Ohm Walsh Micro Talls: who's actually heard 'em?

Wine,

You're not the first to observe that imaging is more characteristic of good stereo than of most live performance. However, it does contribute to the illusion of live performers in the listening room. Strangely, I find that the Ohms do an excellent job of preserving this illusion - images have real "body" and hang in space. The only shortfall I've found is the lack of dramatic front to back differentiation that you find in many of the better minimonitors, for example.

It's a bit strange that lots of folks find the Ohm imaging "diffuse", while I don't at all. I definitely wouldn't ascribe this to omnis in general, because the MBLs are probably the best imaging speakers I've ever heard.

Marty

Ironically, many people have described the Ohms as very dynamic, while I find this to be their sole significant shortcoming. Maybe it's just me.

Winegasman,

I'm grateful to you for your post... it's very helpful!

Have you played around much with the positioning of your Ohm's? I'm wondering if you've noticed the changes in tonal balance and imaging specificity that I have, in response to changing the speaker-to-speaker spread distance.

Also your room isn't that much larger than mine. Do you find the 100's to be well suited to that room? I thought that the bass out of the 100's might be too heavy for a room that size.

Don't apologize for being "long winded." I liked reading your thoughts!

I agree with Winegasman 100%, live music doesn't have precise impaging, it has a more diffuse imaging like the Ohms or the Castle Harlech's I used to own with a top firing driver, and although the Ohms I believe are closer to live music some listeners will still prefer the very precise image that usually comes with a much smaller "sweet spot".

Guppy,

Well put!

Martykl,

My guess is the MBLs are imaging champions for many because they are more omnidirectional on the top end than the Ohms.

The Ohms use a single soft dome tweeter these days in the series 3 versions as I understand it from John Strohbeen. These are normally mounted to face inwards 45 degrees. The soft dome design provides good dispersion as tweeters go, but it is not omnidirectional.

With the Ohms, when listening on-axis your ears receive sound directly from the tweets, the timbre is brighter and the imaging tends to sound more "etched" like more conventional box designs. When not, the timbre is less bright and the imaging sounds less etched, but the imaging still holds up in terms of being able to localize instruments, recording lines, etc.