ELAC - Adante... what’s the verdict?

^ Seems like an honest assessment. I too have noticed that "brassy" tendency with aluminum drivers.

Dear James_w514,

Thank you for your explanation regarding the effect of aluminum drivers in enhancing the brassiness  of speakers. Now that you mentioned it, I recall having the same impression when I was auditioning a pair of paradigm prestige 85Fs, which also have aluminum drivers. I have always been somewhat sensitive to the sound of loud trumpets and other brass instrumentes.

I had an unfortunate experience with an 'unbroken in' pair of Adante at my local shop.  I wanted to try something with concentric driver and compared the Adante with KEF LS50 and R300.  Factoring out the unbroken in factor, I'd say you really have to listen to and confirm that you like the metallic concentric tweeter sound.  The Adante and L50 both were too bright and harsh for me though not the R300.  The R300 similarly with a 3way woofer I did not like the crossover between the bass woofer vs concentric midrange woofer, it was like the bass driver was constantly competing against the midrange driver.   I'd imagine similar concern with Adante.

Coaxial drivers are very rare birds in hifi. My guess is that they are very difficult to get right. They are going to image better of course, but at the expense of what?