What makes speaker's sound big?

When talking about sounding big that usually translates to full extended bass. Powered subs are your friends there. Big = powerful and the bass is where most of the power in music occurs. It takes exponentially more power to deliver flat response as the frequency decreases and that power must be converted to long wavelength sound waves so that pretty much explains it. Tiny drivers/speakers alone are more challenged to deliver full extended bass and all fall short alone to some extent.

This is a great subject and one I have thought about, or wrestled with for some time. Thanks for all the very good views and thoughts expressed.

I owned Martin Logan SL3s as primary audio speakers for 16 years and loved the immersion. I equally agree with getting that from Maggies! And I think it is the bi-pole nature that does help in that aspect.   I moved finally to Dynaudio Sapphires and they were a much larger sound than any of my conventional coned dynamic speakers. Yes, "horsepower" (good one!)

But the brand I'm living with now are Raidhos and although the D2s won't do what the much larger ones will do I still love the tonality and rich clarity plus tight bass to near 30. But, to enlarge that sound I have dialed in an REL Britannia B1 at 28Hz and low volume and it opens up large halls.

There are lots of great inexpensive powered subs that will integrate better than most of years ago, and they uncannily open up everything for a subjectively larger sound.   It's almost stunning that a simple $1k SVS SB-3000 is pretty much the equal of the B1 (or better?) at 1/3 the price. Unreal. Maybe that is one of the least expensive ways of getting 'bigger sound'.  Fun topic.

'Di-polar' on the Martin Logans and Magneplaners. Oops, more coffee.

Stay with tekton, add some subs, two at least, avoid filters if you have them, make sure your amp plugged in to the wall, jump into middle and bass highliting cables and tubes if you have them, try to seal other rooms in your house, just close all the doors when listening. 

Clean SPL (in your room),  Clean Bass Extension,  Your eyes.

Everything else is just meaningless fluff.

You can either achieve a desired SPL, at your listening location, over a desired frequency range, in an undistorted fashion or you cannot.


That SPL is a factor of "total" speaker efficiency, amplifier power, speaker power handling, and room acoustics. I used the word "total" as outside bass frequencies, speakers are directional, and while say a bipolar may have lower on axis response, its total energy at a given frequency may be high, and what gets to your listening position is a combination of direct and reflected.  Have a large room, reflections have a longer path, and energy is less. You are also likely seated farther, so again, less power reaches you.

Note I don't mention speaker size? That is an implementation variable contributing to efficiency, no more, no less, though one can argue if wider range, it does effect doppler distortion but that is getting advanced.

Odds are the Double Impact has a bit more base extension and depending and while their 98db efficiency is likely over stated, they would be more efficient than the B&W, so you are going to need to turn them up.  The bass extension, depending on the music could have a big impact on your impression. That could also be a factor of location as well. Did you use exactly the same placement for each?  Other reviews of the tweeter array show the Tekton having good dispersion so their could be more mid-band energy as well, again filling out the sound.  The tuning of the B&W also looks like it is getting less reinforcement from the port, so if the speakers are close to the front wall, the Tekton may give more bass reinforcement w.r.t. the B&W.