Mirage Speakers

I don't think they perform the same at all. There is a huge difference when comparing OM series speakers to the small Omnisats, even above and beyond the lack of bottom end. I'm looking forward to see their new offerings at CES. According to their site, they will be introducing a variety of new products.

Hi All,

I have a questions for those who is familiar with Mirage speakers. I own 2 floor standing speakers M790 & a center speaker MCsi for 10 years. I was wondering if I upgrade to 3 ominiSat speakers instead of those speakers. Does any one know if the sound for music / movie improve substantially ? Thanks in advance.

Not even close.

They would like you to believe they perform the same, they don't sound similar at all. I'd say they are charging a premium for their small form factor of the Omnisats, and nifty design.

I find the newer Mirage speakers to be "brighter" than the Mirage of a decade ago. Mirage used to sound very laid back. Whether you like the new sound, you'll have to determine for yourself, but I kind miss the old Mirage sound myself.

I think if you made the change, the sound will definitely be different, whether it's an improvement is up to your ears.

I do not know whether you have seen this, but they look awful nice.

http://www.shows.soundstagelive.com/...oppers_1.shtml

I have three omc2's up front, a BPS400 sub, OMR2s on the side, and omni fx in the back. I love the sound of the mirages. They sound great with Panny xr digital receivers as well, which is a great plus.

I used to have a pair of M3SIs--also great with the panny-- that were fantastic and I miss them to this day. They were just so big. I have listened to the Omni 260s in store, but the setup was less then perfect to say the least. I thought they sounded nice, but not even a comparison to the M3s.

These new ones, however, look promising!

Here is a link to mirage that has some info--

http://66.102.7.104/search?q=cache:M...8+mirage&hl=en

IMHO - The old Mirage had some "big" and expensive groundbreaking products such as the M1 speaker which were highly regarded in the audiophile community. Since they were bought out by Audio Product International (the parent company for Energy, Athena and some others) years ago, their product line has shifted more to the mass market. Nothing wrong with that, I just think their products in general have slipped a few notches but they are also cheaper. IMHO, the last highly regarded product they made was the BPS-400 sub which I did own. I listended to their Omni Sats when they first came out. I was to use these in my second system. I came away very disappointed at the performance and then I heard what the price was and was further disappointed. I ended up with much cheaper Energy Take 5.1s which I felt better suited my needs.

I'm curious, I always thought Mirage was part of API. Why do you think they were "bought out"? The M-1 was designed by Ian Paisley who was the head engineer at API at the time. The M-1 was designed entirely by the team at API.

I think the shift toward "mass market" has more to do with the home theater market blossoming, and their need to address that part of the market.

The M-1 is probably Mirage's greatest achievement....it sounded amazing....it was effortless, and was amazingly dynamic.

I probably got my facts mixed up. If I recall Mirage used to have its own factory / warehouse in the 80s and there was an Energy factory on McNicol Ave. Now they are under one roof because of this I thought they were bought out. One of friends mother used to work at the Energy factory (on the line making speakers) in the early - mid 80's and he was in the market for speakers and we were looking at Mirage and Mirage. At that time Energy only had the 22's which were way out of his price range. His mother was able to get an employee discount on the 22's but were still more than he wanted to spend on a student budget. I guess that was ingrained in my head as Energy and Mirage being totally unrelated.

Come to think of it, like Mirage, Energy hasn't really made a really no holds barred ground breaking product in some time like the 22's. The Veritas Reference (think that is what was called) is no longer available as cost no object design.

Hi All,

I'm not an audiophile and I haven't heard older Mirage models. But I did do alot of reading online and decided to purchase 3 omnisats and an Omni S8 subwoofer to pair with a Panny XR-55 receiver. Using this in our living room with a Panny TH-42PD50U plasma and S97 DVD. The tv and dvd have been awesome. I'll give more feedback on the audio when I've had a chance to break it in (just got the stuff today). I got the omnisats for $129 a piece. Don't know if they were worth full price a couple of years ago, but at this price I think it will be a good solution for me. Hope there's more people out there that have Mirage and want to give their input as well.

Cheers!
Mike

BB, Where good audio goes to die.

No such thing as Veritas Reference. The Veritas has always been Energy's attempt at price-no-object design. It certainly aint Wilson Audio pricing, but it compares favourably to Paradigm's cost no object Signature Series, Energy's closest competitor.

Api is realizing that their future lies in producing large quanities of products like athena for Walmart and BB offshore to hit as low a price point as they can. Just like Klipsch, where ordering a Heritage model speaker seems to take forever now. Satelitte speakers, inexpensive bookshelves, HTIBs, and computer speakers are what they're focusing on.

Name all the brands that have had declining quality in the last ten years.

The OMD stuff that was mentioned above in this thread shown at CES is defantly NOT headed for BB or walmart. So I don't know if I would agree with your conclusion. Rather, I think that Mirage is attacking both the higher end and the mas market end. Hopefully using some of the profit from the low end to finance some of the high end feature development and some of the high end features eventually trickle down to the low end. Thus both product mixes helping the overall portfolio of speaker products.

I was at Cedia and CES and talking to them there they seemed to have too few dealers of the upper end left in the US. Klipsch has the ref line at some mid-hi end places (don't know how many anymore) but their emphasis is , also, right now, the Big Box retail market.

I have owned Mirage in the past and still have a couple sets on semi-permanant loan to a few friends, but these are older series. I hope they revive the upper end of the line as well as Energy.

All these people talking trash about companies that are lowering their price-point for speakers crack me up.

I wonder if they've considered that in the past 20 years, due to computerized models, computerized/robotic machining, greater availability of high quality materials, and speaker technology (and lets not forget marketing/discounting/economies of scale) has led to a situation where you can EASILY get a pair of very high quality speakers for $200.

Compared to 20ish years ago, you couldn't have spent that kind of money (factoring in value of currency) and gotten anything that didn't sound distorted and raw, with cheapy paper cones and paper surrounds.

Although the physics of speakers hasn't changed that much in the past 20 years, other factors have led to the ability to create high quality, sharp looking, clean sounding speakers. Just because a company like API spreads out its wholly-owned subsidiaries in terms of their market sector doesn't mean that their mid-market company, Mirage, is somehow deficient. There are several current offerings of Mirage speakers that represent a very good value for the quality you're buying. Take a Mirage Omni S-10 for $250 from vanns. That sounds insanely good for the money.

All things being equal, I'd take a pair of Martin Logans or perhaps a nice set of paradigms, but all things ARENT equal.

Yes, it's taken into account, and you're wrong.

While technology HAS, INDEED, improved , it has for all grades of loudspeakers, at all price points. Diamond and Berilyum (sp) are not cheap, but they will be and by that time there will likely be new advances or materials. Computer modeling has gotten better, but for everyone, and it is most helpful to those that have enough practical, real world experiance to know how and when to use it.
While cheap computers are so much better than what NASA had years ago, I don't think you're going to land on the moon. Also, no one who has the means stops and says this is good enough, it is sooo much better than what Nasa had, and it's $200 dollars. The higher-end has improved as well, and always will.

Here we go, digressing into comparisons of apples and oranges... I guess it was only a matter of time!

My experience talking with my local Mirage dealer confirms that statement. They are nervous about the Mirage line right now. Fortunately for them, they are planning to add the Energy line to try and broaden their product mix.

The Mirage OM Design series is clearly their new reference series, with a full 7.1 setup including the new OMD-S12 sub (MSRP $1600) listing at over $15K. But beyond that, and the similarly expensive new ML series, their recent products have not struck a chord with the core group of Mirage advocates of years past. The bipolar designs of the OM series are long gone, and the ever-present Omniguide module is their unique design feature now. They seem willing to live or die with it.

I hope the new reference series is the tip of the proverbial iceberg, and that we will see products of similar high quality without serious compromises in the coming year. For now, I'll remain content to stick with my all-Mirage 7.2 set-up (4 OM-9's, OM-C2, 2 OM-R2's, and 2 Omni S12 subs).

I'd like to offer my perspective on Mirage as well. I definately think that the better dealers that they might try to get in with would be more than a bit gun shy as the association with MiniMags may give these dealers the feeling that the brand is cheaper, or that all the time that API would dedicate to those volume sales would take away from the quality part of the line.
There is a bit of a debate raging in the retail trenches as to whether or not BB brings brand awareness that the smaller hi-end stores could benifit from, or whether it just makes them look like there isn't much differance between the retailers. Guess which arguement is winning. Personally, I have noticed that reps keep getting spread thinner as they have to detail all the big box movers and smaller dealers get shoved to the bottom of the allocation list by companies that have large national accounts. I'm surprised we have kept Definative, and Tweeter's relationship with Mirage is tenuos at best. Tweeter was , up until recently, 80% of Mirages storefront dealers. Not to mention all I could talk about in referance to reps/distributors.

if anyone spots an OMD review please post it here
thanks


I think they revamped their whole line because the older series were hard to get a perfect setup in every persons room, and the new omni guide system is much more forgiving.

they did seem to not have a flagship series for a while, can't wait to hear the OMD-28's

Hi Guys,

I just managed to pick up an OM-C2 which replaced my MC-2, the older direct radiating model...Technicaly had better specs on the power handling so i was alway retisent in changing, but i saw a ridiculose bargain and thought it was worth a try....I'm still listening as i've only watched a couple of movies, but it defintaly sounds smoother panning accross the front three and i think dialogue is clearer.

I'm running a pair of OM-6's as my fronts, have OM-R2's as rears and sides (ES/EX) and am just about to employ another pair of OM-R2's for Yamaha's front effect speakers.

Sub wise i have a Paradigm Servo 15 Mk1, and just picked up a BPS-150i which i may try as a dual sub set-up (The 150i was in a stupidly cheap deal with a pair of OM-R2's and the OM-C2 i wanted)

Physics defines the problems with small boxes and moving air, you aint ever gonna get big box performance from a small box no matter how much technology you throw at it.

Personaly i doubt i'll be changing my set-up for much, maybe the subs but the rest rock big time...as for asthetics, thats what an acoustic screen wall is for, with all the front three behind as well as the subs

Cya,
Lee

My long time Mirage dealer was not renewed by Mirage and Tweeter got the line.
They have found something better and since I feel that Mirage has gone slightly downhill
it is no big loss.
I have the Mirage M3s and love them but will be sellingthem because they are just too big.
Plus newer speakers offer more detail than the M series does.

Just an FYI, the OmniSats v2 come in a small form factor, called 'Satellites', as well as floor-standing, called 'FS'.

I just picked up a pair of Omnisat V2s for my spare theater family room setup. I wanted something that had some mid-bass, but had a specific application and location. I placed them in one corner using the Mirage stands, behind a sectional sofa. The other corner is blocked by a mid-back recliner which shows the top of the omnisats.

I looked at many other sats/bookshelf speakers, but most were too bulky and I couldn't ceiling/wall-mount them. The Gallos and Orbs were too directional. I didn't want to increase the sound level and deafen anyone sitting at the corners. The smaller Mirage omni's mid-base was non-existent. Not to say the Omnisat V2s provide good mid-bass, but my old Rotel high pass still may overdrive the smaller Sats in small speaker mode.

I like the open, airy omni-directional sound for surrounds in a small form factor. I would not use them for 2-channel usage. I think they should be compared more with Bose or other smaller Sat-Sub combos. They have that "look" that meets my WAF in the downstairs family room. My main room is my "kingdom", looks is secondary.

My concerns were:
1) over-priced ($249/each, $150 pair-stands)
2) very niche product
3) one local reseller(Best Buy)
4) Wife may want me to replace the front bookshelfs with these... (more $$$)

If you're planning the spend money on the Mirage lineup, you should seriously consider other similarly priced options. Unless you like that type of sound...

What do you guys think of using:

Fronts- OS v2 'FS' and 'CC'
Backs- OS v2 'Satellites' ?