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I don't have an Onyx hub (yet?) but I remember an old Shimano hub I had that was near silent. When I switched it to a Hope I found out I'd been using the sound of my tyres to help me gauge traction. The Hope buzz took that information away from me, and I missed it.

I had the Onyx to on my Dreadnought. Unreal rolling speed. The engagement is instant, it has to be less than a degree, a fraction of a degree. No complaints, I’d buy again if I was looking for the instant engagement feel.

while i personally don't own one (yet), the people i know that have them do quite like them, and I haven't heard reports of any issues from them. they do describe it as a soft engagement as others have mentioned. supposedly the box one stealth hubs are much more of a firm engagement (they use a one way roller bearing). however as far as i can tell those hubs are essentially vaporware, they were announced a couple years back, but i've yet to see them available for sale. side note: box had acquired the stealth design from True Precision I...

I have two sets. I ride technical trials-like trails too, I like them for that. The softness you mentioned I think of as a feature and is really very slight, IE a fraction of a degree. Coupled with the noiseless coasting the slight initial softness helps the bike feel quiet instead of having freehub pauls catch hard. They engage very solidly. Like anything, they require maintenance. The Kluber spindle grease is crazy expensive, and the parts aren’t cheap either. I had to replace a sprag clutch assembly on on set of my hubs as the cage holding the sprags had...