# Eureka Specialita or Niche?



## radicoman (Jun 1, 2015)

So.. the time has come to upgrade my MDF.

I brew mostly but want to hone my espresso skills on the weekend. Likely to keep this pattern. Single dosing.

Anyone able to talk about these 2 grinders and give me an idea of which would suit me best?

I've read so many forum posts about both that I am now over informed and unable to reduce it down to my needs.

Much appreciated.

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## MWJB (Feb 28, 2012)

Specialita might be chore when switching from espresso to brew. Perfetto might make more sense for all round grinding.

Which do you like the look of most?


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## MediumRoastSteam (Jul 7, 2015)

radicoman said:


> Likely to keep this pattern. Single dosing


 Buy the Niche. The Eureka is not suitable for single dosing. Some say it can do it, but the results are debatable. Let alone the faff.


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## radicoman (Jun 1, 2015)

MWJB said:


> Specialita might be chore when switching from espresso to brew. Perfetto might make more sense for all round grinding.
> Which do you like the look of most?


The niche looks difficult to source. Nor a fan of admin or waiting. Lol

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## radicoman (Jun 1, 2015)

MediumRoastSteam said:


> Buy the Niche. The Eureka is not suitable for single dosing. Some say it can do it, but the results are debatable. Let alone the faff.


Is it a lot of faff?

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## MediumRoastSteam (Jul 7, 2015)

radicoman said:


> Is it a lot of faff?
> 
> Sent from my SM-N960F using Tapatalk


 Compared to the Niche, IMO - yes. Just watch videos. The problem you have here is that you have a grinder not designed for single dosing in any way, equipped with anti clumping devices on the chute, against one that has been designed to be single dosed from the ground up. The flip side would be to operate the Niche with a hopper: it will fail miserably, and the Specialità will beat it hands down.


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## MWJB (Feb 28, 2012)

radicoman said:


> The niche looks difficult to source. Nor a fan of admin or waiting. Lol
> 
> Sent from my SM-N960F using Tapatalk


 I don't see the Perfetto as being any more available.

I don't understand why you think it is difficult to source.

If you want to buy with 1 click, delivery tomorrow, then you probably don't want either of these.


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## Rob1 (Apr 9, 2015)

MediumRoastSteam said:


> Compared to the Niche, IMO - yes. Just watch videos. The problem you have here is that you have a grinder not designed for single dosing in any way, equipped with anti clumping devices on the chute, against one that has been designed to be single dosed from the ground up. The flip side would be to operate the Niche with a hopper: it will fail miserably, and the Specialità will beat it hands down.


 I think if you fit the Niche with a hopper and timer switch it'll be fine and might even improve. Retention would go up significantly though. You could get a look at how it would behave by filling it with as much coffee as you could fit in the existing 'hopper' and just manually turn it off when you've got your dose.

It's a DC motor so you could easily program an arduino mini with SSR and turn the motor off potentially even by weight if you stick a small sensor under the wooden coaster thing that holds the catch cup or under the decent portafilter fork thing people like to fit.


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## MediumRoastSteam (Jul 7, 2015)

Rob1 said:


> think if you fit the Niche with a hopper and timer switch it'll be fine and might even improve. Retention would go up significantly though. You could get a look at how it would behave by filling it with as much coffee as you could fit in the existing 'hopper' and just manually turn it off when you've got your dose.


 Yep. I'm not saying what I think. I'm saying it because I tried it. And it doesn't work! 😂


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## 2cups (May 6, 2019)

I have a Specialita, it's a good grinder.

If you want to do a mix of brew/espresso and single dose, it would have to be the Niche though. Mignon not designed for either.


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## allikat (Jan 27, 2020)

Single dose? Niche every time.


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## radicoman (Jun 1, 2015)

2cups said:


> I have a Specialita, it's a good grinder.
> If you want to do a mix of brew/espresso and single dose, it would have to be the Niche though. Mignon not designed for either.


Thanks. Nice to hear it from an owner.

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## HM68 (Sep 9, 2020)

Hello from Glasgow. My 1st post.

I also have the Mignon and agree that it is a good grinder. I have just bought a Niche and am looking forward to getting it in February. I single dose hence the Niche purchase. I am looking forward to the comparison.


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## radicoman (Jun 1, 2015)

Thanks all. The niche it is.

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## radicoman (Jun 1, 2015)

HM68 said:


> Hello from Glasgow. My 1st post.
> I also have the Mignon and agree that it is a good grinder. I have just bought a Niche and am looking forward to getting it in February. I single dose hence the Niche purchase. I am looking forward to the comparison.


The shop and ship account lark on their purchase page. Is it simple? Any hidden surprises?

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## DavecUK (Aug 6, 2013)

radicoman said:


> The shop and ship account lark on their purchase page. Is it simple? Any hidden surprises?
> 
> Sent from my SM-N960F using Tapatalk


 It would seem not with over 16500 grinders shipped....


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## 2cups (May 6, 2019)

Honestly, quite tempted to press the button myself as I have started to experiment with brewed more recently.

Funny that Niche are still selling via the Indigogo page, would have expected them to get something more permanent in place by now.


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## Rob1 (Apr 9, 2015)

MediumRoastSteam said:


> Yep. I'm not saying what I think. I'm saying it because I tried it. And it doesn't work! 😂


 It stalls?


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## MediumRoastSteam (Jul 7, 2015)

Rob1 said:


> It stalls?


 It didn't for me Rob. I made a mini hopper with a Yogurt put on top of a wider PF funnel. It had like 100 grams of beans in total. It did its job, twice. No difference from normal operation. If you think about it, the disk would allow very little through anyway, but when I tried it, I tried without the disk. It never stalled.

What I found, however, was there was a lot of crushed beans around the burrs and grinds in the chamber. So, even though it technically works, there's a lot of exchange retention going on. I'll try to find a photo I took.


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## HVL87 (Dec 17, 2019)

Having decided on an espresso machine (I think), I'm also debating whether to buy a specialita now or pre-order a niche for Feb delivery. Having spoken to a certain retailer about an espresso machine purchase, they mentioned that Eureka will be releasing a grinder for single dosing which also has the option to use a hopper. They currently have a prototype, not sure on release date, maybe Q1 next year. Should be under £400 as much of the internals are the same as the specialita.


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## MediumRoastSteam (Jul 7, 2015)

HVL87 said:


> They currently have a prototype, not sure on release date, maybe Q1 next year. Should be under £400 as much of the internals are the same as the specialita.


 I heard the same... 😊.

For single dosing, at the price, at the moment, the Niche is great.


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## DavecUK (Aug 6, 2013)

HVL87 said:


> They currently have a prototype, not sure on release date, maybe Q1 next year. Should be under £400 as much of the internals are the same as the specialita.


 I may well be getting an early production model prior to release, for testing.


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## Rincewind (Aug 25, 2020)

2cups said:


> ...Funny that *Niche are still selling via the Indigogo page*, would have expected them to get something more permanent in place by now.


 mmmm you'd think so, especially after 16500 units shipped.....makes one wonder indeed why nothing permanent; as i see it 16500 is a roaring success.


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## allikat (Jan 27, 2020)

The solution they have works, and while their own website would look great, perhaps they don't actually want much more traffic. Given it's currently a 3 month lead time for orders, can you imagine if they did get a sparkly website and then told you it'd be a year or more as they'd had so many orders? Scaling things up that much costs a lot of money if they had to sort a web presence of their own and add the manufacturing capacity to back it up.


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## MediumRoastSteam (Jul 7, 2015)

Rumpelstiltskin said:


> mmmm you'd think so, especially after 16500 units shipped.....makes one wonder indeed why nothing permanent; as i see it 16500 is a roaring success.


 And you are leaving out all the units branded WPM which are sold in the Asian market. Also I think AU has a distributor and doesn't go via Indigogo either.

I am not sure, but in total I think by now the Niche Zero must have sold in excess of 30,000 units.


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