Mirage Speakers - Page 3

Thanks for the reply, TDI.
I guess it's easy to see from my previous post that I'm a Mirage fan based on my experience with my now 17 year old 760's.
I'm hoping that when we get in to our new house (7 months or so), I'll be able to find a dealer there (Ocala area in Florida) who has them.

Jack

The last word I received from my rep is that the Omni product will begin shipping in November (early or late in the month reps don't usually say and I haven't had a chance to call him to inquire).

BTW, the last post on page 2 is my reply to your inquiry about Mirage's manufacturing.

I bet the OMD's are still made in Canada. Even if only due to price point, and due to that price point, a higher expectation of build quality, components quality, matching, reliability, etc.

I asked about this on the Mirage forum. Here's the reply I received:

"The new OMD products are manufactured by our partner companies in China. Unfortunately, we simply wouldn't have been able to manufacture a high gloss curved cabinet of the finishing quality in North America. Or we would have had to charge about 30k a pair to come close.

By the way, I still remember the first day when the original prototype arrived - all of us, including our manufacturing people, were in awe about how flawless the fit and finish of the cabinet was."


Jack

Are the new OMD's (15, C1, 5) even in stores yet?

Figures

I guess 30k isn't out of the ball park if they built it, but here's what they had been working on in that price range, built in house, and representing (in my opinion) a clearly better value. Too bad it will probably never see the light of day unless the "partner companies" decide to take it on

http://www.avrev.com/news/0101/26.mirage.shtml

That's a shame. So Mirage no longer does *any* manufacturing in Canada. I guess I'll hold on to my Mirage Canadian manufactured system a little longer.

Will Energy now outsource too?

Revel still makes their upscale stuff in the U.S. B&W still makes their upscale stuff in England. Etc.

My Omni S12 (received from Vann's) says made in Canada. But maybe it has been on the shelves awhile. I am waiting for my HDT-CM1's and the receipt still says titanium tweeters, not the aluminum that has replaced the OMD's and Omnis. Probably still some original stock around.

That's because the S12 isn't in their product line anymore. I believe the new S8's and 10's also come from China. I have the Omnisats downstairs with an S8 and Omni 260's, FX's, CC and S12 in the Family room.

While the S12 is discontinued and has been for a while, the Energy line is still supporting their 12" sub which is the same exact piece as the Mirage S12. As for the S8 and S10 origin, I just installed 2 S10's yesterday for a customer that were ordered last month and they were made in Canada. At least the subs are made there (for now) even if everything else isn't.

I think that is true since I received my new S8 yesterday and Made in Canada is on the back plate

By the time you add half-decent stands to OMD-5, it would cost more than the floorstanding Omni 550. Does that make sense? Before the new Omni series was announced, I thought of getting OMD-5 for FL and FR speakers. However, now that Omni 550 costs about the same as OMD-5, I am not so sure.

Based on the feedback on Mirage web site, it appears that Mirage will be selling their new speakers (OMD and Omni) primarily through online stores this year.

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Due to the fact that we are relatively late in the season, it will be a slow launch with only limited dealer coverage. As such, we have decided to work closely with our online partners Crutchfield and Vanns to give our consumers the opportunity to buy these new and exciting products online.

They should have the models available within the next two weeks...
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I was hoping that Magnolia would carry them so that I could at least compare OMD-5 to Omni 550. If someone manages to hear these speakers at a store, please post your comments in this thread.

Are the OMD-5s available at Magnolia? I stopped at the new BB/Mag store in my area and all they had were the Omnisat's. I asked about the OMD and new Omni lines, but the salesguy did not know what I was talking about. I have been looking for the OMD line in my area to audition the 5s but have not had any luck so far.

Hey-

Have been using the nanosats for my HT, and it's time to replace my entry-level speakers in the living room where I listen to music (20'x20'). Want something with a relatively small footprint. Was looking at the V2 FSs coupled with my S10 sub. No Magnolia's nearby...any thoughts on these guys? Any similarly footprinted towers that have a full sound?

I just got a BPS-400 from a friend who upgraded. Any hints or tweeks? I have PSB 4t for front and rear and a PSB 9C. They are driven by a Onkyo SR674.

I know this is an old thread, but after 10 years of loving them (L&R M3's, sub BP400, rears of 595IS's and center MCIS), I am moving on to Anthony Gallo Reference Speakers. I was fortunate to try out the Mirage OMD-28's with the OMD-C2 in my HT (driven by a Parasound system) and found them wanting. Its possible the front end (Parasound) was not up to pushing them properly, but I kinda doubt it. I like my music played at conversation levels and not take over the room (unless I'm pouring out some Aqualung or such. Compared to other products I was able to try at home (Mirage OMD line, Tannoy's Eyris line and the Gallo's) with similar price points, I felt I was getting substantially better product offerings from these other manufactures. I realize these are differently manufactured enclosures and application and its possible my interests have changed as well. I want to be there when Nora Jones is clicking the ivories or Shawn Phillips is doing his 4 octave calls. I want to hear the clean six string fingering Eagles do on the opening of Hotel Cali (Hell Freezes Over) or Jesse Cooks Azul.

For those just getting into the mid range products, you can't go wrong with the older Mirage product offerings and they should be fairly inexpensive on the used market.

Jim

I am not sure if anyone is still on here that is interested in the OMD line but we have the whole line here in our store. Everything except the center channels. Everything sounds awesome. We had a guy in today that has a set of $20,000 speakers (he is a professional drummer btw) and he loved the OMD 15's. He is selling the stuff he has and picking up the OMD's

Brad, where are you located?

in bend oregon...right smack dab in the middle

Well, I'm in S.C., so that's a bit far for me to drive to hear 'em.

As far as i am concerned i have never heard a speaker that sounds this good at this price point. i cant really get enough of them. if you need any more input before you buy anything just send me a message!!

Thanks Brad.

Well it is official. Just got a new shipment of Omni-S10 subs in the other day and the "Made in Canada" label had been stickered over with "China." The last of the made in Canada product is gone. Which begs the question, what does API now do in that 162,000 square foot facility in Canada?

On the other hand, the new Omni Series sounds great. Have the 550, 150 and C150 on display and they've been getting favorable listener response. The 550's in my opionion are definitely better than the original Omni-260 towers in terms of dynamics. At $200 less a pair, the 550's are a great value.

Our OMD-5's, 15's, and 28's all say made in china

Just had a chance to listen to the OMD-28's (just a couple of songs), they sounded pretty darn good to me. Impressive bottom end, extremely articulate, very natural. Are they worth 10 times the price of my trusty old OM-9s, I don't think so. But damn, they are by far the most beautiful speakers I've seen in a while. They had the rosewood and marble like lighter wood finish.

If I had more time I would have also listened to the OMD-15. But just by looking at the cabinet sizes and the woofers/tweeters, it's easy to see they use vastly different componentry. The Mirage site doesn't do them justice, the 28's are very large speakers compared to the 15's!

Has anyone had a chance to hear the new sub (OMD-S10 or whatever)?

Do you happen to know what kind of dealer network Mirage is going to have with the new Omni line? I ckecked online, and the only local dealer for them now is Magnolia, and after talking to them, they did not know anything about this new line, only the Omnisats. It is kind of a shame that this new line is not more readily available.

Yeah we used to have the OMD sub. We sold it off the floor. Before we did that i had a chance to sit down and watch a couple of movies...simply amazing is the only thing I could say. It seemed impossible that it was only a 10 inch. It rumbles way better the the omni S10 and S12.

Hello All! First of all Bradley, can you give me the name of your store, I'm up here near Seattle Wa. and I'd sure like to give the 28's some Ear time sometime in the future.!!
I'll warn you first that this is a bittersweet story that has ended with me sending back my 'Second' Pair of OMD-15's (heretoafter referred to as 'the 15's), but it won't be the end of the saga.
A quick backround to my current setup. I've been using Infinity Kappa 600's (beautiful cherrywood finish!) for the past 5 or so years and they've been the most detailed 'natural' sounding speakers that I could afford, and I haven't been dissapointed with them. Their also the most expensive speaker system I've ever bought, $2200/pr. But as happens in life I came across the 15's by way of the V2 FS model that I saw in the latest Crutchfield catalog. I bought what I thought was a pair of the V2's from the 'scratch and dent' section but when the UPS truck came they only had 'One' speaker!! So I ordered another one, but 'new' because they didn't have another in the s&d section. Stupid move on my part because I was already soured by the experience. Well, I did play with the V2's and was Very impressed by what was coming out of those slender towers!! Way back in the very poor days I owned a pair of BIC speakers that used a 'Omni' design and although they were far from high end, I loved them and the openess that design had. So that's why these caught my eye.
But the one thing I thought to myself (without knowing about the new 15's that were coming out!) was 'If the drivers were a bit bigger and the enclosure was a bit bigger I bet those would Rock'! Well about a week later I was surfing the web and decided to check out the Mirage sight and saw the 15's!! Love at first sight man!! But $2500 is still a bit high for my wages, but I talked the wife into them being my Christmas present and she consented!! So with my refund from Crutchfield taken care of, I called them up and ordered the 15's (black). Got an upgrade to 3 day air and waited for the suckers to arrive at my door.
Well, without knowing much about Mirage's history, when I saw the 'made in china' on the box, I felt my stomach knotting up. (I dont remember seeing that on the V2's box) And when I opened up the box, the styrofoam they used was cracked on 4 of the 6 shipping pieces and I really was starting to feel sick, this is NOT the way a man should feel when getting new toys! But I unpacked the speaker and took all the protective wrap off of it and was just shocked at how beautiful this thing was!!! Just stunning! I must admit the build quality looked very good. So I unpacked the other one and positioned them initially according to Mirage's reconmendations. Now as I'm doing this, the Christmas tree is on and I'm really close to the speakers and I start seeing something weird on the drivers.....FINGERPRINTS!! Smudgy, oily fingerprints on almost all the drivers. I deduced over the ensuing week that I must have gotten a 'Scratch n dent' pair from Crutchfield! Back in the box They Went and I politely raised hell with Crutchfield, which I have to say right now is a Great Firm to deal with, they didn't give me any hasstle at all during all of this and they really could have thought that I was just a nut! And since they paid all the return shipping, that's a bit of coin that I didnt have to pay.
So then I got the 'New' New pair and same thing with the styrofoam, cracked in 4 places and the carboard needs to be a couple of rungs tougher. There were tears in ALL of the boxes I received and the carboard, even when tightly taped, were flimsy for this heavy an item. I played with them for another week, trying out different positions and 'breaking them in' with Johnny A's 'Get Inside' and a newly done remaster of the Stones 'Voodoo Lounge'.
Now to the meat: The 'Openess' and extra detail in the midrange and treble area's is almost alarming!! My Kappa's are no sludge in detail and I was taken aback by the 15's sheer audio 'Quality'. I was hearing things, little breathy detail things very clearly that were nowhere to be found in the Kappa's! I had been playing the Johnny A cd over the last couple of months everyday because Charlie, our cat, came down with a weird medical problem with his equalibrium and he seemed to really like this cd. (Go Figure), so I was pretty well aware of how it sounded on the Kappa's. But listening to it just flow out of the 15's (can the descriptive term 'delicious Midrange' be used here!!) it's hard to describe when, again, It didn't 'appear' to blow the Kappa's away (until I rehooked them back up last night, but that's later!), it just seemed 'more of everything', except the bass.
Although not lacking in 'extension', there is just so much you can do with a 5 1/2" driver. And I came close to mating the 15's with my two 10" powered subwoofers but I could not get that snare drum 'whack' to sound seemless, which is my test for seemlessness between the subs and the mains. But now I thought it was time to put the spikes in and see what effect that brought. I Started with the right speaker, nice spikes, beautiful in fact and very high quality. Then I started putting the spikes on the left speaker and in doing so had my trusty Mag light on to see the base portion better....BINGO.....WHAT THE HELL IS THIS?????? The plastic "Port" piece (between the bottom of the speaker itself and the base, which is about 1&1/2" from each other) was sitting on top of the base with little pieces of insulation dust around it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Man, this beautiful speaker is right here and all these pitally things that SHOULDN'T happen ARE happening!! I don't know whether it 'fell' out during shipping or they did'nt us good glue in China, but at $2500 this kind of rinky dink 'mishaps' is UNacceptable in this competitive day and age. So, this is why the story is bittersweet, I wanted SOOOO much to fall in love with these speakers, but the zits were just too much for me, so I sent the second pair back today.
Last night when I re-hooked up the Kappa's and put in Johnny A's 'Get Inside' and pushed play, And I heard, or didn't hear, the detail I had heard with the 15's, I just looked at the boxes that I would be sending back and just sighed......
Gerry

Wow, been browsing through the forum and it just blows me away at how casually so many audiophiles talk about 5k,10k,20k speakers! I'm a PhoneMan and make pretty good money, but not enough to afford That kind of speaker!!
It just stupefies me, no wonder I have such a problem, expensive tastes but never enough $.
I included a couple of pics of my living room with my Kappa 600's and when I had the OMD-15's set up. The room is 14' 8" wide and 17' deep, so pretty average. Not a very large room but the vaulted ceilings give the sound plenty of room to roam. And it's pretty well balanced between hard surfaces and carpet/furniture, but I've always had difficulty in 'tuning' the bass response so that it is consistent around the room and doesn't collapse in the middle, like so many setups seem to do. Which is where the Kappa's have been such a pleasure, If I just use them without the subs, I can crank up the bass control to max and they will go cleanly almost as low as the subs. And there's no 'booming', just full, clean bass. But being the rockin type of guy I am, if I crank up the volume then the woofers excursion is just too much and that's what I have the subs for. And the way I've integrated them into the system has been to use the 'line level in' on the subs to connect to the amp and then to run the Kappa's from the 'output' of the subs, thinking that doing it that way would free both the amp (Onkyo 50th anniversary A-9911 integrated amp 85w/ch) and the speakers from working to hard.
Now the OMD's, on their own, filled the room with sound, and although they didn't have the 'volume' of bass the Kappa's were putting out, they came very close. But again, this is where my dilemma is.... I love the openness and detail that the 15'sa exhibited. And believe me, I heard, clearly, things within the music that I've listened to thousands of times, that I've never hear before, with a sense of ease that I found very rare. But I could never get that seamless bass. I tried many different positions with both the 15's and the subs, but there always seemed to be that 'hole' that when certain bass notes were hit (Like on 'You Got Me Rocking' on the Stones 'Voodoo Lounge' cd when they're singing the chorus and Daryl Jones goes from a very low bass note to climbing up the fretboard, all those notes should be very audible) all the sudden I'd loose that bass clarity and then it would come back on the bottom notes. I tried positioning the 15's back toward the rear wall (my ideal position was 37" from the back wall), but it muddied up the midrange terribly, so that wont work.
Now comes the questions......
Is it possible to achieve that seamlessness or are those 5 1/2" woofers just not putting out enough in that one lower midrange/bass region that would allow the sub to bite into it?
Or... would the Mirage Omni S-10 Sub 'Mate' better with the 15's and why would that be?? (Probably a Stupid question to some of you but I'm always open to new ideas, especially with Audio)
Or... Would anybody know of a 'used' pair of OMD-28's that I could get a good deal on?!!! Of course, they'd make THE Speaker that I really wanted, and would probably be Perfect for my room, The Most expensive one, the one I couldn't afford.........LOL!! $7500.00 I'd have to get a divorce before I could have that kind of cash!
I hope you enjoy the pictures, Audio is meant to be fun and the frustration of trying to get things 'just right' is always going to be a part of it. Thanks for letting me get some thoughts out here.
Me Best to you all...
Mickboy