Robbob,
Yes, I would like to put several much less expensive monitors including MErlins up against those.
Have you heard Magico minis? |
Yes, I did hear them, but really can't say that I had a fair chance to really evaluate them. My friend bought and sold them at a good profit. He did not think they were worth anything near what they cost. In fact he preferred his little Totems, which cost a fraction of the Magico price. He has since adopted the Merlin TSM-MMe has his top monitor. We did not like the top end of the Totems.
That said I'm not going to suggest that the Merlins are better because one or two owners felt that way. I will say, and I hope he doesn't mind, that Bobby believes he has the superior design. Before I got the Merlins Bobby also told me the TSM's would be better than my previous speakers, the Magnepan 1.6 QR's with Mye stands.
I will honestly say now that I did not believe him. The Maggies did a lot of things very well. But the Merlins do exceed the performance of the Maggies substantially, even in soundstage/image, which is the Maggie's home turf.
I guess the bottom line, echoed by other owners, is that I'm very impressed with these speakers! The system is warming up right now....going to check out Cyndi Lauper's new blues CD!
Rob |
The Magico's I heard sounded very good but then again I would expect most any good speaker matched to the system I heard them on to sound very good also. The electronics and wires alone probably pushed or broker 6 figures. At those prices, there is room for preferences but not for poor performance the way I look at things.
I would not trade my OHMs for Magicos. I'd have to a/b compare on my system to know how my monitors compare. They both might at low volumes and the Dyns maybe at higher volumes. No way to know for sure without comparing on your own system.
Its also typcila that different speaker designs shine best with different electronics feeding them, so comparisons on a single system do not tell the whole story, no matter how good the system is. |
I partly agree regarding associated gear. I have a pair of SVS speakers which cost about 100 bucks each. They sound fair at best. I connected them to the new Manley II amp and put them on the Skylan stands. Augmented by my MJ Acoustics sub they sounded far better than they had a right to!
But at the other end of the spectrum they sound thin and hooty when connected to a Denon receiver. As I've been impressed with the Merlins, I'm also thrilled with the Manley amp, which I should mention is the first tube amp I've owned. I previously stuck with SS and occasional tube preamps.
The Ohm speakers are a unique and fun design. I've thought of buying a small pair for our livingroom.
Rob |
I used to own the Ohm Micro Talls and they are terrific little speakers with the added benefit of a very small footprint. That being said the Merlins are in another league in every area I can think of, but again I feel Ohm makes an excellent speaker and I don't want to knock this underrated company. |
OHm and Merlin have a lot in common as companies I think, mainly a very dedicated and long standing customer base.
Customer service seems to be paramount to both which is a key ingredient.
The biggest difference I think is that Merlin has more appeal to teh audio high end community in general due to its focus on absolute quality and associated costs that go with that in some cases, yet still ranks pretty well in the high end big picture, when you consider companies like Magico, etc.
John Strohbeen, the guru behind OHM, is a unique breed, an MIT trained engineer with a seemingly more blue collar pedigree. Take a look at the OHM shop sometime. There are photos in one of the Six Moons reviews, I believe. VEry low overhead apparently otehr than residing in Brooklyn, NY. The OHm line has always focused on highest quality sound for the lowest prices for maximum appeal. That's the case with their older conventional bookshelve and floorstander designs as well as their more recent bread and butter Walsh designs. |
Guppy,
The OHM 2000 ($2800) or OHM 3000 ($4000) is probably a fairer comparison to the entry level Merlins ($3080) based on list price than the entry level Micro Walsh Talls ($1400) as best I can tell. |
I've said before that I think that Ohm and Merlin have at least one thing in common: the vision of a single designer who has continually refined a few basic concepts over a long period of time. And in both cases, calling the company number is likely to get you an extended conversation with the very helpful head honcho. :-) |
One other difference I think I note between Bobby and John is that Bobby has an absolute vision of what it takes to get the best sound that he believes in and shares that openly with his customers.
John Strohbeen will provide guidance when asked but is more about giving the customer what they want rather than what he thinks is best. He will tweak his standard designs as neededif the customer asks, as long as he does not see any inherent problems.
Both approaches have merit depending on what the customer is looking for.
the downside of John's approach is I think sometimes the customer thinks they know what they want and John oblidges, then they may have second thoughts afterwards.
Intetesting too that generally John recommends NAD amps if someone asks which to use with the OHMs. Personally, I think you can do better if your goal is the "absolute sound", but NAD offers good value for most so I understand why he does that. |
One of the things I like about Ohm (along with a recently auditioned pair of Duevel Planets, is they are great for playing music when I'm having a party! Few speakers fill rooms with good sound the way Ohm speakers do. Mirage has also tackled that concept with some success.
The Merlins are a "sit down and listen" type of speaker.
Rob |
I suspect also that Merlins are more amp friendly than OHMs and Dynaudio Contour 1.3mkii also for that matter.
Not that these sound bad with lesser amps, only that they sound increasingly better with more powerful good amps.
Same true regarding Totem also from what I have heard.
Triangle Titus are very amp friendly. I hear fewer differences from amp to amp. |
I also have a pair of OHM L bookshelf speakers that I have owned for over 30 years. I custom upgraded these myself a couple years back with some very good Morel woofers and the OHM sub bass activator circuit (similar in goals to Merlin BAM). These are not teh smoothest of my smaller box speakers, but for pop/rock music, they may just be the most rewarding. Of course, I am not a speaker designer and would not claim my custom enhancements to be teh best. OHM sometimes offers these completely refurbished with new drivers and circuits for $599. They sold for $499 and were my favorite smaller bookshelf speaker back then in 1978, so you can get an idea of teh potential value factoring in inflation, etc. with these nowadays. I'd like to hear a pair of OHMs professionally upgraded Ls. or even larger C2s or Hs. |
Mapman,
I think there was a chain of stores, at least here in NY, called Tech Hi Fi that used to sell Ohm speakers. I was a teenager at the time, but I remember visiting a Tech Hi-Fi in Queens, NY and listening to Ohm speakers....and trying to convince dear old dad to replace his Fisher sudio 10's!
Rob |
Mapman you are right there is a big price difference, but the is also a big difference in performance. Of course they offer very different designs and sounds so as always personal preference is the key and I gave mine. The person I sold the Micro Talls to is using them for fronts in a home theater system with the Ohm 2000's and he said there is a strong family resemblance. John from Ohm is a real gentleman and makes a very fine product, I could walk to his factory in ten minutes from my workplace and I wish him success as I do Bobby from Merlin because they are both fine gentleman who give great customer support and produce great products. Ohm and Merlin are two great American companies that are easy to root for. |
I found the Ohms like power. My 85wpc Unison Research Unico sounded good, but my Thule IA252B 250wpc integrated sounded better. The Merlins like tubes and I prefer tubes, butI tried the TSM's with my Redgum RGI35 35wpc solid state amp and it sounded very good, but I still preferred my JWN 35 WPC EL34 push pull. |
Yes,
I worked part time in college at a Tech Hifi in Jersey and sold many speakers. The OHMs were my favorite and I sold many pair, more than any other line. I bought my Ls there back then and have never been able to part with them.
Trivia fact: John Strohbeen, current whizbang for OHM, was an owner of Tech Hifi and Tech Hifi and the OHM line were affiliated.
So technically I worked for John Stohbeen once but I did not know of him at the time and never met him.
John told me this in a phone conversation a couple years back when I was doing some upgrades to my OHM collection. |
Guppy,
Yes, power and also importantly current.
I've found high power, high current separate amps to be best matches to the OHM Walshes rather than integrateds because it is very expensive to build a high power and current power source into an integrated without having negative effects on the overall sound due to proximity of low level circuits in teh pre to EMI fields generated, etc.
IcePower and OHMs are a match made in heaven that several on this site have latched onto, including me.
Prior to Icepower, the amp requriements to max out OHMs may have made them less cost effective in teh end compared to easier to drive designs, as I suspect the MErlins are. Icepower breaks down those barriers though some better Icepower amps, like the BCs in my rig, are still not cheap. WYred 4 Sound is probably the best value in IcePower to drive OHMs, especially if one is using a tube pre-amp. |
There are a lot of snafus one can encounter in trying to piece together a top performing rig alone.
Merlin seems like a practical fast track to high end performance for many. The design seems well thought out to work well for most user with most available equipment and Bobby provides teh guidance and expertise when needed. That is a very effective combo! |
I also used an Onkyo 9555,class D, with the Ohms and it was a very good match. As far as Merlin goes they only make two models,one monitor and one floorstander, which are both two way designs and have been continuously evolving over the years with great skill and devotion and as you say Bobby provides great guidance with the speaker positioning and associated components as well as just about any other audio question and the bottom line is customers are very happy with the results so word gets around and Merlin thrives. |
OHMs are not tube friendly, so if a tube amp is a must, you can get by perhaps, but are not likely to max out performance with any OHM Walshes I suspect.
500 w/ch IcePower is the bomb however with both my OHM Walshes, 5S3 and 100S3. The Dyns and Triangle work fine with the IcePower but the differences with those from prior amps (Carver m4.0t and Musical Fidelity A3CR) is not as significant.
I've also owned B&W P6s and Magnepan mg1c's, and original OHM Walsh 2s in recent years prior to my current setup. The B&Ws were nice in larger rooms but never imaged the way I liked. The Maggies were fantastic for years in the large basement room of my old town home but never clicked in my new house. The Triangle Titus' with sub was the best combo I had with these speaks in house at the time. That was a top notch combo running off a Tandberg tr2080 receiver in my second rig. The original OHM Walsh 2s were nice but not nearly as refined top to bottom as the newer designs (they were over 25 years old though). I traded those in towards the OHM F5s. OHm has a very nice trade-in policy where you can receive up to 40% off new speaker cost by trading in up to two pair of older OHMs that I took advantage of to obtain the F5s at a very favorable price compared to new Walsh 5S3s. |
I agree tubes don't work well with the OHMS, but the Unison Research Unico hybrid did a nice job. I thought the Triangle Cometes performed much better with tubes. |
Some have indicated using a sub with the OHMs off of tube amps with excellent results.
Maybe Bobby's RC network could work on other speakers like the OHMs to make them more tube friendly? It would be an interesting experiment to try if someone has both. |
One of the things I like about Ohm (along with a recently auditioned pair of Duevel Planets, is they are great for playing music when I'm having a party! Few speakers fill rooms with good sound the way Ohm speakers do. Mirage has also tackled that concept with some success.
The Merlins are a "sit down and listen" type of speaker. Robbob, My experience exactly. Ohm rightly promotes one of its advantages as being a huge "sweet sweep;" sit (or stand) anywhere in the room and get the full stereo effect. But owning Ohms for about 18 months taught me that I am much more of a "sit down, close my eyes and listen 'into' the music" kind of guy. I want to be swept away, so to speak. I don't mind speakers with a more conventional "sweet spot," as long as I don't feel that I have to keep my head locked in a vise to get the full effect. Mapman has written elsewhere that some listeners will "dig" (my word) the unique Ohm spatial presentation, and some won't. Over time, I found that I got frustrated with how the Ohm's interacted with my room (I'm guessing that was the issue) and with what I'd sloppily call a kind of "vagueness" in their imaging, especially. The Merlins can throw an enormous soundstage, given the right source material. But they seem (thus far, and I'm sure I'm not yet getting the most I can out of them) to really excel at tone, texture, nuance, and the sense that the music is all of one piece. |
Guppy: I agree tubes don't work well with the OHMS, but the Unison Research Unico hybrid did a nice job. I thought the Triangle Cometes performed much better with tubes. I ran my Ohm Walsh Micro Talls and my Ohm 100's with a Unison Unico. It sounded sweet, but when I switched to separates (a Manley Shrimp tube pre and a Bel Canto S300 with 150 w/ch) it really kicked the Ohms up a couple of notches. Yeah, the Ohms like power and current, for sure. |
I had another long session with the new TSM-XMr's this evening. I swapped out the Skylan stand pegs for spikes and experimented with placement. After about 40 minutes I had a none-too subtle improvement in the mid bass and the speakers tightened up even more.
I went to some well known material....Fleetwood Mac, Joan Baez and a revealing acoustic of Everlong. The Merlins are amazing. Name the audiophile phrase of approval and they were there. What's exciting is that I'm still missing the Cardas interconnect and a better CD player in the mix. And of course break-in is far from complete.
I finished off with another old favorite; Copland conducts Copland (version with old American songs).....absolutely splendid.
Cheers and goodnight!
Rob |
mapman because you are using ss with the ohms then the tsm i would recommend and the most reasonable is the mmi version. this is the one that rebbi is using and he uses a class d amp i believe. hoever both versions would perform very well with ss.
thank you, b |
Yes, as Rebbi pointed out, OHM Walsh (and omnis in general) do imaging differently than monitors, planars or any other more directional designs. I will not say necessarily better or worse, just different. Some will take to it and never look back and others will not. To me, it is more like what you hear at a live event and less like a typical stereo presentation. The large sweet spot is a unique feature as well.
I like good monitors for their ability to allow you to focus into recording details, particularly at lower volumes. You can do this with properly set up OHMs as well, but it is different. Also I like to play music at realistic volumes and delivering a live like presentation at live like volumes is a forte of the OHMs. If not for that, I may have been satisfied with my Dynaudio monitors which I acquired prior up trying out the newer OHM Walshes. |
Bobby,
Thanks for the info.
I'll keep an eye out for the opportunity to audition teh MErlins and see if they convince me to jump from what I have. |
Bobby,
Curious about the two versions and use with SS versus tubes.
My understanding is the difference is the finish and perhaps cabinet construction. IS that correct?
Is the extra rigidity or damping ability of the upper model what makes it more tube friendly?
Thanks. |
Also one last comment about OHM Walshes and monitors.
I see OHM Walshes properly matched to room competing more with full range speakers in general, though they are certainly good for near field listening as well, which is a monitors in general. Other than for nearfield listening, I consider the OHMs and monitors to be two totally different solutions intended for two totally different kinds of listeners. |
m, the two speakers are essentially the same but the crossover components are picked to a different tolerance, the woofers have a different amount of latex coating on them, the torque settings on the fasteners are set differently and the undercaots of the finish are different. a polymer coat adds mass to the mx-r which makes the cabinet a little quieter, the sound more continuous from top to bottom so there is more resolution.
there is an obvious difference in the way they sound because they are tuned differently.
the mmi is easier to get great sound out of while the mx-r does sound more right/better but you need a better system to get it out of them.
ok?
best, b
best, b |
I found that following the directions mad a BIG difference in sound. |
g, the tsm directions?
yes of course, this speaker is designed with its power response and it needs to be listened to the way it was designed. it also wants to be listened to on its musical center and not on tweeter axis. use of the jumpers and not internal bi-wires or shotguns also make a profound difference as they should. piece of cake once you understand what is going on. i have worked on them for over 13 years so i know the ropes and it takes all of the guess work out of the set up.
best, b |
Yes, Bobby is correct. I have an ICE amp, a Bel Canto S300. |
I suspect the Merlins and tube amps represent a particularly tasty and effective combo.
I've heard Totem Mani IIs for example. Wonderful speakers, but need lots of good SS juice to peak and justify the cost. Dynaudios are similar I believe.
Even the Magico minis when I heard them were running off a top notch VAC tube amp with more tubes in the VTL pre-amp and a $20,000 DCS player (which does some very special things with its DAC technology). How much of the magic was Magico and how much the tube gear? And or the DCS Ring DAC? Hard to say. The combo was very "sweet" though in the best audio sense.
Someday I suspect I will venture into tube amp waters. WHen I do, I think the Merlins will become especially appealing also. |
Yes the TSM directions and positioning the speakers correctly makes a big difference. Even a slight adjustment can make a big difference and the angled wood tool,I forgot the name, that comes with the speaker is easy to use so even a klutz like me can get it right. |
Back to the "comparison" part of this thread's subject, for a moment. Any of you folks ever gotten to compare TSM's to Green Mountain Audio products? I was reminded of this when
I noticed a pair of Green Mountain Audio Callistos up on sale here. Thoughts? |
m, the impedance has been corrected so it is constant and a little high making them particularly tube friendly but they are still wonderful with ss. there is a review link to andio morotti the founder of fedelta del suono in italy on the main page of the merlin site. in it he discusses his feelings of the tsm with ss and tubes. perfectly described imho. it is a review of the tsm mme which is the predecessor to the mmi. the hf circuit in the tsm is q circuited.
best regards,
bobby |
rebbi, a very fine product with 1st order networks.
guppy, it is the alignment tool.
best, b |
Never mind, I retract my last question! I just discovered a huge (and pretty cantankerous) "Merlin TSM versus Green Mountain Calisto" thread. One of those is enough! |
One thing I'll say about my TSM's is that they reveal everything. Even a small change in something is audible. For example, the setup instructions recommend that the speaker tweeters be between six and seven feet apart, but no more. Mine were a few inches less than six feet apart. I moved them a little over 6 feet apart and readjusted the toe-in with the set up tool. The soundstage bloomed even further, and the low end seems to have firmed up considerably. Interesting! |
rebbi, i have used the speaker as little as 5.5 feet apart but only in a very narrow room and this was at a show.
farther apart the bass may tighten as you have less summing but it also may have lightened a touch.
imho, with a speaker as uniform as the tsm is in dispersion and bandwidth it becomes very easy to sense when you are right or wrong in set up refinements. and after you get used to what they do, it becomes even easier to dial them in. when a new pair is purchased and the owner reads the set up instructions, he can pretty much have them 100% right fromm the get go. i have designed an aligment tool so you can adjust the toe angle and made helpful recommendations from my years working with them. follow them and you should be all set.
good show.
do those things to your room and you will be even more happy.
best, b |
I have experimented with my new TSM's position quite a bit over the last few days. At about 7 feet apart and 10 feet from listening position I get as near a perfect image and stage as I've heard from any system. But placing the speakers further apart seemed to "open up" some lesser recordings. The toe-in is also fun to play with. In the end I tend to return to the suggested placement.
One thing I found is that my Skylan stands (4 post) were not doing a great job when filled with kitty litter. I switched over to sand and things are now much better! I'm officially thumbs down on kitty litter as I do not believe that it's as effective at acoustic damping.
Cheers,
Rob |
Bobby, in an 18x11 size room, what placement would you recommend for the TSM, VSM - same for both? |
paul, on the short wall?
is the short wall draped or damped?
b |
On short wall, 2 open windows in center, bass traps in rear corners, and acoustic panels to the sides in front of speakers. Currently have them 5 feet from back wall and 6 feet apart center to center, or 2 1/2' tweeter center to side walls - toed in to listening position with alignment tool. |
are the the windows covered in curtains, if not i would.
anything else on the rear wall other than the traps like a wall hanging or the like. think about these points.
if the wall is damped you can move them closer to it to reinforce the deepest bass by producing a longer bass wavelegnth to the listening position. right now you are set up between 1/4's and 1/3's which will hit more in the central bass. i would even try moving them in to 5.5 feet tweeter to tweeter and see what you think. what is your listening distance?
9.5 to 10 feet is optimal.
best, b |
So, I measured. The tweeter is 5"6" from the rear wall. The tweeters are 6' apart and 2'6" from the side wall. And I my head is 9'6" from the plane of the speakers. And it sounds great. Not exactly "Cardas" but close:). By the way, you were right about the Dueland capacitors for the BAM and RC Network. Thanks for the guidance. |
sounds like it is a little more to my liking than the golden rule would be. because the speakers are designed with their power response they like to be listened to a little farther away. 9.5 to 10 feet is my preference. if the rear wall is not damped with drapes or wall hangings leave them as they are but if it is damped move them back to 48 to 50. listen at 10 feet and adjust the toe angle.
then compare. won't matter is the side reflection panels are in the right place. but all in all i know i would like what you have done.
best, b |
Will try the small move, might dial them in even more than they are now. How do TSM and VSM placement recommedations differ? I assume you look for a bit more bass reinforcement with the TSMs. |
