Why not horns?

BTW, I was quite disappointed to read Mr. Lindich's findings regarding the GP Uncorns in that I am a big fan of Walsh technology and I do believe horns have the potential to break certain common performance barriers as well, so my expectations for a design using both in a single driver full range design were quite high.

That's why I'm wondering if anybody on this thread can offer any insight to how the Unicorns sound. I've never heard them but am intimately familiar with the OHMs. No other speaker has lured me away from them during 30 years of ownership of various models. The GPs are one that I would expect could (if I could afford them) and the application of the horn with teh Walsh is certainly quite unique at a minimum.

A poor setup at a show is always suspect. The Unicorns apply equalization to the bass as well, so who's to say this was set to match Mr. Lindich's preferences.

One other thing that struck me is that despite being horn loaded, the Unicorn is still only 87 db or so efficient, according to the specs I found. A horn loaded speaker that is still that inefficient is certainly a unique beast as well.

I suspect that GP's Unicorn was an exercise in trying to make a full range single driver speaker system. As appealing as that concept might be, success in that quest has been allusive for all that have dared to try. The idea of a horn loaded omni directional driver would appear to be an oxymoron.

Yes horns and omni drivers are a unique combo for sure.

Most GP designs appear to limit the coverage of the DDD driver to the upper frequencies where Walsh drivers operate in a mostly wave bending manner, as I understand it. This is supplemented by more traditional dynamic drivers for the low end.

The Unicorn apparently trys to extend the range of the DDD lower where it like all Walshes I believe operate more pistonically in producing bass, but that does not appear to be the strength of the DDD. The horn loading and equalization applied in the Unicorn to the DDD bass region output appears to compensate for that.

Macrojack, my 4.5" drivers are only good to 70-75dB because I run them full range from 45-15,000hz. If they were cut at 300hz like your horns, they could be played over 100dB.

If you go with Folded transmission line or Standard transmission line they advertise that you can get the bass and volume levels.

I believe this Tang-Band W4-1337SD will give similar performance to your horns. I have used it in a cabinet as small as 8 1/2" high. You will loose some bass as compared to a larger cabinet but if you put them against the wall, you should be okay. I found the HF ttshhh ttshh, annoying and would require a low-pass filter to cut or reduce the HF. I also prefer the snappy, softer sound of paper to the crystalline clarity of titanium. But I also use bi-polar solid state amplification and CD's.

There are many good single drivers (so I am told). Especially the PHY and Supravox if you are willing to spend the money. Also Jordan JX-92S but I found them to be thin in the bass. Even with a large transmission line cabinet.

Hope this clarifies things for you.