Eclipse Ti vs. Brahma

After reading this topic, I am very curious. I just talked to a Adire dealer and he told me how much two 15 inch Brahma's would cost and after reading this I would like to know how much of a difference would I notice if i went out and bought the Brahma's to replace my 2 15 inch Eclispe Alum running of a jbl 1200 bp1 amp. Now dont get me wrong, I am very happy with the Eclipse and they pound to the point that i get sick. Clean and almost no distortion. So the question is if i bought the Brahmas, would i feel and hear it instantly? Let me know Because the dealer is giving them to me for 500.00 for both brandnew in the box, okay not brand new Just what was on the sales floor and they was never abused. Besides they were only used for 1 month. Advice will be greatly appreciated.goingcrazyonsound

kfr01 wrote: Alright, I'll ask a less pointed question. Did you hear some of the CSS 4.5" and/or Extremis kits at CES? Any listening impressions you care to share?

I'm acutally using the CSS 4.5" speakers in my home theater right now.  They are taking care of the front speakers right now, but will be moved to the rear when I get some Extremis towers built for myself. 

As for the subjective side of your question, I will let those who did hear them answer.  I know of at least one person around here that heard them at CES.  Although I will say that one fun demo I've found to use on the Extremis kits is bass CD's.  It really shows how low those 6" mids play; and at a most impressive output.  

Steven Kephart

Adire Audio

Remember a Adire guy will tell you his products are better just like any good salesman...LOLEclipse "Approaching Perfection"

Lizardking wrote: Remember a Adire guy will tell you his products are better just like any good salesman...LOL

Yeah, that's why I didn't offer any subjective information.  All I can do is offer the facts as unbiased as possible.  When comparing another companies speaker to ours, I try to list their strengths as well.  That's why I was hoping those that do have experience would chime in with the subjective side of things.

If it helps, I'm not a salesman.  I'm just a previous installer at an Adire dealer that was impressed with the company so much I came up here to work for them as the Warehouse Manager and Warranty Technician. 

And I don't have to claim our speaker is the best.  I'll let the Klippel test prove it when we finally get it back.  The only complaint Dr. Klippel made about our speaker was a 3% distortion peak at one frequency from a cone resonance.  Of course the speaker was moving 11mm one way at the time.

Steven Kephart

Adire Audio

Steven, I have to say I can't wait to order the TMM tower kit. I've been surfing all the boards (madisound, diyaudio, etc.) - overall people seem impressed with the value the Extremis offers - some have some funky measurements around 1.6khz, but I have a suspicion some of that is just them not measuring correctly. Anyway, they're ALL impressed with the bass output. Curious - have you heard those CSS spires? Now, let me guess who else was at CES. :-) Jeff? Haemphyst? New Project: 2003 Pathfinder

Yep, Steven's talking about me... I loved them. To be perfectly honest, I was extremely surprised by the CSS - (aka KIT41) they were a very good sounding speaker. I would HIGHLY recommend them as a very high SAF speaker system for a set of rears in a reasonable HT system. Now, the Extremis system... (aka KIT61) I'm still wet! Amazing!!! Yeah, if I didn't have over 10 grand in my living room speakers right now, and I was seriously looking for a REALLY nice set of speakers in the sub one thousand range - they'd be the ones. (Personally, I think he is underpricing those things a bit - but they ARE kits, aren't they) The bass from that little speaker was truly astounding. I really did think there was a sub in the room, but there wasn't... granted, the extreme low end (below around 40Hz) was there, but they could perform better with a good external electronic crossover and amplifier for a subwoofer system, but what bookshelf system won't? Remember it is only a 6 inch woofer... I CAN tell you, and while it would, indeed, be overkill for most OTHER people, (the nickname IS haemphyst, after all ) you couldn't buy a better multimedia system - for any amount of money! (Sorry, Steven, but when you build a computer like I do, this is the kind of speaker system one looks for!) The last set of MM speakers I built was a two Morel MW-162's with a Vifa D-26 tweeter in an MTM config, and a 10 inch Aura subwoofer in a TL, so there's the reference... Seriously, though... EXCELLENT speaker system, and from what I was seeing from the reactions of the people showing up in the room to listen, very well received. One thing I do remember as constant remarks was "WOW!", and "No subwoofer?"It all reminds me of something that Molière once said to Guy de Maupassant at a café in Vienna: "That's nice. You should write it down."

Thanks for the review. I'm curious, what is your current home audio setup like? Is it HT or music focused? Did you hear in person or hear any rumors about the KIT261? I'm really interested in getting as close to full-range as possible. :-)New Project: 2003 Pathfinder

My home audio setup is two channel... completely music focused, and largely build with my own two hands. 52 inch BG ribbons, with Titanic 12's in sealed 2.2 cubes. Bi-amped and bi-wired with an Adcom GFA-555 on the Titanics running 125Hz/48dB and down to around an F3 of (if I remember correctly) 28 or 25... The ribbons are on an NAD 218THX, running around 450 watts to each at 125Hz/48dB and up. The electronic crossovers are Marchand XM-16 modules (with upgraded Burr-Brown op amps, Vishay resistors, and polyetheylene capacitors) in separate dedicated copper shielded, solid oak boxes. These are powered by a custom manufactured (by me) ±15 volt @ 1.5 amp power supply, with less than 5mv pk-pk noise and ripple. The cables (and I am not a cable tweakist, but there are benefits to certain geometries) are teflon insulated pairs, random twisted, silver wire that I found at a surplus store for 20 bux (for about 15 pounds of silver wire? I'll take it!). (I used a shielded version of the same wire for all low level signal paths...) The capacitance between positive and negative is (again, if I remember correcly) less than 10 picofarads per foot, and the inductance was unmeasurable by my instruments. The only thing between my speakers and amps is a resistor, for all intents and purposes. The military used that wire for UHF circuit boards, so I guessed it would be good enough for audio frequencies... and it is. A JVC Pro DVD-Audio player and a (presently broken) JVC Pro S-VHS player provide the signal. The sources are controlled by a Creek OBH-12 Passive pre-amp. No gain stages in the signal path untill the signal reaches the crossover. Yeah, I'm a freak, I know, but there ya have it! Umm, I kinda forgot the second question, but no, no rumors or reviews yet...It all reminds me of something that Molière once said to Guy de Maupassant at a café in Vienna: "That's nice. You should write it down."

Wow, thanks for the rundown! Sounds like an awesome system man. A couple questions, if you don't mind. Would you go with the Marchland xo if you were building again? Tell me about the concept of a 'passive pre-amp' if you have time. I haven't heard that term before. Also, you come analog off the JVC? Do you find this component keeps up with the rest of your system? Thanks man - I'm just starting to catch the home audio bug. :-) New Project: 2003 Pathfinder

kfr01 wrote: Steven, I have to say I can't wait to order the TMM tower kit. I've been surfing all the boards (madisound, diyaudio, etc.) - overall people seem impressed with the value the Extremis offers - some have some funky measurements around 1.6khz, but I have a suspicion some of that is just them not measuring correctly. Anyway, they're ALL impressed with the bass output.

A lot of their measurements are off.  Plus they are complaining about the wrong things.  It becomes obvious because when they actually listen to the speaker their tunes completely change.  Also some of them complained that we used a poly cone instead of metal.  However they ignore that metal cones have their own issues as well. 

kfr01 wrote: Curious - have you heard those CSS spires?

I haven't heard the spires.  However I did get some good listening time with these:

Line arrays are the big fad right now.  But I really don't like them much.  They have some huge lobing problems unless you are listening to them in the far field.  And very few people have a HT room big enough to have their listening position in the far field.   I would take our least expensive kits over even a $40k+ set of line arrays any day.  Of course that's my opinion.

Steven Kephart

Adire Audio