 Mirage Omnisat Micro
Loudspeakers
Think different!
God knows, I try.
I love home theater, but I live in New York. I love
surround sound, but I live in a Brooklyn brownstone. I love big, brawny sound, but I don't
want to give up all my prime real estate to my speaker system.
How's that for different?
Oh, you don't want to live in an audio showroom either?
Maybe I don't think so different after all.
Fortunately, Mirage's Andrew Welker really does
think differently. Confronted with the need to envelop home-theater listeners in sound,
Welker dreamed up a small-enclosure omnidirectional two-way loudspeaker called the
Omnisat.
The Omnisat featured a concentrically mounted tweeter above
an angled, forward-firing midrange/woofer. Its molded reinforced plastic enclosure was
barely wider than the bass driver's circumference and was styled like something out of The
Jetsons. However, what made the Omnisat unique was not size or futuristic styling, but
a pair of pod-like domes (which Mirage calls "dispersion saucers") that hovered
over the drivers, dispersing the sound over 360 degrees, but in such a way that more
energy is radiated from the front of the speaker than the rear. This, Welker conjectured,
would simulate the dispersion and power response of musical instruments in an acoustic
environment -- a ratio of about 30% direct sound and 70% reflected sound.
The Omnisats were a critical and popular success. Welker's
next challenge was to capture lightning in a bottle all over again -- only smaller and
cheaper this time. What he came up with was the Omnisat Micros.
Now that's the same but different!
Oh why was I born with a different face?
The Omnisat Micro shares its big brother's quasi-hourglass
shape and domed, screen grille-cap. This design, which seems to lean forward as if
standing on tiptoes, sets a 3" Titanium Deposit Hybrid driver into a forward-slanted
aluminum top-plate. Suspended above it is the OmniGuide module, a device that resembles
the classic cartoon rendition of a flying saucer. The lower-most dispersion saucer's domed
underside focuses the 3" driver's energy 360 degrees, but with a bias toward the
front, while the Micro's 1" Pure Titanium Hybrid dome tweeter is mounted into its
topside. Suspended over it is another dispersion saucer, which does the same for
it.
The Omnisat Micro can be stand mounted (it attaches to
Mirage's dedicated stands), but where's the fun in that? The Micros have slots on their
bases for a "4-way key-way" screw and anchor mounting system that allows you to
easily stick 'em on a wall, ceiling, or shelf. Now we're talking!
Speaker wire connections are by way of hefty, gold-plated
five-way binding posts tucked under the speaker's base.
The Micro comes in four colors: black, white, platinum, and
platinum/black. (Okay, you sticklers, that's three colors, but it's four choices --
which is what I meant, of course.)
Everyone is ignorant, only on different subjects
The Omnisat Micro is a small speaker -- its
manufacturer-supplied frequency response is only 90Hz to 20kHz (+/- 3dB) -- which means
you really must mate them to a real subwoofer. These days, however, a full-range
subwoofer is a necessity in just about any home-theater rig, whether modest or
ambitious.
Ditto, careful set up. Keep the front-channel speakers in
the same plane, as close to equidistant from your comfy chair as possible -- and cross the
sub over as close to the Micro's 90Hz lower limit as possible. Theoretically, I suppose
you should place the rear channels in the same plane as the L/C/Rs, but, in my opinion,
getting them high up on the wall or ceiling helps tremendously in audibly masking the
surround speakers' locations. That's the way I likes 'em, but it's your choice.
At least the Omnisats make it a painless one.
Tradition is entirely different from habit
In keeping with the Micros' $180-USD-per-speaker price
point and modest size, I mated 'em to Mirage's nifty little $300 100W LF-100, which puts
an 8" titanium woofer in a compact ported enclosure for maximum punch in a minimal
footprint (review forthcoming).
My reference system wasn't so unassuming, but the whole
point of having a reference system is that it's your reference, after all. Arcam's DV88 Plus DVD player fed Anthem's
AVM 20 v2. preamp/processor, which drove five Musical Fidelity
M250 monoblocks. My SIM2 HT200 DMF supplied the images that
went with all the sound and fury.
Them which is of other natures thinks different
Now you could argue that any speaker system ought to
sound good with that kind of equipment driving it, and to an extent, you'd be right. But
that kind of sonic microscope can cut both ways (awkward metaphor alert!), it can also
reveal any shortcomings with brutal clarity. At first, that's exactly what I thought was
happening -- the Omnisat Micros sounded lightweight overall, coarse through the midrange,
and squawky above that. However, that proved short-lived; the Micros are speakers that must
be vigorously run-in.
Play just about any Vin Diesel movie and you'll be halfway
home -- and the Micros will gain some bass bloom, more mellifluous mids, and a top end
that, while not silky smooth, is detailed and quite easy to take.
Let's not leave out enveloping. Shades of Dr. Bose -- there
really does seem to be something to all that direct/reflected sound business after all.
We've all grown reasonably used to good sound, even in
small packages, so I didn't find the sound quality of the Omnisat Micros all that hard to
believe. What I had a hard time wrapping my mind around, however, was how big they
sounded. They look so tiny and they sound like, well, whatever they're supposed to sound
like.
I don't mean they sound big as in massive, deep, or brawny
-- they don't, but if you set up your subwoofer right, they're plenty big enough. But they
sure don't sound small. In fact, they pretty much disappear. That's what speakers
are supposed to do, but the best small 'uns always astonish when they pull it off. The
Omnisat Micros may stand out visually, but they're remarkably transparent in action.
They do have one trait that can be either a feature or a
bug depending on your point of view. They handle the middle of the midrange just a little
more easily than the midbass or high frequencies, which means they present the human voice
with great clarity. On the feature side, this means you can understand film dialogue quite
easily; the bug is that environmental sound effects are somewhat minimized in relation to
that dialogue.
There's a scene in Shakespeare In Love I have come
to rely upon for assessing a component's ability to integrate these two elements. In it
Joseph Fienes and Gwyneth Paltrow are picnicking in a meadow: the wind rustles the grass
and the trees, birds sing -- it's a beautiful day on the sceptered isle. The best systems
place the conversation of the two lovers in the midst of all that rustle and chirping; the
worst lose everything but the words.
The Micros didn't lose the sound effects, they just didn't
quite completely integrate the words into background noise. The moving air and birdsong
were there, and were quite audible, but the voices stood apart from them.
We boil at different degrees
The similarly priced Magnepan
MMG W/MMG C system did a better job of putting the conversation into the world it
inhabited; on the other hand, I understood it better at moderate volumes using the Micros.
So which speaker did I prefer? It all depended. In terms of
overall envelopment, the two systems were near equals, but there were tonal differences.
The Maggies seemed mellower overall, while the Omnisats had a bit more top-end zing. The
Micros also seemed to have a small amount more of that dynamic jump-factor that big action
movies thrive upon.
Both systems were extremely dependent upon the quality of
the subwoofer that accompanied them, not surprising given the limited bottom-end output
they have in common. But if you're willing to spend the sweat equity to get that
subwoofer/speaker interaction to work for you (and why wouldn't you be?), you can get
either system to produce truly gasp-inducing sound.
I'm still on the fence when it comes to most multichannel
music discs, but title by title I'm building up a critical mass of music-oriented video
DVDs, titles I return to time and time again. One of my favorite releases of this ilk is
the new disc of Frank Zappa's Baby Snakes, which features a superb 5.1 mix
supervised by Dweezil Zappa.
My fascination with Frank Zappa is one of the few features
of my misspent youth that I can discuss on the record, so I'll 'fess up that I
attended some 30 FZ concerts in the mid-1970s. That means I know the sound of his guitar intimately
-- it was sharp and biting, with picking transients that pinged like sheet metal
crumpling. Baby Snakes tends to put Zappa's guitar into the center channel,
featuring it prominently -- as did the man's concerts.
This is exactly the sort of meat that the Omnisat Micros
feasted upon. They captured the zing and speed of Zappa's heavily modified Gibson. The
Maggies didn't quite get that Zappa edginess right, although they weren't too far off the
mark, but they also didn't quite capture the dynamic shifts and shadings that were so
essential to Zappa's music.
Part of this might just be a matter of sensitivity. If I
turned up the loudness, the Maggies handled musical contrasts just fine, but they
certainly seemed to need a short, swift kick in the pants to get there. The Omnisats are
probably a better choice with receivers or amplifiers of modest output.
But even if power isn't an issue, the Micros might be a
better choice for rock fans, who don't cotton to mellow. That's not to say the Maggies
can't rock, just that -- like me, for example -- they're just ever so slightly less
comfortable with radical shifts in direction. They remind me of an old acquaintance's
aging Aston Martin DB5 -- capable of great speed and power, but they take a while to get
up to speed sometimes.
The world of the happy is quite different from the
unhappy
If you get the idea that the Omnisat Micros impressed me,
you're a perceptive sort (but I knew that when you clicked onto this URL). They have so
much more to offer than just a pretty face.
But they are striking. They've generated more
excitement among my non-audiophile friends than just about any design since the
MartinLogan Aerius. Of course, some of their comments were derisive (that's a
loudspeaker?), but all I had to do to shut 'em up was show a movie. Sometimes stunned
silence says it all.
The Micros aren't perfect. They aren't the most
refined-sounding loudspeakers I've ever heard, although they're more than competitive with
most speakers in their price class. Nor do they have much deep bass -- although judicious
set up and subwoofer integration make this almost completely inconsequential.
But they're easy to place within a real-world multiuse
room, which is no small consideration, and they are dynamic and gutsy performers that
don't cost a whole bunch of money.
In my book, that makes 'em very different.
...Wes Phillips
wes@onhometheater.com
Mirage Omnisat Micro
Loudspeakers
Price: $180 USD each.
Warranty: Five years parts and labor.
Mirage Speakers
3641 McNicoll Avenue
Toronto, ON M1X 1G5 Canada
Phone: (416) 321-1800
Fax: (416) 321-1500
Website: www.miragespeakers.com
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