SORANIK / MEMS-VOIX TECHNOLOGY
A solid-state transducer brought out of the treble and into the heart of music.
The MEMS-Voix system uses a purpose-built acoustic system to transform the operating environment of the xMEMS Muir, introducing a deliberately controlled resonant behavior through the vocal presence region.
01 / SILICON
Built for the highs.
Chosen for something else.
Introduced by xMEMS in 2024 as its smallest piezoMEMS microspeaker, Muir is a solid-state transducer whose moving structure is fabricated in silicon. It carries very low moving mass, a comparatively high intrinsic mechanical resonance, and a package just 1.15 mm thick.
It was positioned primarily as a high-frequency transducer. Those same properties make it an unusually interesting starting point for acoustic loading experiments.
Dimensions, mass and mechanical resonance per the xMEMS XSC-2200 (top-firing) datasheet, rev. 1.0, Jun. 28, 2024.
Why Muir was the better foundation for Voix
| Attribute | Direct-radiating MEMSxMEMS Montara | Voix resonatorxMEMS Muir |
|---|---|---|
| Role | Broad, direct reproduction | Specialized resonant loading |
| Package | Larger MEMS architecture | Compact Muir architecture, small enough to fit the required volume constraints |
| Implementation | Direct radiation to the ear canal | Transformed acoustic loading |
| Purpose | Reproduce | Harmonics tuning |
Muir was chosen for Voix because it suits the resonator. Montara has its own role in MEMS-Voix 4: full-range reproduction.
02 / TRANSFORMATION
VOIX BEGINS WITH ACOUSTIC LOAD.
Muir was designed
to reproduce high frequencies.
We asked:
what if the acoustic system
changed its role?
03 / MECHANISM
The acoustic system becomes part of the transducer.
Stage 01 / Excitation
Muir's silicon membrane provides the initial acoustic excitation. Its compact silicon architecture allows the surrounding acoustic network to become a dominant part of the system response.
Stage 02 / Coupling
The 6 mm diaphragm does more than reproduce sound. Its moving mechanical compliance also becomes part of the acoustic load seen by Muir.
Together, the MEMS driver, enclosed volume, sound path and compliant diaphragm form a coupled acoustic resonator, with Helmholtz-like behavior.
Stage 03 / Resonance
Dominant Voix coupled resonance
The Muir device retains its own intrinsic mechanical characteristics. Voix does not physically relocate Muir's 12.2 kHz mechanical resonance. Instead, the complete acoustic network creates a new lower-frequency coupled resonance in the system response.
Same silicon.
Different acoustic behavior.
Conceptual ring-down, not a measurement. Measured burst decay: see 04.
04 / TIME DOMAIN
Frequency response tells us how much.
Burst decay tells us how long.
No dominant sustained midrange mode
Controlled energy persistence around ~1.8 kHz
With a conventional configuration, midrange energy decays comparatively uniformly.
With Voix, a clearly defined coupled acoustic mode appears around 1.8 kHz and persists through successive decay periods.
Voix does not simply increase the midrange. It gives the midrange a controlled resonant behavior of its own.
This deliberately controlled resonance forms part of the Voix tuning philosophy. It is designed to shape the presence, continuity and character of vocal reproduction.
SAME MEMS.
DIFFERENT ACOUSTIC BEHAVIOR.
05 / PRESENCE
Not because one frequency defines a voice.Because several acoustic cues meet here.
For voices and many familiar instruments, much of the pitch-defining fundamental range lies below the Voix region.
As frequency rises, harmonic structure and spectral shape increasingly influence timbre, articulation and character.
~2 kHz
Speech-perception research found that the frequency band contributing most strongly to intelligibility was centered near 2 kHz across words, sentences and continuous speech. [02]
≈2.6–3.0 kHz
Typical adult open-ear primary gain
In the unoccluded adult ear, the external auditory canal behaves approximately as a quarter-wave resonator.
Published measurements commonly place its primary natural gain around 2.6–3.0 kHz. [01]
Open ear / reference
We therefore chose 1.5–2.5 kHz as the controlled resonant region: high enough to influence vocal articulation and harmonic character, yet extending toward the frequency region naturally emphasized by the open human ear.
Voix does not reproduce the open-ear resonance itself.
The natural ear response is used as an acoustic reference for the upper boundary of the tuning.
One of the design objectives of Voix is an open, unconstrained sense of vocal presence.
Extending the controlled resonance toward the natural external-ear gain region was one of the acoustic references used while developing that character.
Professional voice research has identified concentrated spectral energy in the roughly 2.5–3 kHz region associated with the singer's formant, with broader trained-vocal energy sometimes extending approximately 2.2–3.4 kHz. [03]
This does not mean Voix "reproduces the singer's formant." It simply reinforces that this frequency region can be especially important to vocal projection and spectral character.
The objective is not maximum resonance.It is resonance in the right place.
01 / Open-ear resonance
Real Ear Unaided Gain and external-ear resonance literature.
Published adult measurements commonly place primary open-ear gain around approximately 2.6–3.0 kHz, with substantial person-to-person variation.
02 / Speech frequency importance
Frequency Importance Functions for Words, Sentences, and Continuous Discourse.
The study found the band contributing the greatest amount to speech intelligibility centered close to 2 kHz across tested speech materials.
03 / Vocal projection
Singer's formant research.
Published studies describe concentrated trained-vocal spectral energy in roughly the 2.5–3 kHz region, with broader ranges depending on singer, register and method.
MEMS-VOIX / MODELS
