Ugh, back into the same dilemma as b4...

[billybrown66 10+ year member]

there hasn't really been a price announced though, $500 MSRP, so it will be lower than that.

 

[fatryan 5,000+ posts]

there hasn't really been a price announced though, $500 MSRP, so it will be lower than that.

i hope so. cause if i end up wanting 1, id like to at least break even with the money from my eclipse

 

[pwnt by pat 10+ year member]

well i guess im in that 1%, cause i def noticed a difference.

Just a question, I'm not calling you a liar persay, but have you tried a/b testing?

 

[fatryan 5,000+ posts]

Just a question, I'm not calling you a liar persay, but have you tried a/b testing?

i dunno what a/b testing is. but i do know that ive owned many different decks. all of which were below 4V and all had 1-bit DAC. and when i switched to my eclipse, which is 8v/55ohm and 24-bit DAC, i noticed a significant difference in sq

 

[pwnt by pat 10+ year member]

a/b means you blindly listen to each one and try and determine which is which. This is the amp challenge, however same rules would still apply:

http://www.talkaudio.co.uk/vbb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=18815

What makes it so hard about head units is that there's more to the reproduction of sound besides the dac, and quality of the dac is NOT the sole reason for the accuracy of the sound. If I recall correctly, all but the highest end Clarions had 1 bit dacs and were still reguarded as pretty good sounding units.

 

[davidfre21 5,000+ posts]

not some of the ones i was lookin at. and i want pause anyways, not mute

thats what i meant, i know my 8600 has it, u just need to find it through the screens. Unless u have a remote then its the program button... which works on almost all Pioneers

 

[El Ropo 10+ year member]

thanx, yeah i never heard of any1 having problems like this with eclipse decks

My roommate was an eskips dealer for several years in a shop up in MO somewhere. They dropped the whole line after many defective HUs, and eclipse refusing to honor their warranty. This is very common, but since eskips has a smaller market share (they sell a lot less HUs than alpine or pioneer), the stories don't seem to come up as often.

Most people are just thrilled with their stuff, but the company itself is very hard to deal with, and outright effed up when it comes to honoring their warranty on defective product.

 

[OldOneEye 10+ year member]

My experience (and this year it changed) was that Eclipse has an advanced exchange. Your dealer calls up Eclipse, they send a unit to him, they put that in your car and then put yours in the box and send it back. Usually they have refurbished units fixed, boxed and ready to go waiting for the phone call.

Eclipse might have had a bad batch, but your dealer seems to be out of the loop. I would call Eclipse directly and ask them directly what to do. I guess they have refurbished ones (where do you think bad ones go?) sitting around ready to go and your dealer just doesn't want to get up off his A$$.

My guess is he won't give you your money back and you will get a refurbished 8445 back shortly from Eclipse through your dealer.

Juan

Ive had my 8445 for some time now. I got it in the fall (october maybe). and in december, the display started cutting out. well when i bought it (from Good Vibes in Horsham, pa), the owner told me it'll have a 3 year warranty and that if i ever have a problem, hell do a direct exchange at the shop for a brand new one. well when i encountered this first problem, he "didnt have any 8445's in stock". so i gave him mine and he was gonna try to get eclipse to do an advanced sale, so id have a replacement in days. i managed to get him to give me a loner, but it was a total POS old nak deck from 1912 and the preouts were totally ****ed. well 3 weeks later i finally got my **** deck back. and now, just a couple weeks ago, this brand new deck starts shit too. first it started randomly jumping into auxilary mode. then it started skipping like crazy on every cd (even freshly burned ones). and sometimes it would just completely stop playing, but the counter would continue to incriment. i watched it count to 10 minutes one time on a 3 minute song. and this is all after it worked flawlessly for a couple months. so anyways, i go back to good vibes yesterday and tell them. and theyre total dickheads at first. but then the owner starts with the "im on your side" bs. but whatever. well he says they dont make the 8445 anymore...ok i figured that since the new lines out. so i just had to send it in for repair (despite the fact that when i bought it he said he take care of it). well i told them im not going through with that bullshit again. and he said he could try to argue with eclipse to get me a credit. and i think that meant ill get my money back...well at least thats how he made it sound. so im thinkin if that happens, im gonna stay away from eclipse. maybe i just had bad luck, i dunno, but im **** sick of this. so my dilemma is what HU to get.
ive posted a thread or 2 about this b4. i want a HU with high V preouts, 24bit DAC, mp3 playback, and some way to pause it, not mute. my eclipse didnt have a pause option, but the power button worked just the same. it turned on and off quickly (unlike pioneers). sorry about the little rant in this thread. so, any suggestions?

 

[mikegett 10+ year member]

My roommate was an eskips dealer for several years in a shop up in MO somewhere. They dropped the whole line after many defective HUs, and eclipse refusing to honor their warranty. This is very common, but since eskips has a smaller market share (they sell a lot less HUs than alpine or pioneer), the stories don't seem to come up as often.
Most people are just thrilled with their stuff, but the company itself is very hard to deal with, and outright effed up when it comes to honoring their warranty on defective product.

Not true. Eclipse has one of the lowest deffect percentages in the market. There productions are a fraction of the amount that Alpine, Pioneer, Kenwood and others produce. When calculating ppm percentages, lower volumes of product will result in higher deffect scores. This means that a company that produces less product will have to have fewer deffects to keep the same percentages that higher volume companies carry.

A warranty issue does not have to go through your dealer. As long as you have your reciept and have registered your warranty it can be done over the phone. I have owned six Eclipse HU's, three amps, four sets of speakers, and three subs. My first problem was with a 8455 last March. I live over fifty miles from the nearest dealer and called Eclipse. It took about ten minutes to find my registration, ten minutes to explain the problem, and another four or five to get a PO number. I mailed in the defective unit and they sent a brand new 8455 via ups two day delivery. I can't stand the eclipse email support, but the phone support is quite nice.

 

[JLCivic 10+ year member]

i dunno what a/b testing is. but i do know that ive owned many different decks. all of which were below 4V and all had 1-bit DAC. and when i switched to my eclipse, which is 8v/55ohm and 24-bit DAC, i noticed a significant difference in sq

I don't doubt that at all(huge eclipse fan here), BUT you don't know for sure if the better sound was due to the dacs, for example(I have heard dual 1 bit eclipses sound better than 24 bit decks that cost nearly twice as much, for example).

I do think, of the mass marketed decks, Eclipse makes the best sounding ones.

 

[fatryan 5,000+ posts]

a/b means you blindly listen to each one and try and determine which is which. This is the amp challenge, however same rules would still apply:http://www.talkaudio.co.uk/vbb/showthread.php?s=&threadid=18815

What makes it so hard about head units is that there's more to the reproduction of sound besides the dac, and quality of the dac is NOT the sole reason for the accuracy of the sound. If I recall correctly, all but the highest end Clarions had 1 bit dacs and were still reguarded as pretty good sounding units.

no i havent done that. that would be virtually impossible for me to do since id hafta install the decks. anyways, i know the DAC isnt the only feature that determines sq, but it IS 1 factor. and i want the best i can get for the money.

 

[fatryan 5,000+ posts]

thats what i meant, i know my 8600 has it, u just need to find it through the screens. Unless u have a remote then its the program button... which works on almost all Pioneers

i think they might all have the pause feature in the function menu, thats how my 550mp was. but they dont all have a program button on the remote, because not all pioneer decks use that specific remote. the steering wheel remote doesnt have a pause or program button. i dealt with my 550mp's annoying pause feature (having to go through the menu to pause it) for years, and i want something easier.

 

[fatryan 5,000+ posts]

My roommate was an eskips dealer for several years in a shop up in MO somewhere. They dropped the whole line after many defective HUs, and eclipse refusing to honor their warranty. This is very common, but since eskips has a smaller market share (they sell a lot less HUs than alpine or pioneer), the stories don't seem to come up as often.
Most people are just thrilled with their stuff, but the company itself is very hard to deal with, and outright effed up when it comes to honoring their warranty on defective product.

yeah, thats how it seems when i talk to the owner of good vibes about my deck. he says theyre such a pain in the ***. btw, that bastard at good vibes didnt call me AGAIN. im gonna go shove my foot up his *** when i get home tonight.

 

[fatryan 5,000+ posts]

My experience (and this year it changed) was that Eclipse has an advanced exchange. Your dealer calls up Eclipse, they send a unit to him, they put that in your car and then put yours in the box and send it back. Usually they have refurbished units fixed, boxed and ready to go waiting for the phone call.
Eclipse might have had a bad batch, but your dealer seems to be out of the loop. I would call Eclipse directly and ask them directly what to do. I guess they have refurbished ones (where do you think bad ones go?) sitting around ready to go and your dealer just doesn't want to get up off his A$$.

My guess is he won't give you your money back and you will get a refurbished 8445 back shortly from Eclipse through your dealer.

Juan

well thats what he did the first time. of course, it took 3 ****ing weeks for some reason. and this time they said they wont do it.

 

[fatryan 5,000+ posts]

I don't doubt that at all(huge eclipse fan here), BUT you don't know for sure if the better sound was due to the dacs, for example(I have heard dual 1 bit eclipses sound better than 24 bit decks that cost nearly twice as much, for example).
I do think, of the mass marketed decks, Eclipse makes the best sounding ones.

im not saying the DAC is the only factor in sq. how do you guys derive this from what i said? lol. yes, there may be other DACs that are better than a 24-bit, of course. but id rather have a 24 as compaired to a 1.