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


Hi,

I'd love to hear the impressions of people who've actually spent some time with these speakers to share their sense of their plusses and minuses. Mapman here on Audiogon is a big fan, and has shared lots on them, but I'm wondering who else might be familiar with them.
rebbi
FYI - I have had a lot of "Holy Crap!" moments with my Walsh 2000s. Had another one last weekend.

I was getting ready to box up an old Onkyo Dolby ProLogic AVR, retiring from the den. I wanted to see if was functioning properly first, so I fed it with my MacIntosh C220 preamp and hooked the 2000s to it directly (no subwoofer, full range). WOW! I have never really listened to the 2000s full range much before, but the bass output was amazing. Deep, tight, clean and powerful, subjectively almost as powerful as my Vandersteen 2Wq subwoofers! The rest of the audio spectrum sounded great as well. I ended up listening to some of my Reference Recordings CDs. Although I think my big rig amp sounds better, and the subwoofers to give a nice assist to the amp and Ohm speakers, the difference was not as wide as I would have expected.

Ohm rocks!
My best moments of late come when I listen to some old favorite recording that I have heard so may times with so many different kinds of gear over the years and I cannot find a fault in what I hear.

Its been a while since I have been where I am afraid to change a darn thing for fear of not being able to get back to where I was.

Also, I must say that the Dynaudio monitors are sounding the best ever these days in their smaller room and there is not much more I could reasonable ask of them.

However the difference between the monitors and the OHMs, despite having a subtly different but not dissimilar overall tonality and different way of doing imaging and soundstage, have always been in the impact and "meat on the bones" areas.

Its just not reasonable to expect any small monitor to deliver 100% on hard rock or modern pop or any large scale classical or jazz works. They are just not big enough for the job. They can get to 80% or so perhaps of what is possible, but cannot tackle the last few tough % in that regard.
I am thinking of getting a pair of Micro's for my office....I have a pr. of the new M-5's and FRS 15's I bought new in 1991 and have upgraded the drivers......I will never have any other speaker in my home other than Ohm's as I have never heard any speaker that plays all types of music as Ohms do......
I am fortunate to have many types of well designed loudspeakers, so I can pretty much choose. Of all the speakers I collect, I have OHM acoustics the most. In fact I own a walsh 2xo, 4xo, pro 200 sound cylner and my best, ohm walsh 300 mk 2 rebuilt drivers by ohm upgraded to the 4000 series. For those who don't think it needs a boost in the highs and mids, you can always get an ADD on supertweeter or DIY project by selecting your transducer from partsexpress, madisound, simply sound or ebay etc. I have a janszen z 130 electrostat add on that I am adding to the ohm 300 mk 2 that will put it in another level. To have both the ohm walsh and the ESS HEIL 1D which I modified the bass drivers by adding a sub driver to the front, removing the radiator in the back and using the stock front drivers, the result is awesome. The only think that equals or possibly surpass it among my systems is my modified ohm walsh with the janszen electrostats. It is hard being a speaker collector because I love all my different designs. I am a magnepan and acoustat fan too, because I HAVE THEM also. BOSE hit the dumpster long time ago after the mid 90's when I no longer had any need for them. Bose to me these days is nothing but a joke. In the 70's and mid 80's they were good for the time. Dbx soundfield was far better designed, and I have them too! OHM speakers to me is the MOST versatile and multipurpose loudspeaker every designed. It was way ahead of it's time for critical stereo listening and home theater. The original AR-9 is also the loudspeaker way ahead of it's time. Most of the home theater towers were patterned after the original AR 9 some 30 plus years ago. Heathkit was another speaker design that was way ahead of it's time made for todays home theater. without ohm's, there would be no higher high end like german physiks, mbl, duevel. I think OHM's and ESS are the two of the most revolutinary designs by two of the greatest sound physicists the late dr. lincoln walsh and dr. oskar heil.
OHm sold me as a salesperson at Tech Hifi where I had access to many speakers, but the OHMs were always the best sounding to me at almost any common price point back then.

I started with OHM Ls and graduated to Walsh 2s around 1982 or so after.

Magnepans weaned me off the Walsh 2s as my main speakers around 1987 or so, but I also still enjoyed the Walsh 2s as a second speaker at teh time though a few weaknesses in resolution and detail were revealed.

I added a pair of B&W P6s and Triangle Titus in the 1990's.

I got the upgrade bug a few years back. I ended up replacing the Maggies, Walsh2's and B&Ws with what I run today which includes 3 pair of OHMs, my original Ls from teh seventies that I rebuilt myself, the 100 series 3 drivers in the Walsh 2 cabinets, and the OHM 5 series 3.

Maybe an upgrade to latest X000 series or whatever might come after will happen someday.