Ohm Speakers, thoughts?

Tonal balance will vary with location based on room acoustics as is the case with any speaker. All rooms are different and affect sound differently.

I think I can say with confidence that the best results with tonal balance is most likely to occur as well if the speakers are not too close to the wall.

In my case, the upper midrange of my Walsh 5's (adjustable 300 drivers, see photo of the adjustments in my system section), which are 5 feet out from the wall in a much larger room is more "restrained" than the 100 drivers in the smaller room. This is intentional in my case in that I have the "perspective" adjustment set to "far". I think this setting attenuates or lowers the midrange level.

My Walsh 2's (100 driver) may be more analogous to your 200s in that, though smaller and designed for smaller rooms, there are no adjustments. I've had these in two very different 12X12 rooms which I can say confidently did affect the tonal balance to some extent based on room acoustics.

Mwr0707, do you recall if the soundstage of the F's was located primarily behind the speakers when listening straight on axis like the CLS series 3 drivers?

Maybe there is a difference here that you perceive as "more restrained" upper midrange?

With the Walsh 5 S3 drivers, the "perspective" adjustment, which corresponds mainly to midrange, I believe can be set to "close", "medium" or "far". The "far" setting seems to move the soundstage more back behind the speakers when listening dead on.

Unfortunately, I do not know which settings on the Walsh5 S3 match or come closest to matching the sound of the 300 or 200 drivers, which do not have adjustments.

You might want to pop John Strohbeen an email and get his input.

Mapman,

I remember the 3d nature of the F's soundstage, but I cannot recall the forward/back placement.

My challenge in the current room is that I cannot place seating any farther than 11 feet back from the front wall, because of a 1/3 back wall.
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I suppose I could turn the setup 90 degrees so that the speakers are in the leg of the 'L', (I guess, kind of like you have it), but I really enjoy the sound from way back in the kitchen.

Maybe a slight adjustment with speakers slightly closer together and maybe a touch farther out from the wall, if possible like below?

The "more restrained" upper midrange may just be the nature of the 200s timbre. having never heard Fs, its hard for me to say, but I think the S3 drivers natural upper midrange could be described that way compared to some speakers. I would say it is "more restrained" than my Dynaudio Contour 1.3 mk IIs for sure, but this is not a bad thing for me in my case.

You might try different interconnects perhaps to adjust this somewhat if desired. What source devices and interconnects are you using currently? I use several different types. OF these the MIT Terminator 2s I use off my CD would be my choice for this purpose compared to others I use (DNM Reson and HArmonic TEchnology Truth Link), which tend to also be more restrained.

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MWr0707,

I used to sell many of Ohms non-Walsh dynamic models years ago, including the E, L, C2, and H. Unfortunately, the shop I worked in never got a pair of As or Fs so I never heard these.

I still have and enjoy my Ls that I've had now for ~ 30 years (see my system photo).

However, most of these models, including my Ls, had a similar tonal balance, which I believe was modeled after the F, if I recall correctly, which was the flagship model of the time.

Many of these models had high and low treble or midrange level adjustment switches on them, but in general, the sound of these speakers, which I remember well, and still experience with my Ls is significantly more forward in the upper midrange, compared to Ohms latest drivers (my Ls and f5s are in adjacent rooms for easy comparison).

The tonal balance/timber of the series 3 drivers are definitely more recessed and perhaps neutral sounding or perhaps laid back in this range compared to my Ls or my Dynaudio or Triangle monitors. The Triangles timbre probably matches the Ohm S3 drivers most closely of these three.

I use phono, CD and FM tuner sources mainly. I switched from the DNM REson interconnect to the MIT Terminator 2 with my Denon CD, which was the only source in my system which I felt needed a tweak in this area with the F5s. The results now are more to my liking, definitely a touch "brighter" and more forward but still smooth as silk.

I picked up my MIT terminator 2 interconnect on Ebay for less than $50.