Publisher Profile

Ohm Acoustics F5 speaker Review

By: |

Amplification considerations

While the F5 is rated at 88 dB sensitivity and 6 Ohm impedance, it is not the easiest to drive, but because it has an active sub, it does not preclude use of lower powered amps. However, I have found with all genres of speakers that more power and current are always beneficial. I do not necessarily consider it advantageous to select a tube amplifier to drive the top module of speakers such as the F5, because in opting for lower power in search of better tonality, often there is a tradeoff in terms of diminished dynamics. No longer does the hobbyist have to make such a sacrifice. I suggest serious consideration be given to matching the F5’s ICEpower subwoofer amplification to a new generation of ICEpower-based class D amp. I have in mind here the Legacy Audio i·V2 Ultra, which I reviewed the i·V4 Ultra, which has four channels, a design I have found nearly unassailable. Having both high current and high power, it is ideal for driving a speaker such as the F5, and it will do so with lower noise and distortion than the preponderance of class A or A/B amps.

Omnidirectional speakers are not immune to the effects of amplifier selection. Lower powered amps may impart more bloom or blossom than a solid-state amp, but with a speaker such as this, why bother? With 81 settings to mimic such characteristics, it would be a shame to lose the precision and power advantage of an amp such as the i·V Ultra.

 

Systems for assessment

The systems that were used with this speaker tended to be streamlined, involving a DAC to amplifier setup. One method I use often is to use a dedicated DAC, such as the Eastern Electric Minimax Tube DAC Supreme, with various discrete opamps rolled in along with the Legacy i·V4 Ultra. Such a setup requires use of software volume control, which is provided through a setting of the source, the Small Green Computer sonicTransporter in combination with the SONORE Signature Rendu SE with systemOptique. This arrangement allows for the user to go into the settings of the Roon software via the sonicTransporter home page at Small Green Computer’s website and select between Hardware and Software volume controls. This allows for use of either a dedicated (no volume control) DAC or an integrated DAC with a volume control.

When I wish to alternate, I replace the EE DAC with the likes of the COS D1 DAC+ Preamplifier. Then I select the “Fixed” volume setting of the sonicTransporter’s output of the signal and use the volume control of the D1 DAC. It all works splendidly as long as you remember to change the setting of the sonicTransporter’s operations! If you fail to choose the Software option and restart the sonicTransporter, you can have a situation where, upon startup of music, it is completely unattenuated, a nasty loud burst for the speakers. Even when I am quite sure of the settings, I always have my finger ready to hit the pause button in Roon’s playback window, just in case. Often there is a telltale loud hiss emanating from the speakers that indicates the signal is unattenuated; listen closely to see if there is such a hiss, and if so, recheck your settings. Paying attention to how quiet the supposed silence is can save you a lot of grief.

One of the advantages of the F5 is that it offers a bail-out for less than ideally matched sets of components. With 81 settings covering the majority of the frequency spectrum, a much larger than average number of combinations of gear can be optimized. This feature can be a game changer for persons who are tired of blind matching of gear. The speaker is inherently friendly to persons who are more interested in vintage, affordable and DIY gear, as it can stretch far beyond speakers with a fixed personality (crossover, drivers, etc) in making components play nice with each other.

 

Listening to three room placement options

Audiophiles’ rooms are unique, so the following may need to be considered in the light of one’s own listening space. My room forms a nearly perfect rectangular space, so the three options for locating the speakers are simple. One involves placement approximately one third the distance out from the front wall, tucked in quite tightly against the side walls; another uses the same distance from the front wall but pushes the speakers inward to remove the side walls’ direct influence; and the last follows the suggested location by Ohm: pushed far into the front walls’ corners. Placement of the speakers is discussed in the Owner’s Manual, with the last of my three options recommended.

I started with the speakers at the position I use for monitor/bookshelf speakers and the Kingsound Tower omnidirectional speakers, about 8’ into the room from the front wall and about 4’ from each side wall. This creates a smaller triangle between the listening chair and the speakers, close to an equilateral shape with the speakers approximately 6’ apart and the listening chair 8’ away. As would be expected, even though these are hybrid omni speakers, the effect of closer positioning to each other and my chair results in a denser, more solid sound. All speakers sound more forceful when positioned closely versus farther away, so it was no surprise that the F5 was more dynamically immediate and had imaging, even though bulbous, that was relatively solid versus atomized, like the Kingsound King III electrostatic, a dipole speaker.

The inclusion of a directed tweeter brought more attention to the front of the performance as opposed to the completely exploded soundstage of the Model F. There is a nudge toward a location of performers with the use of the tweeter and its backing shield. I thought it would be fun to arrange the speakers opposite of the arrows directing the tweeters inward, and so I positioned them with the arrows outward. The outcome was not good; not only was the imaging poor, but it verged on being random. I cannot imagine anyone liking such skewed performance.

The thought struck me that perhaps the speaker could be made to operate somewhat more akin to a dynamic speaker if the side wall boundaries were used to force concentration of sound waves toward the center. It worked! Never had I heard an omnidirectional speaker that could produce a reasonable effort at a conventional soundstage, with discernible Left/Center/Right localizing of instruments and singers.

This is not to say the F5 was superior in that regard, as it was not. Traditional dynamic speakers are simply better at creating that experience, but the F5 was not designed to do so, which makes it all the more impressive that it can mimic a traditional soundstage. It is great that curious and bored audiophiles can get a significant shift in system performance simply by rolling the speakers in or out from the side walls.

The settings of the top module are supposed to correlate with the room size and position of the speakers nearer or farther from the walls. I found that since they primarily adjust frequency bands, I did not necessarily prefer the suggested settings relating to whether the speakers were near walls or corners. I adjusted them as I saw fit, and my enjoyment was enhanced when I did so. I see these settings as most beneficial when used in a pragmatic way, a “whatever works” arrangement. I paid more attention to the balance between highs and lows to avoid a shrill or thin result, instead of being constrained to only settings deemed appropriate by the indicators with each switch.

When I rolled the speakers into the corners the shift in their output and personality changed dramatically. As might be expected, I had to rework all the selector settings to recapture my satisfaction. The subwoofer was overwhelmingly powerful in the corner, whereas, in the middle of the room, it was strong but not violent.

Ohm wishes for owners to have the speakers near highly reflective walls, but in my case, as I have sound absorption panels affixed into the corners, the results may vary a bit from other users. I do not think that negates my impressions, but those with hard, highly reflective walls will want to consider that the performance will vary. Ohm suggested that I remove the wall panels for the review, and I understand that request from a speaker maker’s perspective, but I am not interested in violating my room for any piece of equipment.

That is not to say the outcome was poor. Quite the contrary, I felt the speaker did well in the deep corners. All I needed to do in order to compensate for the sucking up on some frequencies by the panels was to move up one or two settings on the switches controlling the mid and high frequencies. The high configurability allowed the speaker to be positioned anywhere I wanted and with pretty much an identically satisfying mix of attributes in terms of frequency, impact, and soundstage — as I wished.

It’s not a coffin or a door

It is a cement mixer, and the aggregate sound tumbles out at you. In somewhat volcanic action, but with a limiter on the height dimension, it is ejected with a volcano-like power and with widespread general dispersion like an ash cloud and localized center imaging like a lava flow. It does not have the boxiness of a dynamic speaker (derisively called “coffins”), nor the wimpiness of a dipole (derisively called “doors”).

What kind of music would this benefit? The answer may depend upon your ideals, whether you want a larger-than-life character to your listening experience. To a greater degree with dynamic speakers, and to a somewhat lesser degree with dipole speakers, the boundaries of the performance are set in space with fairly defined limits. The omnidirectional speaker violates such limits, somewhat like a probe that is launched beyond the solar system. Parts of the performance extend beyond where one expects, especially vocals and solo instruments; they seem everywhere.

Vocals of live performances as heard through the F5 can have a spaciousness that eludes studio recordings, as evidenced by Eva Cassidy, Ginny Owens, Seal, and other artists with well recorded live albums. The F5 expands the already generous-sized orb of the singer’s voice to make it much larger, extending perceptually quite a bit beyond the width of the speakers. The concentration, or what is often called image density and focus, is lessened in favor of this expansion.

Left and right signal information also is blended more than with a traditional transducer. They meet in the middle and the performance has an acoustic feel more like watching a waterfall, where the curtain of water has no distinct partitions. If you want a hard delineation between performers on the stage (L/C/R), then an omni is not for you. However, if you are concerned less about that and wish to have much more of the sense of immersion into the event, then you likely are a good candidate to seek an omni speaker.

Blow-the-doors-off listening is a great goal for such speakers. Movies with big soundtracks will sound limitless. Discarnate productions, such as electronic music and epic soundtracks, also fare very well with the F5. Yello, Jean Luc Ponty, Third Force, Craig Chaquico — a plethora of atmospheric and nebular tracks will enthrall a person who cannot get enough hugeness.

The Ohm speaker experience is rightly considered the antithesis of the petite, full range, frequency limited, near field listening experience. In that kind of setup the listening space is reduced in many dimensions, often to capture a magical midrange. The F5, in contrast, relies upon its dispersion and the room’s reflections to push the boundaries outward perceptually. It can take higher listening levels without sounding distorted because of the degree of interaction with the room. I have heard many smallish speaker systems sound strained and distorted when they were pushed hard. The F5 does not sound constrained when pushed hard, which makes it a compelling choice over fine bookshelf/monitor speakers in the same price range.

 

Real world considerations addressed

Very few people have the luxury of a dedicated room, much less a large one, for listening. Also, many enthusiasts fit their system into rooms with asymmetrical furniture arrangements.The Ohm speaker can have an advantage in such situations. The bulbous nature of the soundstage is agreeable to uneven placement in the room, i.e., where the speakers are not equidistant from the listener, or have an impediment such as a chair in line with the wave launch. Such things can devastate a dynamic or dipole speaker’s perceived performance, but the omnidirectional can roll with it.

As many today spend their time watching movies as opposed to purely listening to stereo, the F5 can admirably do both without the need for an extra set of subwoofers. A person may even get away with adjusting the spatial settings on the surround processor to see if surround speakers are immediately needed. I cannot speak with experience in that regard; I have not used an omnidirectional speaker in a home theater setup without surrounds, but it would certainly be worth exploring.

Given the anticipated longevity of service life of the F5, the flexible room placement options, the built-in prodigious subwoofer, and many settings to contour the speaker to the environment and user’s preferences, it offers an extraordinary set of features for a speaker at the $10K/pair mark. Like other venerated American speakers, Ohm Acoustics continues to offer a large serving of big scale, big experience sound that no doubt will appeal to many. It is a viable alternative to Magnepan speakers, with what I consider more aesthetic appeal and more powerful performance. If the sky is the limit on the scale of the music, this speaker may be your OHMYGOODNESS perfect choice!

 

ASSOCIATED COMPONENTS:

Source: Small Green Computer sonicTransporter AP I7 4T and SONORE Signature Rendu SE and systemOptique

Streaming Music Service: Tidal premium

DAC:  COS D1 DAC + Pre; Exogal Comet DAC and Plus upgrade power supply and Pulsar IR receiver; Eastern Electric Minimax DSD DAC Supreme with Burson, Sonic Imagery and Sparkos Labs Discrete Opamps

Preamp: TEO Audio Liquid Preamplifier

Amps:  Legacy Audio i·V4 Ultra (pair, totaling 9 channels); Exogal Ion (PowerDAC, used exclusively with Exogal Comet DAC)

Integrated: Redgum Audio Articulata; Kinki Studio EX-M1+

Speakers: Aspen Acoustics Lagrange L5 MkII; Salk Sound SS 9.5 custom; Kings Audio Kingsound King III; Legacy Audio DSW Clarity Edition; PureAudioProject Trio15 Horn 1; Pure Audio Project Quintet15 Horn1; Kings Audio King Tower omnidirectional; Ohm Walsh Model F (refurbished)

Subwoofers: Legacy Audio XTREME HD (2)

IC’s: Iconoclast 4×4 “Generation 2” XLR and 1×4 “Generation 2 RCA”; Clarity Cable RCA with Audio Sensibility Y Cables; Schroeder Method Audio Sensibility RCA; Schroeder Method Clarity Cable XLR with Audio Sensibility Y Cables; TEO Liquid Splash-Rs and Splash-Rc; TEO Liquid Standard MkII; Clarity Cable Organic RCA/XLR; Snake River Audio Signature Series Interconnects; (Schroeder Method, self-assembled with Audio Sensibility Y Cables used with several brands)

Speaker Cables: Iconoclast by Belden SPTPC Level 2 Speaker Cables; TEO Cable Standard Speaker; Clarity Cable Organic Speaker; Snake River Audio Signature Series Speaker Cables;

Digital Cables: Clarity Cable Organic Digital; Snake River Audio Boomslang; Silent Source “The Music Reference”

USB: Clarity Cable Supernatural 1m

Power Cables: Belden BAV (Belden Audio/Video) Power Cord; Clarity Cable Vortex; MIT Oracle ZIII; Snake River Audio Signature Series; Anticables Level 3 Reference Series

Power Conditioning: Wireworld Matrix Power Cord Extender; Tice Audio Solo

 

Copy editor: Dan Rubin

3 Responses to Ohm Acoustics F5 speaker Review


  1. Lash says:

    10k for that? No thanks.

  2. Paul says:

    I really enjoyed this review because it gave me a great picture of what the speakers do well, don’t do as well, and would be like to live with. I wish all reviews were this helpful.

  3. Jerry Hajek says:

    Still imho, the F5 will still remain in the shadows of its’ namesake. The Fs’ and A s’ were hobbled by the technology of their era, the remaining suffering from that and their sheer age.
    There exist better examples of Walsh drivers; they still remain a bit ‘esoteric’ for many.
    But, not all shoes fit all feet, either….;)

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Popups Powered By : XYZScripts.com