Hi Fantastic
Let me first say thank you for taking the time and suggesting possible ways to improve my existing setup.
This will be a rather long post, so please get a mug of coffee or drink [emoji485][emoji484]
My aim was (and is) a stereo system to get "Vintage/Retro" sound. Warm but involving, clarity in resolution, spacious soundstage both width and depth, reasonably accurate imaging.
So I wanted to get speakers that were from the 80s and known for providing the characteristics.
The Mirage (L/R) I have are the OMD-12. I got a full 5.1 Mirage set from someone who was going for thinner speakers due to WAF [emoji51]
Next was how to drive them to potential. Selected the Yamaha A-S2000, a Teac DAC and a good CD player.
Being omnipolar, the speaker placement is crucial and my front wall is fully covered with a showcase.
So I had to place the speakers beside the couch (listening area) and it gave a weird soundstage and killed the imaging.
I somehow managed to place the speakers on the showcase but it did not have very good imaging or soundstage width which am almost sure is because it is too close to the wall [emoji24]
Also, the sound somehow seemed thin and hollow, lacked midrange, stuff still sounded all mashed up instead of being airy.
So, I went in search of a front firing speaker which was a bookshelf but had reasonable power handling.
Enter the Axiom audio M22 two way bookshelf speaker.
I found the soundstage was wide and imaging was much better but the front to back depth was lacking and the sound still seemed laid back and un involving. I bi-wired them and got improvement in resolution but still not a huge difference in front to back depth.
Changed my interconnects to Emotiva from unbranded ones and found a further improvement in detailing and separation but still laid back and un involving sound overall.
Next logical step seemed to be changing the amp to a faster one. I went for Class A monoblocks with huge capacitance and damping with a matching analog pre-amp to drive the Monoblocks (a month back)
The result was a significant improvement in speed, better attack and started fleshing out front to back dept in imaging. Added isolation to the speakers and further cleared the sound.
Each improvement was confirmed (double blind test) and verified by my non audio fanatic wife to make sure it is not me imagining things to justify the purchase.
Along with her describing the change/improvement, we also tested if we could play louder without her feeling annoyed [emoji196]
Recently, a few days back I swapped the emotiva XLR interconnects to Mogami and the sound is much more controlled and coherent.
I plan to see how the mirage perform with the monoblocks today [emoji51][emoji51][emoji51]