Tekton Lore Review with Measurements

[fuzz092888]

A review of the Tekton Lore with a measurement.

The Official $1,000 Speaker Evaluation / Home Audition Event Results - Home Theater Forum and Systems - HomeTheaterShack.com

 

[ImcLoud]

I read that this morning, lol....

I think out of all the speakers in the lineup I would choose the Lores, ooops, I did lol....

In all the tekton threads I say the same thing, they are a decent speaker, you can power with a refrigerator magnet and a small paperclip, they sound good, fill a large room effortlessly and look really good doing it... I'm not sure how they measure {even after looking at the graph, lol}, I have a feeling its not super flat, or even as flat as my 340se bookshelfs, but they sound good with music and honestly for the money I can't think of a better 2.0 set of towers for the price... For some reason live tracks sound life life, like I'm in the front row doing permanent hearing damage, and I only have a 40x2 tube amp pushing them...

I know some guys here are skeptical, but for the money in a "custom" tower, I don't think you can do better... Would I use them in a super critical music listening system, probably not, for a theater, probably not since you are going to cross them to a sub and there are better ht speakers out there for les, like my 340se's.. but for a low powered high volume, good looking system, sure, they will rock...

Plus you have to see them in person to appreciate the looks, I have a satin red, withred speaker cables, a red project carbon, and soon Im going to have my amp stand and maybe the faceplate of my amp coated red...

 

[shadyJ]

Those measurements are irrelevant since they were taken in-room. All that effort to get measurements, but who in the hell would care since they are mostly meaningless thanks to the way it was handled. Also on some of their results they were speculating that the speaker might have opened up more if they had a better amplifier. What, so 100 watts wasn't enough? It also hurts the credibility of their article when they describe an amplifier as 'airy'. If a amplifier is particularly airy, it is broken. Nonetheless, the subjective reviews do have me interested in hearing a pair of the Arx to see if they are as good as was reported.

 

[TheStalker]

In-room measurements have their purpose and in some ways are just as important as quasi-anechoic when evaluating a loudspeaker. Zaph Audio is a fan of that method and posts in-room measurements on his website and so does Stereophile. They paint an overall picture of the tone balance and where access, or lack of energy is present.

 

[fuzz092888]

Those measurements are irrelevant since they were taken in-room. All that effort to get measurements, but who in the hell would care since they are mostly meaningless thanks to the way it was handled. Also on some of their results they were speculating that the speaker might have opened up more if they had a better amplifier. What, so 100 watts wasn't enough? It also hurts the credibility of their article when they describe an amplifier as 'airy'. If a amplifier is particularly airy, it is broken. Nonetheless, the subjective reviews do have me interested in hearing a pair of the Arx to see if they are as good as was reported.

I think that the in room measurements mean a lot more than the other measurements we've seen since they have quite a bit of information on the listening room including reverb times.

 

[ImcLoud]

I think you guys are missing the point, they are comparing them speakers, so they were all measured in the same room, what way is better than that, they aren't looking to compare their measurements to others in other rooms, he was picking a set of speakers for that room, so why not measure there? Don't get me wrong, I have no idea what they mean, except that the flatter the better..

I know we talk about this to death, but honestly, the measurements don't mean anything to me when it comes to spending my money, I want to hear them in my room where I intend on placing them, then I want to compare them to others I like that fall in the budget... If I didn't like the sound of my lores, I would have returned them, sure it would have cost me $85 shipping but I would spend 10 times that before keeping something I don't like the sound of... Plus the pickings are slim when you get to the efficient stuff especially on a budget and its even harder if you want bass.....

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

For under $1K, I would personally get the NHT Absolute Zero for $175 each (sale price match) + A Rythmik LV12 for $589 shipped.

Even comes with grilles and customer support.

My brother has the NHT SuperZero in his 20' x 20' x 15' room and they sound awesomely loud and clear with his 50WPC HK AVR.

 

[gtpsuper24]

Those measurements are irrelevant since they were taken in-room. All that effort to get measurements, but who in the hell would care since they are mostly meaningless thanks to the way it was handled. Also on some of their results they were speculating that the speaker might have opened up more if they had a better amplifier. What, so 100 watts wasn't enough? It also hurts the credibility of their article when they describe an amplifier as 'airy'. If a amplifier is particularly airy, it is broken. Nonetheless, the subjective reviews do have me interested in hearing a pair of the Arx to see if they are as good as was reported.

Well he didn't do the write as a strict 3rd party review. He is doing this for himself and went about doing a very comprehensive writeup and see how they each perform in the room that they will be listened to in the end.

I totally agree about the amplifier comment and I myself have never heard those things in different amps, airy, tight, ect.... And I run the Arx A5s off a Parasound A23 Halo amp and heard no difference between that and the Onkyo receiver.

I think you would be very impressed with the Arx speakers, definitely competitive with all the other ID brands.

 

[ski2xblack]

It also hurts the credibility of their article when they describe an amplifier as 'airy'. If a amplifier is particularly airy, it is broken.

I totally agree about the amplifier comment and I myself have never heard those things in different amps, airy, tight, ect....

You guys are not taking into account the test were conducted using tube processors, er, amplification. I would agree that it does severely reduce applicability of the results. The 'air' and reported resonance bass peaks would likely have been different had they used a plain old ss amp, and that may have resulted in different final preferences. Who knows, as they followed the idiosyncratic, personal preference route on system setup. I'll give them credit for going to such lengths as it clearly took a lot of work. Lord knows I would never do that unless I was getting paid for my time and effort.

 

[Chu Gai]

You guys are not taking into account the test were conducted using tube processors, er, amplification. I would agree that it does severely reduce applicability of the results. The 'air' and reported resonance bass peaks would likely have been different had they used a plain old ss amp, and that may have resulted in different final preferences. Who knows, as they followed the idiosyncratic, personal preference route on system setup. I'll give them credit for going to such lengths as it clearly took a lot of work. Lord knows I would never do that unless I was getting paid for my time and effort.

Whether the results would have been different had they used your stereotypical SS amp is pretty unclear. A lot depends on the output impedance of the amp, which is a function of frequency and possibly output level, as well as the impedance profile of the speakers. Distortion is a contributory factor too but it may be sufficiently low as to be a non-issue. Stereophile has reviewed at least one amp from that company along with measurements which those interested can look up but extrapolating or extending those findings to the rest of their line would be a leap of faith.

Perhaps a more significant factor in their overall selection is the tweeter Arx uses which I think restricts the vertical dispersion somewhat. While they did treat the room, I'm assuming the ceiling wasn't done.

 

[jinjuku]

So if the Arx came in first why is the thread about the Tektons?

 

[LiveJazz]

^ I think because it's one of the few (only?) places where the Lore's frequency response measurements have been published, making it a unique review, even though it wasn't the winning speaker.

 

[gtpsuper24]

Perhaps a more significant factor in their overall selection is the tweeter Arx uses which I think restricts the vertical dispersion somewhat. While they did treat the room, I'm assuming the ceiling wasn't done.

Yes I think planar and ribbon tweeters in general restricts the vertical dispersion and reduces reflections from floor and ceilings. But really none of them came out losers and all seemed fairly close in comparison except the HTD which from what I read had mismatched tweeters and that reflects kind of poorly on their QC.

 

[lsiberian]

You guys are not taking into account the test were conducted using tube processors, er, amplification. I would agree that it does severely reduce applicability of the results. The 'air' and reported resonance bass peaks would likely have been different had they used a plain old ss amp, and that may have resulted in different final preferences. Who knows, as they followed the idiosyncratic, personal preference route on system setup. I'll give them credit for going to such lengths as it clearly took a lot of work. Lord knows I would never do that unless I was getting paid for my time and effort.

Um they do get paid not a lot mind you, but they do certainly get paid something.

 

[fuzz092888]

Um they do get paid not a lot mind you, but they do certainly get paid something.

Did it say so in any of the threads? I know part of the reason Sonnie did this was because he was looking to buy a pair of the winners and he did indeed buy the Arx A5's after they won.

 

[lsiberian]

Did it say so in any of the threads? I know part of the reason Sonnie did this was because he was looking to buy a pair of the winners and he did indeed buy the Arx A5's after they won.

I worked for HTS a couple years ago until I got too busy and had to step down. We didn't make a lot, but we did get a nice check around Christmas for our efforts. Since I was doing what I enjoyed already I view it as a great gesture. AH fits my personality better than HTS.

 

[TLS Guy]

If you look at the scale, the mid band response of the Lores is +/- 12 db!

 

[slipperybidness]

If you look at the scale, the mid band response of the Lores is +/- 12 db!

Of course, in-room measurements so it makes it tough to judge by that alone.

But yeah, +/- 12dB, ooooof

 

[jcl]

I didn't think the measurements for any of the speakers looked terribly impressive. Seems a little strange as the room has treatments, but perhaps not bass traps.

 

[Dennis Murphy]

Of course, in-room measurements so it makes it tough to judge by that alone.

But yeah, +/- 12dB, ooooof

Tough indeed. A lot of these speakers were 2-ways or 2.5's with no crossovers in the 200-800 Hz range, yet there is a huge variation in the response of the various speakers in this region. I'm not sure exactly how these measurements were made, but it looks like they're being influenced by the position of the speakers and/or the height of the woofers. Note also that the winning speaker had an overall variation greater than the Lore's, including a huge suck out in the 1 kHz region. I really doubt that a standard 1-meter anechoic measurement would show that kind of behavior. It looks like some kind of cancellation effect that might go away at a slightly different position or measurement angle. Finally, just about all of the speakers measured smoother in the upper treble than is usual in an anechoic measurement. There must be lots of smoothing going on, or the room is swallowing up those variations. I dunno. I think they need a better measuring system.