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Your 5.1 home theater speaker system can be good or it can be great, and this surround sound system will do the latter. The Mirage Nanosat is a unique package that will pluck you from your sofa and pitch you into the front lines of every epic battle scene that graces your TV. They are small, attractive and high-quality speakers – but they don't stop there. These little guys pack an ace in their sleeve: a unique driver design that disperses sound waves in 360 degrees, literally filling a room with sound. This innovation brings an element of realism to home theater that cannot be found in any other speaker system, making it the worthy recipient of our TopTenREVIEWS Silver Award.
This speaker package comes with a subwoofer and five satellite speakers, together capable of producing sound waves between 33 and 20,000 hertz. The human ear is capable of detecting frequencies as low as 20 hertz, so the bass doesn't quite provide perfect coverage, but it certainly provides enough to give your home theater system a respectable punch. If you care more about a rowdy bass than crisp midranges and highs, the system might not meet your expectations. For everybody else, the frequency range is more than adequate.
Here's a quick peek at other important specs:
- Power output: 10-100 watts
- Impedance: 8 ohms
- Sensitivity: 87 dB
- Crossover: 40-150 Hz
Speaker sensitivity (fancy speaker-lingo for efficiency) is a couple decibels lower than other rival home theater speaker systems, which means that they don't pack quite as much pounce for the ounce. The difference is pretty small, however, so chances are that it won't have any noticeable impact on your power consumption.
The low-pass crossover manages the transfer between your midrange speakers and the subwoofer. You can set it anywhere from 40 to 150 hertz, which gives you plenty of flexibility. The higher you set the crossover, the higher the frequencies your subwoofer will put out.
The package includes five satellite speakers and a subwoofer. Unfortunately, the package does not include a dedicated center-channel speaker. We like to see a center-channel speaker with an extra mid-range driver to help tie the surround sound together and keep viewer's attention focused on the screen. This important job falls to one of the five satellites. Admittedly, you do get greater flexibility from this configuration because any speaker can do any job, but a dedicated center-channel speaker would have been a welcome addition to the family. Mirage does offer a matching center-channel speaker either separately or in a slightly more expensive Prestige package if you have a flexible budget.
In any case, the speakers look awesome, and we think your better half will agree. They take that age-old box-style speaker cabinet and wad it up for the garbage man, employing a unique triangular design instead. If the box didn't come labeled as a 5.1 home theater speaker system, you might not guess that they are speakers at all. They come with removable dome-shaped grilles, so it is up to you whether you leave them attached. The speakers look great either way.
The satellite speakers pack a lot of technology into a small space. They come magnetically shielded for starters, which keeps the speaker magnets from damaging your television or other sensitive electronics. However, the 360-degree sound dispersion takes the spotlight, blindfolded and with both hands tied. Mirage calls this unique feature "Omnipolar Technology," and the visual effect is dramatic. The titanium-based 2.75" midrange driver fires upward into a special apparatus (also known as the Omniguide) suspended over the diaphragm. The apparatus is responsible for redirecting sound waves in all directions to create the room-filling sweet spot for which Mirage is so well known. The tiny titanium dome tweeters can be difficult to spot if you don't know where to look for them; upon close examination of the Omniguide apparatus, you will find that it is a lot like a Russian nesting doll. The tweeters perch on top, with a miniature Omniguide of their own.
To round things off, this surround sound speaker package includes a down-firing subwoofer just a bit larger than 13 x 11 inches. The woofer sports a ribbed elliptical ring intended to improve bass quality.
Audiophiles may note that these surround sound speakers aren't quite as clear as they could be, but regular listeners will be too fascinated to care. The Omniguide apparatus lives up to the claim, bouncing sound waves off every surface in the room to create a remarkable sound stage. You might even find it difficult to identify the speakers as the source. Unlike other theater systems that focus all the sound on one sweet spot, the Mirage Nanosat speakers project well-blended sound throughout the entire room.
Even without the 360-degree sound field, these surround sound speakers would be impressive. They put out big sound from a small cabinet, and they do it with good clarity and preservation of detail. The bass and stereo speakers are well blended.
It is important to note that these speakers will produce optimal results in a small to mid-sized room. The speakers produce big sound for the size, but the immersive sound stage will become less dramatic in larger and more spacious rooms.