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

JWC,

I was not referring to clipping, though that is certainly always something to be concerned about. I was referring more to dynamic headroom, the drivers ability to pressurize the air in the room highly at higher volumes, especially at lower frequencies. The assumption is the amp is NOT clipping and not the bottleneck. Bottom line is I have never found the OHMs to be the bottleneck in achieving this, even with my current 500 w/ch Class D amps, which throw the most power and current the OHMs way of any amp I have ever used with them.

You hig the nail on the head I think regarding the way the driver operating in Walsh transmission line mode rather than pistonic helps utilize surface area better and reduce excursion magnitude. That is exactly how I think it works. Just not sure I could point to anything concrete or documented to support that theory.

2's and 2XOs are gen 1 Walshes. More recent revisions are much more refined, including at low volumes. I can vouch for that in that I actually compared my original Wash 2s to my newer 100S3 based Walsh 2 models in side by side a/b comparisons when I still had both. Night and day!!! Soon after I traded in my old Walsh 2s towards my current F5s.

I will second Mapman's post. My 2000s sound wonderfull at lower volumes. So good, that when they are playing at moderate background levels, I will often stop to listen, even though I have things to do. And that's usually with low-res Pandora or internet radio! I did try my 2000s with an older Onkyo AVR, rated at 80 watts/channel, and even full range, the sound was surprisingly good. That said, my 150 watt/channel amp is clipping on sustained peaks in the midrange, and I am totally focused on upgrading to something much more powerful. But financially, that's about year away.

Jwc,

I also have a pair of small Triangle Titus XS monitors. These have been acknowledged by many over the years as champions at low volume and I would agree. They convinced me that dynamic speakers could be as fast and detailed at low volumes as planars like the Maggies I had had for years, which were also low volume champs. I had the original Walsh 2s also still at the same time, and in comparisons of the Walsh 2s against the Maggies and Triangles at low to moderate volumes, the Walsh 2s left something to be desired.

The newer OHM Walshes at lower volume are pretty much the darn equal of the Triangles at lower volumes I would say, although of course the overall way the music is presented is night and day, the usual OHM/omni versus more directional design thing.

Map and Bond, I am VERY happy to hear your low volume impressions. I ordered the upgrade to the 2000s a few days ago. I was a bit uncertain about it, in part because of this issue. You guys have helped stiffened my spine.

Bondman, your clipping problem is puzzling. It's probably buried somewhere in this now endless thread, but what's your amp and how much headroom is it supposed to have? How loud are you driving the music (peak/non-peak) when your system runs into trouble? It would be surprising to me if that much wattage would clip at non-deafening levels. Does the amp ever seem to run out of gas on non-peak volume? Could there be a problem with the amp--maybe the power supply caps?

When I was in the process of comparing and upgrading a pair of OW2's to the new 2000 series drivers, I did not notice a big change at all in the two different speakers sensitivities and ability to play well at lower volumes with the impact and resolution that I would get at higher levels. With my 3XO upgrade to the 3000 series drivers, it seemed different to me, and I likened it to my Magnepan MMG's, they just seemed to open up at higher volume levels, not just the bass end, but the mids and treble as well. With the older 3XO can, they seemed to play better at lower levels on up. Maybe I just have cloth ears, who knows?

The above was with an Anthem MCA 20 amplifier at 225 wpc, and also an ARC D-130 at 130 wpc in a moderate listening space. Everyone's mileage may differ, and probably will.

Enjoy your 2000 upgrade John! Keep us posted! Tim