All,
Last night was a blast hanging out with Louis and listening to his Omega Speakers paired with the Clari-T-Amp with Custom battery-powered SN DacKit! It was a big ol’ 4-hour listening session, but well worth every minute
First things first… I really found out how much of a great guy Louis is. When I walked in, I found him hard at work building Super 3’s. He was nice enough to take the time out to give me the Grande tour of his new facility, and his various speakers cabinets, finishes, etc. I was impressed with how solid all his cabinets are. Also, if you think the Omega speakers look good on the website, they look better in person! Louis’s craftsmanship is excellent. He is planning on building a sound room in his new facility as well, but since it wasn’t finished, he was kind enough to go out of his way to drive us to his dealer in northern NJ.
At the dealer’s soundroom (medium sized room…sorry I did not get the dimensions), I connected the Custom battery-powered SN DacKit to a massive Pioneer Elite transport. The DAC was then connected to the Clari-T, and we were good to go!
Grande 8’s – I was surprised by the physical size of this bookshelf speaker (much bigger than I expected), and was even more surprised by how much deep and tight bass we were getting with the Clari-T-Amp’s volume barely up loud. This is the Omega speaker with the most
SLAM (for my tastes, I would never need a subwoofer with the Grande 8’s)! I put my Bela Fleck UFO Tofu CD and was able to ‘feel’ the music with this very efficient speaker. The medium-sized room we were in was filled with a very big sound. That 8” single driver Fostex speaker even does a nice job with midrange (no crossover to muck things up). I’ve heard of such negative things as “speaker shout” with certain single driver speakers, but I sure wasn’t hearing this with any of the Omega speakers last night…
Super 3’s – This was my favorite speaker I listened to last night
. Talk about a
lightning-fast little speaker! It was unbelievably fast, tight, and dynamic, with a gorgeous midrange and plenty of detail. We played my Jacqui Naylor “Shelter” CD, and I was treated to a very wide and deep soundstage and such midrange purity. These speakers also image beautifully! Whatever Louis does to make the little 4” Fostex speaker sound so full, he does it VERY well. The Super 3’s cannot hit as hard or go as deep as the Grande 8’s, but they superbly do everything else. While not as efficient as the Grande 8’s, the Clari-T-Amp was able still able to drive them to loud volumes with such ease.
Grande 6’s – Unfortunately, the dealer did not have the Grande 6’s
. Instead, we listened to the older 6” speaker (TS2) that was replaced with the Grande 6’s. Louis mentioned that the Grande 6’s are similar, but have much improved bass. I’ll be very honest…I only listened to the TS2 for two or three songs (they are discontinued after all). They didn’t have the weight and slam of the Grande 8’s, and they didn’t have that magical speed and imaging of the Super 3’s. That being said, they still were a decent sounding speaker.
The Minuet – Holy $hit, my jaw dropped when I heard how much SLAM these little speakers had
! These speakers look bigger on the Omega webpage, but they are quite the small bookshelf speaker. They sound anything but small. I was hearing bass output on levels that were close to the Grande 8’s! These twin-firing 4” speakers also had a clean midrange and plenty of detail. I was left wondering why the Minuets haven’t become as popular as other Omega’s.
So how about the
modded Sharp SD-EX111 with the Omegas? Again, driving them (this time with the Sharp) was a piece of cake. One thing that jumped out at me was that I was able to hear the differences between the sonic signatures of the Clari-T-Amp and Sharp much better with the Omega speakers than with my modified Triangle Titus 202’s. How could this be? I thought it would be the opposite because the Triangles have a tweeter and would be more revealing. I was dead WRONG! We just sat down and listened as the Omegas told the story. There was no doubt about it, the sound of the Clari-T-Amp was more pure, more intimate, more of that “open window” effect. Combined with the battery dac, there was complete background silence. This is not to say the Sharp didn’t perform well…it believe it certainly did and I am very confident that if I used Omegas to compare the stock Sharp to the modified Sharp, it would be quick and easy work to hear the improvements in bass speed, tightness, as well as midrange purity and detail. What struck me very odd that the Clari-T-Amp seemed to act more powerful with the Omegas than the Sharp! On paper, the Sharp is the more powerful amplifier. Last night, the Clari-T-Amp tossed mere paper specs out the window! It clearly had more muscle, more grip, and superior speed and dynamics.
So how did Louis like the Clari-T-Amp? He liked it very much…more so than his $2,000 solid-state amp that is rated at 50 watts per channel! Please don’t ask me to mention the name of this piece that he was comparing it to, but he found the Clari-T-Amp to have more power and not sound anything like a solid-state amp. I’d say he was very surprised indeed, as I was with his speakers. Without saying more about this, Louis will be buying a Clari-T-Amp, and I will be buying a pair of his amazing Super 3’s. I fell in love with the Super 3’s on the first song. “They had me at hello. They had me at hello.” Sorry, just felt like doing a cheesy Jerry Maguire movie rendition
I want to give a
big “thank you” to Louis again for inviting me down and taking time out of his insane, work-a-holic schedule (we are very alike in that regard) to give a listen and let me listen to my products pair with his products. He was also very kind to share his experiences with starting up his speaker company, and naturally I was all ears…
