@bradf, I bought a pair of Super Victory II speakers used about 6 years ago. I am going to make an assumption that the SVIII is not a radical redesign. As Charles1dad mentioned, I drive the SV’s with Atma-sphere M-60’s. The M-60’s don’t break a sweat, however, these speakers were not happy driven by my Coincident Frankenstein 300Bs.
The tweeter and midrange (i think) used in the SVII are no longer available, which may have been the motivation behind launching the SVIII. Also, the coincident website indicates that the SVII did not have an aluminum woofer, but this is not correct. So the woofer may be a different woofer, but my guess is that it is fairly similar. The coincident website indicates some adjustments were made to the crossover to accommodate the new drivers. I suspect the crossover design is similar, perhaps with some adjustments to cap and resistor values.
You ask some excellent questions. I own both the Super Victory II's and a pair of the old retired Triumph Extreme II monitors. I had the opportunity to extensively audition (about 5 hours) a pair of PREs. Tonal accuracy and coherence is a strong suit in all the coincident speakers I’ve heard. I would say my SVIIs as they are currently set up give a nice, tuneful, articulate bass.
Again, as they are currently set up, imaging is quite good. Not the strongest center fill I would say, but superb outside the center. They image convincingly outside the speakers in my 15 ft wide room, giving the impression of an image of 25-30 ft wide on some recordings.
Both bass response and imaging benefited from an enormous effort in optimizing speaker and listening position placement as well as room treatment. In the absence of this, speaker performance in those areas was disappointing. These will not be speakers that will work in any room, and might not be the best in a room where you don’t have freedom to add extensive treatment due to esthetics considerations. The side firing woofers allow for a narrow baffle, which is a plus with respect to imaging, but the side firing woofers can be a bit more demanding when it comes to placement.
If I were to offer a performance criticism on my speakers, it would be that the midrange is not the loveliest or most refined I’ve every heard. The new drivers in the SVIIIs may be an improvement in this area, but I suspect this is going to be problem when using any 7" as a midrange driver.
I have no experience with the Super 9s, so I can’t be of help on those.
Now then, I need to tell you that I rebuilt the crossovers using about $1200 in parts. This work utterly transformed the SVIIs. Before the crossover rebuilt, the speakers were laid back to the point of being boring. You are only going to get so much out of $3 Solens fast caps. On the other hand, the inductors are pretty good, so I didn’t replace those. The transformation was significant enough that I suspect my modified speakers will out perform anything in the 10-15K price range.
Would I spend this kind of money on this speaker with no return option? No. I can justify buying used if the price is right, because if I can’t make the speaker work in my room and my system, I can resell without loosing my shirt.
