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

Hi Marty,
Interesting.
I remember a collection of Beach Boys recordings where many of the tracks had been clearly recorded in the same studio with the same treatments. In these cases the voices appeared uniformly over 5ft but some tracks were clearly done elsewhere. In one case, a Beach Boy's voice appeared at the top of the L panel (>5ft) while his opposite number appeared (extraordinarily) at the BASE of the R panel (just above the sub-woofer)!!

Generally I find that height is a function of loudness. Full height is coincidentally achieved when the vocalist is pretty much level, or a whisker behind, the speaker plane - but sometimes can be even further back. Drums and guitars are generally about 3-4 ft from the floor while flutes etc tend to be same height as the vocalists so it all leads to a very realistic presentation.
Adding surround sound DSP increases the phasiness and results in all performers becoming slightly "taller" :)
Reverb embedded within the recording is the primary reason for outside-the-loudspeaker effects just as the complete absence of reverb causes the sound to appear dead centre of the panel.
Agreed that this sonic trickery is not based on reality but a function of the speakers using the room's reflective surfaces and also reverb/phasing within the recording itself.
It is undeniably entertaining and experience enhancing :)

Thanks Bondmanp....funny you should mention a sub-woofer. I've looked at 2 "omnis/quasi-omnis" in particular : the Deuevel Bella Luna (needs a subwoofer?) and of course the Ohm 5K (which for music, probably never needs a sub-woofer?) Certainly given the Ohms rendering of Organ music, it suggests that the Ohm is often better than many dedicated sub-woofers! :)
This really makes the Ohm a front-runner in my book. I've heard too many speakers that drop off at 40Hz e.g. the Maggie 3.7 and for me that's just too limited.
All the best....

Moon,

No ill effects from the wide range driver that i am aware of. I believe the Walsh driver confguration has a lot to do with its effectiveness from top to bottom, a fairly unique capability of Walsh drivers i would say.

Hi Mapman,
I'm seriously considering booking the odd 1 week holiday here and there and taking in demos of the 2 speakers I mentioned (Duevel's full omni vs Ohm's quasi-omni).
Matthias, the European distributor is a very helpful chap and has offered the facility of User demos if I'm ever in the neighbourhood. I missed the chance to hear them during a recent German hifi exhibition (and to be honest he's probably given up on me thinking I've gone elsewhere but I simply take reasonable time to evaluate and choose products). No point in pestering the man when we have a Forum like this. :)
I believe he also does his own active-crossovered version of the 5K which even John is impressed by relative to the top performing passive Ohm 5K.... :)
I don't know how many people own them but the bass performance is clearly enhanced by this method.
(Can you buy the "upgrade kit"? Food for thought :)

Hi guys, nice to see this thread still moving along. I think with the image height as others have said, is very recording dependant as is soundstaging(althought the very nature of the Ohm makes these things even better in my mind). I notice varying image height very much when I am playing around with my MWT/omni's. Last night I was listening to many different types of music, from Yellowjackets, Pink Floyd, and then decided to listen to some Who. On "Who's Next", image height was to the top of my 8' ceiling, whereas the other recordings I had been listening to were more about the 6' foot or so height. The omni MWT's are very interesting, the stage is more set back from the front plane of the speakers, yet pretty much blows the wall behind them away. My Ohm 3000's tend to be more all around the speaker. The MWT kind of challenged my preconceived notions of what they would sound like in a 2-channel setup-I had purchased mine with more of a surround/rear duty in an A/V setup.

Moonglum, the next time you see or talk to Mathias, give him a "hello" from the USA for me. We corresponded a couple fo times via e-mail quite awhile back. He seems to be a very wonderful guy and has a passion for the Ohm's. I too would be intersted in hearing an actively driven pair of 5000's myself! Enjoy the music! Tim