I've never heard MBL or German Physiks. I would expect to hear "holographic" imaging from these if set up properly, though my understanding is this can be hard.
Its interesting how peoples opinions of omni designs vary so widely.
I think it is a combination of these systems perhaps often not being set up properly combined perhaps with people having a hard time getting used to listening to them when there ears are trained to listen using more directional designs.
I know when I first received my Ohm series 3, I missed the sound that was being produced entirely despite having owned original Ohm Walsh 2's for years, along with several other makes and designs including Magnepan, B&W and Dynaudio.
I shook my head and asked myself whats going on, I must be missing something? It sounded like there was a stereo balance problem as well. The left side seemed to be producing more sound than the right, even though everything checked out and the system was properly balanced.
What I was missing was that I was expecting the sound to be emanating largely from the location of the speakers, as had been the case with the older Walsh 2s that sat in the exact location prior.
But in fact , the sound was totally disassociated from the speaker location.
In the L shaped room they were in, the speaker location was skewed completely to the right of center of an approximately 20' long wall, about 5 feet apart (in order to fire into the length of the L shaped room).
But the soundstage was in fact evenly extended from wall to wall despite this. And the individual instruments and recording elements were clearly located within the sound stage from left to right with height from ceiling to floor and considerable variability of depth. Mono recordings emanate actually from the left of the left side speaker, located dead center along the wall but entirely to the left of both speakers.
That is how I've had it set up and listen since. I am not exaggerating this. If that ain't holographic, I don't know what is.
My point is that the sound was so holographically disjointed from what I was expecting that I missed it completely at first. Once I figured it out and tuned in, it has been my live concert hall ever since.
The thing that threw me for a loop is that no speakers I had ever placed in that room similarly before, including the original Walsh 2s ever had this degree of disassociation between speakers and sound.
I used to be able to get it in my old house that had a large rectangular family room with my old Maggies. Could never get it in the new house...until I tried the series 3 Ohms. Now I own two pair.
Its interesting how peoples opinions of omni designs vary so widely.
I think it is a combination of these systems perhaps often not being set up properly combined perhaps with people having a hard time getting used to listening to them when there ears are trained to listen using more directional designs.
I know when I first received my Ohm series 3, I missed the sound that was being produced entirely despite having owned original Ohm Walsh 2's for years, along with several other makes and designs including Magnepan, B&W and Dynaudio.
I shook my head and asked myself whats going on, I must be missing something? It sounded like there was a stereo balance problem as well. The left side seemed to be producing more sound than the right, even though everything checked out and the system was properly balanced.
What I was missing was that I was expecting the sound to be emanating largely from the location of the speakers, as had been the case with the older Walsh 2s that sat in the exact location prior.
But in fact , the sound was totally disassociated from the speaker location.
In the L shaped room they were in, the speaker location was skewed completely to the right of center of an approximately 20' long wall, about 5 feet apart (in order to fire into the length of the L shaped room).
But the soundstage was in fact evenly extended from wall to wall despite this. And the individual instruments and recording elements were clearly located within the sound stage from left to right with height from ceiling to floor and considerable variability of depth. Mono recordings emanate actually from the left of the left side speaker, located dead center along the wall but entirely to the left of both speakers.
That is how I've had it set up and listen since. I am not exaggerating this. If that ain't holographic, I don't know what is.
My point is that the sound was so holographically disjointed from what I was expecting that I missed it completely at first. Once I figured it out and tuned in, it has been my live concert hall ever since.
The thing that threw me for a loop is that no speakers I had ever placed in that room similarly before, including the original Walsh 2s ever had this degree of disassociation between speakers and sound.
I used to be able to get it in my old house that had a large rectangular family room with my old Maggies. Could never get it in the new house...until I tried the series 3 Ohms. Now I own two pair.