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
I acquired my 100S3's second hand first as a test. THese may have been somewhat broken in by the prior owner but nit certain. Totally foreign sound at first listen. Then I gradually got tuned in and tweaked. Based on that, then eventually I bought the 5S3s from OHM as my new cornerstone speakers. My ears were adapted more somewhat but it still took several months for these to really break-in I would say. Then I changed pre-amp, amp and tweaked ICs and setup as needed. It's been dialed in now for well over a year, going on two, and I am hesitant to change or touch a thing! Sometimes, the smallest thing can lead to a whole new sequence of tweaks/changes. I hate that when things are finally sounding just the way you want them too!
Anyone who does not believe in break in should audition ohms for a month. Mine are a few weeks old and they have taken on different sound aspects. Right now they seem to be going through a "dumb" period as a bit congested ......but they have certainly floated my boat thus far
I actually think that the vast majority of "breaking in" is just getting used to the incredible sound stage that these speakers offer. It truly is a foreign sound when one first hears it. A good analogy would be headphones. One can put on a pair of topnotch headphones, and listen to music that has a flat frequency response curve from 20-20,000. But some people don't like them and prefer speakers. Sam thing with OHMs, but as in headphones one needs to put in 100 hours of listening to see if this does it for you and for many it will- just look at all the earbuds that one sees.

Having said all the above, I admit to fiddling around with speaker placement, switch positions (I have 5000's), etc until I was happy. Now I'm at the point of, "if it ain't broke, don't f*** with it". As a confession, I switched out the WWII 6SN7's for the Black Treasures from Shuguang- the RCA's were too microphonic, but they did give voices a dreamy quality, like being transported back to the 40's.
My upgrade kit came this week, so -- after getting physical with a couple of glued in crossover boards -- I now have Walsh 2.2000s. My question is, can someone who owns something from the 1000s line give me a ballpark figure for how many hours in took to fully break these guys in?
Batch,

I am familiar with the Walsh 2 upgrade process but never been through it. Doesn't sound too bad again if one is comfortable with ripping out teh old boards in the base and working a glue gun. I did the glue gun bit once on my old Walsh 2s to reattach some internal braces that had become detached over the years. Not too bad!

Don't have 1000 series but I suspect full breakin could take up to weeks/months depending on usage levels and volumes applied.

I have always wondered about adding/subtracting/rearranging damping material used internally on the Walshes as an easy tweak to try if needed, but have never spent time experimenting extensively. Might be worth it for some that might feel their OHMs are over or under damped in their application.