple of years?"

Best answer I can give:

His main speakers are the Walsh 4, I believe, the really big ones from the 1980s. But, a few years ago he removed the CLS drivers and returned them to the factory for a "complete rebuild and upgrade" - whatever that means. So I cannot vouch for the actual model or vintage of these speakers. While the speakers themselves go down to the low 30s, being a bass hog, he has a giant SVS sub hooked up in the system and the pairing is really impressive for those instances when the program material dips into the 20s or below. But I digress...

He also has about 5 year old Micro Walsh Talls set up as his rear speakers for HT and multichannel audio duty. Their characteristic sound is not unlike their older and bigger brothers, but with less authority. These are all driven by fairly powerful Hafler and Dynaco amps with a Yamaha receiver serving as the processor/pre.

To elaborate on why I think the Ohm speakers might be more forgiving of what comes up stream, my friend and I have a running argument going about the efficacy of premium wires and digital sources (I am for, he is against), and have played around with different combinations on his system. Turns out I find that it is much more difficult to identify sound signatures of different ICs and front ends in his system than in my system that has modest but decent electronics and custom speakers with quality dynamic drivers in a sealed cabinet - about as far as you can get from the Ohm's presentation. I also find it easier to tell these differences in other dynamic speaker based systems compared with the Ohms.

Don't get me wrong his system and the Ohm-Walsh speakers sound terrific. But the Ohms always bounce the sound off everything - sometimes giving me the feeling I am hearing the sound reflected off two back walls, the one in the studio or concert hall and the one in the listening space. I guess I prefer greater pinpointing of instruments and their reflections in the recording space during play back. But again, to each their own.