Are Ohm Walsh Speakers the Poor Man's MBLs?

I own Ohm 100s and have extensively auditioned every MBL except for the new extremes. They sound almost nothing alike. MBLs are a more dynamic, exciting speaker that can startle with sheer SPLs and 3d imaging. Ohms are actually far more neutral in octave to octave balance, and have wonderful imaging with body and weight, but nowhere near the front to back depth.

For an hour, I'll take MBL. For the long haul, I prefer Ohm. Just MHO.

Marty

PS A good subwoofer will help the Ohm narrow the gap in dynamics and impact, but not front to back imaging.

Ohms and German Physiks are the same technology, driver wise, not MBLs.

Marty,

You may be right about the front to back imaging in that the mbl demo was as good as I have heard in that regard, particularly with a state of the art reel to reel orchestral recording as the source, but I would have to hear both, probably larger 300s or 5s on the OHM side, in the same larger, acoustically conditioned room that I heard the mbls in to be sure.

I'd attribute the mbls exceptional performance in this regard somewhat to use of omni drivers for the high end whereas OHM Walsh speakers are not omni in the uppermost frequency range that most people can hear. Original Ohm As and Fs were.

OHM speakers also use a single Walsh driver for most of the frequency range (all of the frequency range covered in the case of original As and Fs) which gives them an edge in overall coherence I believe.

OHM and German Physics use similar technology based on the Walsh driver concept but their Walsh driver technology and speaker designs are quite different, I believe.

GErman Physiks uses the Walsh driver for the top end and supplements that with conventional woofers on the low end in most models (except the horn loaded Unicorn, I believe), as does mbl with the exception of the 101s.

OHM does the opposite. The omni Walsh driver covers the low end, mids and some highs but supplements that with more conventional cloth dome tweeters for the high end in the newer series 3 models.

Interestingly, we were informed here on another A'gon thread recently by John Strohbeen, the man behind OHM, that they now have a distributor in GErmany, mbl and German Physiks home turf.

I wonder how well they will do there?

It seems that a lot of Omnis do no limit the tweeter (Deuvel and Morrison come to mind) . Does limiting the tweeter from being full omni help the coherence but hurt the imaging? Does it also make it easier to place by letting it be closer to the rear wall?

Very good questions!

"(I)t seems that a lot of Omnis do no(t) limit the tweeter (Deuvel and Morrison come to mind) . "

"Does limiting the tweeter from being full omni help the coherence but hurt the imaging? "

No. I think coherence is mostly due to sonic waveforms being in phase at all frequencies top to bottom. Crossovers and multiple drivers present an extra challenge in accomplishing this I believe. A single Walsh driver that covers a wide frequency range has an advantage here I think.

"Does it also make it easier to place by letting it be closer to the rear wall? "

In general, yes. However there are other ways to accomplish this otherwise with any omni driver.

OHm Walsh speakers accomplish it by design with acoustic dampening material inside the cage and around the drivers that attenuate SPL of sound from the omni Walsh driver in the wall facing directions.

I believe it is possible to special order CLS Walsh drivers from OHM that do not use the acoustic dampening material to attenuate sound in wall facing directions if desired. This would be more mbl and German Physiks like in radation pattern and resulting effect on optimal location of speaks relative to walls. I think OHM may use this approach for some of their Walsh A/V surround sound speakers, but I am not certain.