Coincident Eclipse vs Devore

I will soon be listening to the Devores, likely the Nines
because this dealer did not have the Silverbacks." The Devores may look good paper in that regard, but I've seen alot of tube amplifiers just never bring them to life." Just curious. What would be your guess for tube power that would get the most out of the Super 8's, Nines... This is obviously based alot on opinions, and personal preferences, as well as room size. I would tend to believe that dealers may exaggerate their opinions on this subject in general for many of their speaker lines. That said, the Devores are often paired with 40-80 watt range tube amps. Sometimes even lower powered ones from what I understand.

Trelja,

Sorry it has taken so long for me to respond back. If Devore's are hard to drive why then do they match them with low powered amps like Leben and Shindo, that only put out about 10-12 watts. Reading your comments, I would not think that would work well at all. I have a Cary sli80, but have always wanted a SET amp, so I would not want to make a mistake and buy speakers that would not work well. As you pointed out the Coincident are very versital when it comes to amplification. My room is 14x18 with a cathedral ceiling, so its not that big. The "Lush" you speak of in regards to the Devore's, is something I like. I do like my Coincident speakers, but I like the driver arrangement on the Devore's. I had the Coincident a SEIII's and sold them (bad move), but have always like the De'oppolitto arrangement that they had, but not the amount of drivers in those speakers, too many! Your thoughts are always appreciated.
Thanks
Mike

Mike,

I auditioned the DeVores with Shindo Corton-Charlemagne (25 watts) and they were a wonderful combination. I would agree that the DeVore sound is just slightly to the polite side of neutral while the Coincident house sound is just slightly forward of neutral. Both are excellent speakers.

Good luck

Mike, that was just my opinion. With a pair of 16 wpc 211 based monoblocks and push-pull integrateds using EL34 (35 wpc Class A/B), KT88 (30 wpc pure Class A), and 2A3 (12 wpc pure Class A) output tubes, we could never get them to come alive for me in the way some of the other amplifiers in the shop did.

For what it's worth, the salesperson felt the same as I did about those combinations, but also that the best combination he had with the DeVores were a pair of DeHavilland 845 monoblocks. So, there is likely some validity to that theory. Unfortunately, I never got to hear them together.

The ultimate arbiter is how YOU find the combination.

I heard the Devore nines with Shindo Monbrison pre and Montrachet Amp and the sound was very transparent and true, virtualy no color in the sound but the bass was just a tad on the light side for my taste and so netrual as to be a bit uninvolving. (at least for me)

15 mins later went to another hi fi store and heard the Pathos Twin Towers with the Devore Nines and WOW! what a beautiful sound! Very transparent and a real kick in the bass. The Pathos TT is probably not as transparent an amplifier as the Shindo gear, but for my tastes the Pathos won out. Also the Pathos is around $7000 less than the shindo combo. Bear in mind that I listen to mostly classical and Jazz.