Categories: Cymbals

Sabian 22″ AAX Omni (Crash and Ride) Cymbal

Jojo Mayer requested that Sabian design a cymbal that could be all-purpose, namely crash and ride. Of course, you can crash and ride any cymbal, but the sound that is produced is not often suitable. So, Sabian came up with the Omni. Currently, they are available in two sizes, 18″ and 22″. This review covers the 18″ version, and I have to say that the design not only works well, but the two versions make a nice set.

When crashed, it sounds like a crash, obviously deeper and louder than its 18″ cousin. As a ride cymbal, the outer region has a good wash, and the inner region is dry, similar to the 18″ Omni.

Specifications

Manufacturer Line: AAX Omni
Type: Crash and Ride
Style: Medium
Alloy: B20 – CuSn20 – 80% Copper, 20% Tin
Diameter: 22″
Metal Work: Hand Hammered and Lathed, Buffed Finish
Weight: 6 Pounds
MSRP: $524; Street Price $305
Sabian

The bell is not lathed or hammered, and the region next to the bell is hammered with the hammering spaced very close together. The outer region of the cymbal is only lathed. This gives you not only the crash availability, but two distinct ride sounds. While the outer area has plenty of wash, the inner area next to the bell is dry, due to the heavy hammering. Both the 18″ and 22″ versions are hammered and lathed in this same pattern.

The crash spectrum has peaks at 450 Hz, 550 Hz, declines, and then rises again at 1.4 kHz where it remains relatively flat out to about 7 kHz. The response then declines to 40 kHz. Overall, it has a very different sound than the 18″ Omni.

The crash peaks at 0.15 seconds, a bit slower than the 18″ Omni, which is to be expected. The crash has a long sustain.

I also measured the spectrum of the first 0.5 second of a single ping (so that we are looking mainly at the spectrum of the ping and not the wash) on the outer and inner (next to the bell) regions of the cymbal. The first graph below is the spectrum from the outer region and the second graph is from the inner region. Notice that the inner region next to the bell has less lower frequencies than the outer region that is not hammered. However, unlike the 18″ Omni, the inner region rolls off sooner (beginning at 10 kHz) than the 18″ Omni does. Between the two Omni cymbals, you have four distinct ride sounds, and two crash sounds.

Click HERE to listen to an audio sample, which will include crash (when appropriate), ride, and bell sounds (these are 24 bit, 176.4 kHz wav files, so be sure your sound card is capable of handling these high resolution sound files). In this case, there are two ride sound samples. The first one is on the outer region, and the second one is on the region next to the bell.

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John E. Johnson, Jr.

Editor-in-Chief Emeritus. John E. Johnson, Jr. founded Secrets of Home Theater and High Fidelity in 1994, shortly after publishing a hardcopy book of the same title. He served as Editor-in-Chief of Secrets of Home Theater and High Fidelity until 2022. John has been involved in audio and video for more than 50 years, having built radio transmitters, amplifiers, turntables, and speakers from scratch. He was also one of the founders of the Northern California Audio Video Association, now The Bay Area Audio Society. John holds four university degrees, including a Ph.D. in Neuroscience, and has published numerous scientific books, along with dozens of scientific articles on biomedical research topics as well as imaging technology. He was the founder and Editor-in-Chief of two medical/scientific journals for 20 years. John holds several patents, including one on high resolution image analysis and one on a surgical instrument. He has been affiliated with NASA, The National Institutes of Health, The Johns Hopkins University, Stanford Research Institute, and The University of California at Berkeley. He is President of the consulting firm Scientific Design and Information, Inc., which is based in Redwood City, California. John resides in the San Francisco Bay area with his wife and multiple kitties! His daughter, Cynthia, who was an integral part of SECRETS for many years, resides in San Francisco.