Super Eclipses are very good speakers: dynamic, good frequency extension, coherent from bottom to the top, and not bad looking, either.
Caveats: They require carefully chosen- room placement, cabling, and upstream electronics--as others have mentioned. Also, my personal preference is to run far more amplification power than the mfr tends to suggest. (See below.)
I have used the 'Super E's' for 1.5 years--not the new tweeter version, obviously. I've tried five different power amps, three different manufactures' cables, and two pre-amps to narrow down the right synergy among the gear.
Placement: Because they have side-firing double woofers that are not on a straight line vertically from each other, the speaker can be a little tricky to place in some rooms. The staggered woofer configuration can make it difficult to determine the best placement based on room dimensions in relationship to the woofers. I recommend the Cardas speaker placement formula; see their website.
Cabling: Use Coincident's own cabling where ever possible. You can't go wrong unless you experience a synergy problem elsewhere in your system. I thought Harmonic Technology, Truth Link was a good combo until I tied Coincident's CST I interconnects.
Electronics: High-quality, non-glaring electronics do well. As I mentioned, I prefer much more power than many seem to favor with the 'Super E's'. I can recommend the 150 watt OTL Atma-Sphere MA-1 MkII's. The MA-1's liked the 'Supers' to be half the distance from the wall behind them compared to my usual 92" (measured from wall to front baffle) in order to bring out sufficient weight and authority in the bass. The MA-1 Mk II/Super E combo has stunning speed, tonal realism, and an frequency extension (both low and high, but especially upper fr) that it just may blow your preconceptions of what is possible with this audio obsession game.
The Cary SLAM-100's (with oil-filled coupling caps) also sound really good. At 95 triode-mode, push/pull watts/165 tetrode, they really can do justice to very demanding music and retain enough detail and nuance to satisfy my needs. The SLAM-100's have the same transformers as the discontinued SLM-200's and can be switched from triode to tetrode mode on the fly. Unlike the MA-1's, the SLAM-100's don't have any problem with weight and authority at the full 92' mark into the room in their triode--preferred--mode. Sort of like Coincident cables: others may do some audiophile-nerd tricks better, but Coincident cables just sound right. The Cary SLAM-100's just sound right. They are also more quiet than the MA-1's when using RCA/single ended interconnects. (The MA-1's really are designed to run in so-called balanced mode [XLR] in all fairness to Atma-Sphere.)
I will spare you a list of the other auditioned amps' shortcomings. Contact me off the discussion group if you want to take that further.
Israel Blume (Coincident principle) will probably hate this Cary SLAM-100 suggestion because he is most likely more familiar with Cary's SET's and does not like them. I go with what works independent of what's sexy, or a theoretical match. Too often I was told rhetoric like. 'More than enough power with amp X. World-class performance with amp Z.' only to find my experience with those very amps to differ significantly from their hype.
Interesting to note, that some one who bought Israel's demo system (Sutts) stated-I believe-that it used 170 watts on the bass modules of the Total Eclipses with additional amplification for the mids and tweets in a bi-amp config. And the 'Totals' are supposed to be even more efficient than the 'Supers' are. Does this tell you something about how the Super Eclipses really can shine?
Caveats: They require carefully chosen- room placement, cabling, and upstream electronics--as others have mentioned. Also, my personal preference is to run far more amplification power than the mfr tends to suggest. (See below.)
I have used the 'Super E's' for 1.5 years--not the new tweeter version, obviously. I've tried five different power amps, three different manufactures' cables, and two pre-amps to narrow down the right synergy among the gear.
Placement: Because they have side-firing double woofers that are not on a straight line vertically from each other, the speaker can be a little tricky to place in some rooms. The staggered woofer configuration can make it difficult to determine the best placement based on room dimensions in relationship to the woofers. I recommend the Cardas speaker placement formula; see their website.
Cabling: Use Coincident's own cabling where ever possible. You can't go wrong unless you experience a synergy problem elsewhere in your system. I thought Harmonic Technology, Truth Link was a good combo until I tied Coincident's CST I interconnects.
Electronics: High-quality, non-glaring electronics do well. As I mentioned, I prefer much more power than many seem to favor with the 'Super E's'. I can recommend the 150 watt OTL Atma-Sphere MA-1 MkII's. The MA-1's liked the 'Supers' to be half the distance from the wall behind them compared to my usual 92" (measured from wall to front baffle) in order to bring out sufficient weight and authority in the bass. The MA-1 Mk II/Super E combo has stunning speed, tonal realism, and an frequency extension (both low and high, but especially upper fr) that it just may blow your preconceptions of what is possible with this audio obsession game.
The Cary SLAM-100's (with oil-filled coupling caps) also sound really good. At 95 triode-mode, push/pull watts/165 tetrode, they really can do justice to very demanding music and retain enough detail and nuance to satisfy my needs. The SLAM-100's have the same transformers as the discontinued SLM-200's and can be switched from triode to tetrode mode on the fly. Unlike the MA-1's, the SLAM-100's don't have any problem with weight and authority at the full 92' mark into the room in their triode--preferred--mode. Sort of like Coincident cables: others may do some audiophile-nerd tricks better, but Coincident cables just sound right. The Cary SLAM-100's just sound right. They are also more quiet than the MA-1's when using RCA/single ended interconnects. (The MA-1's really are designed to run in so-called balanced mode [XLR] in all fairness to Atma-Sphere.)
I will spare you a list of the other auditioned amps' shortcomings. Contact me off the discussion group if you want to take that further.
Israel Blume (Coincident principle) will probably hate this Cary SLAM-100 suggestion because he is most likely more familiar with Cary's SET's and does not like them. I go with what works independent of what's sexy, or a theoretical match. Too often I was told rhetoric like. 'More than enough power with amp X. World-class performance with amp Z.' only to find my experience with those very amps to differ significantly from their hype.
Interesting to note, that some one who bought Israel's demo system (Sutts) stated-I believe-that it used 170 watts on the bass modules of the Total Eclipses with additional amplification for the mids and tweets in a bi-amp config. And the 'Totals' are supposed to be even more efficient than the 'Supers' are. Does this tell you something about how the Super Eclipses really can shine?