Zu Omen or Tekton Lore

05-07-11: Gpowered
Now, from your “to the point” review, it is obvious that the Lore gets the edge, but can you tell me, is the differences you are talking about extremely obvious, or subtle?"

In my small room with 'mellow' music, the differences were what I would call subtle. But even in my room when I started to rock out a bit the differences became more pronounced. In the larger room as we pushed the speakers harder I would call them obvious.

"Also, interesting there are these differences, since both speakers use the SAME Eminence driver! Zu modifies it by cutting out the whizzer cone and installing its proprietary phase plug. Were you aware of this???"

You mean the big silver thing hanging off the front? Yeah, I was aware LOL!
The fact that they use the same driver and they sound so different was a surprise to me. What do I know about speaker design? Not much because I didn't realize that the cabinet would make such a total difference.

The other thing I didn't hit on was the highs. One of the guys that was there has a music background (played in numerous bands) and commented on the highs a lot. He said that with the Lores he could tell how close to the bell the drummer was hitting the cymbal or high hat, and that he could hear differences in each strike. He said with the Omens it just sounded like a stick hitting a cymbal.

As I have them back in my room, back in familiar environment, I'm also hearing a lot more imaging. The Katz are probably the best speakers I've had in here for projecting a holographic image, and I'm getting some of that with the Lores. Keep in mind that I've only had the Lores for about a week and I have only started to fine tune positioning so I'm hopeful that that will come. It took me a few weeks to get the Katz dialed in (I got a job and a family you know).

05-07-11: Telescope_trade
Hi,

Just want to make one observation regarding the Omens.
First, when I had the regular Omens ( I now have Omen Defs)
I found that the height of the spikes made a difference in the sound of the speaker (mostly in the bass) in that if to low or to high, it could make the bass less solid, and a tad ragged sounding, and it could sound a bit congested."

Telescope - I agree. I went through great pains to get the spikes to where I thought they were best in my room (about 4 weeks worth). I have the speakers on the carpet spikes tilted up slightly in front. I did mention to the guys that that might be a contributor since we did not re-do that in the new room. And I agree that the Omens are more likely to be problematic with placement, etc.
But - As the Omens were optomized to my room, and I heard the same things from them vs. the Lore in the new room, I believe that tweaking the Omens would probably have brought about only an incremental improvement. I could be wrong. I'd love to keep comparing, but these suckers are heavy and I just want to listen to music.

"Also, interesting there are these differences, since both speakers use the SAME Eminence driver!"

Actually I think we need to be careful here. My understanding is that there are in fact differences between the main driver on the Lore and the main driver on the Omen. What the exact differences are and how significant they are I don't know, but per the Zu website they use a Zu260FRD/G4 on the Omen. When I spoke to Eric he did say that the drivers were not the same. I am looking at them both and there may be other differences besides the color.
I think it's safe to say they are similar but not the same.

Hi to all, I'm the guy with the room and bad sounding amp that Sebrof and Slowgeezr commented on for the Zu Omen vs Tekton Lore shootout! Maybe it's time for a tube amp? ;-)

Not too much to say here since their comments mirror my sentiments, but here's my 2 cents for what its worth.

Lows: The Lores didn't quite capture the lowest lows as did the Omens, but what they did on the bottom end, they did exquisitely. And while the Omens went a bit lower, I believe they sacrificed lower and mid-low end clarity in the process, almost as if the driver was too busy to manage it all. Maybe there is only so much freq range you can cover effectively with a full range driver?

Highs: For the highs, the Omens sounded great, but could not match the little nuances portrayed beautifully via the Lores. For example, with the Lores, I could easily tell where on the ride cymbal the drummer was playing. With the Omens, you just couldn't hear that level of detail - another point for the Lores.

Sounds stage: Wont go into it here, both Sebrof and Slowgeezr covered it perfectly.

Net: Lores win handily - highs, lows and everything in between. It's quite refreshing to see that you can still get fantastic sounding AND very efficient speakers without breaking the bank. Kudos to both companies. Sebrof - Feel free to drop off the either pair, but if I could decide, make it the Lores! :-)

re: "I think it's safe to say they are similar but not the same."

Agreed! They are both Eminence and appear to be very similar but I see now they are a different color and part so I just want to apologize to everyone if that was misleading.