Tekton Double Impact Review

About 2 years ago I was in the market for some new speakers and came across some of the many reviews of the Tekton speakers.  I just couldn't do it, there were so many polarizing views on the speakers and I knew better than to let that stuff get to me BUT in this day and age, it's getting harder and harder to go into a retailer or another person home to test out speakers.  The WAF was also a must-have at that point in time and these failed that with force.......But I've always been a good shopper too, so the last few speakers I bought I purchased without listening to them before, I read and read and researched exhaustedly looking for input on the speakers.  if I didn't like them, then I would resell them for the same price or at least within a few hundred dollars and was happy with that, I like to live with the speakers and realize the downsides to that.

Here is a list of some of my past speakers to help you with my point of reference.

Thiel 3.6
Thiel 7.2
Onix Reference 1 & Referece 2
Onix Mini Strata
Klipsch Cornwall I & III
Klipsch Heresy I & II
Spatial Audio M3 Triode Masters (latest purchase and sale)

I was also in the business working for a company that designed custom home theaters and 2 channel listening rooms.  I was their head designer for 5 years and we were a dealer for Thiel, James, Totem, Velodyne, and many many others.

Back to the Tekton.

Instead of buying the Tektons Pendragon or Double Impact a few years ago, I went with Spatial Audio M3 Triode Masters instead.  I tried and tried to like them, I think it was my room as I could only pull them out about 2' from the back wall and they needed 3-4' easily to really open up.  There was no midrange, and really no bass either (again in my room) but did like the airy quality of the vocals and highs once I got the right equipment but I was missing too much and didn't enjoy my time with them and decided to sell them.

I was once again in the market for speakers, looking at some older classic speakers, Tyler Acoustics, Zu, and Tekton.  It's funny but I think seeing how the owners of Tekton speakers were getting treated made me want to look into them again because it was the same way back in the day with AV123 and their speakers (let's not even go there with what happened to the owner) which I enjoyed very much (the Onix line at least) and how people would rip into them for liking a DTC speaker with a very vocal and "interesting" owner.  So while shopping around I came across a pair of Double Impacts that were within driving distance and decided I couldn't go wrong in trying them in my room because if I didn't like them then it would be easy to resell.

I got home last night with the speakers and started to put them thru the paces and have been listening all day today while working too.

Here is my equipment.

Roon steaming to an iFi Zen Stream
Schiit Modius DAC
Schiit Freya + with all new tubes
Cherry amplifier X-CHerry 2 
u-turn turntable 

So nothing super out of control expensive and quite approachable for many people

First off, these speakers are ugly as sin, let's get that out of the way.  It's kind of ridiculous how big and "plain" looking they are.  The finish is "bleh" and nothing special at all, up close they almost look like they were spray-painted in a garage, maybe that's a bit harsh, they aren't that bad but that's the first thing that came to my mind.  The thing is though is that at the $3k price range you are either getting a furniture grade enclosure that doesn't sound all that great OR you get a speaker where more of the money went to research, design, and components and it doesn't look good.  I don't think the Golden Ear Triton is a good-looking speaker, that's probably one of the biggest competitors to these speakers if you ask me but I think (again my opinion and taste) they are not any better looking than the Tekton.

In all honesty though, who cares, I've NEVER heard a speaker that is so imposing just disappear into my room.  It's almost comical in just how imposing they are visually and how the sound is nothing like the look!  They remind me, in many ways, of my old Thiels from 15-20 years ago in how big the speaker is and yet how he sound is boarders on that "just how the hell is this possible" type of sound. These are full-range speakers, something else to think about when considering the size, they are this big because you can easily use these with no sub, like no need whatsoever.  They also remind me of the Thiels in that they are as transparent as anything I've ever listened to, it's made getting a sense of them a bit more difficult because songs I use to "review" speakers sounded so different from these DI's. 

One example of this was a record I like to play and not think about (you know what I mean, not be over-analytical and just enjoy) from Kevin Morby - City Music.  I was listening to it thinking "I don't like the vocals from these speakers" it sounded like he was singing into a can!  That was the first time I realized that there was a treatment to the vocals with either a lot of reverb or distortion (I'm not a recording engineer), I had never noticed it before in any of my other speakers.

Where these speakers just blew my mind was with The Wes Montgomery Trio album from Wes Montgomery.  Oh my......jazz guitar has never stirred my soul in such a way as what I was hearing from these monoliths. 

Right now I'm listening to Muddy Waters - Folk Singer.  I love this album for speaker tryouts because of how it's recorded, it's about as simple as can be and comes across that way with a stark empty background, Muddy Waters just right of center, drums to the far left, stand up bass just to the left and forward of the drums, and another guitar just right of Muddy.  That's all you get and it's all so immediate, clean, and clear.  It's quite magical.

I could go on and on with each song I heard, some felt like the first time but who wants to read all that.  I'm also not going to say these are "the greatest speakers under $10K!!!" and all that crap that's been said from people in the past, it's stupid and ridiculous BUT I have never heard a speaker under let's say maybe $5k, that sound as good as these.  It's really not a comment I should make but I think people respond well to that type of comparison.  

Highlights
Gorgeous full-range sound
Incredibly quick attack and decay
Midrange that's on the luscious side of things (which I like), it hits fast but with weight.
Airy, floating highs.
Deliver way above the price point.
Efficient
Transparent

Lows
Can be considered an ugly speaker, WAF is at an all-time low here people.
Boarder on too bright, because you want to play these at high volumes they can on certain recordings sound a tad too harsh and bright. 
Need to be out at least 18" or more from back walls because of the rear port, they can sound boomy without it and pulling these beasts out into your room makes them stand out even more.
Transparent - at this price point you could end up not liking the speakers if you don't have the right equipment or source quality.  

I need to play with positioning a bit more as I think I could get the soundstage to grow outward a bit more with the right amount of tweaking.

I'm keeping these, I truly feel that if I wanted to upgrade to better sound it would cost me double to triple what I paid ($2,700).  Are these the last set of speakers I'll ever need?  HELL NO!!!  Upgrade bug will hit one day but I could see myself with these for many years.

If you want to hear these speakers and are in the NorCal/NV area then my doors are open here in Reno.  If you haven't heard them before, please keep your comments to yourself but we know that's not going to happen so I'm not going to feed the bears this go around.

I truly felt that I was going into listening to these with the idea I would sell them or keep them and could care less about the outcome, I wanted to be as impartial as can be as I think a lot of this is mental.  I'm in the wine business and you can hand a normal blindfolded consumer a glass of room temp wine and they couldn't tell you the color of it even after tasting it, you see the color and you have preconceived ideas of how it will taste.  You see an expensive label and your brain tells you "you will like this!" 

Obviously, our hobby is the same way, you spend a bunch of money on a USB cable and guess what?!?! It sounds amazing!!!!  You want to like a product, you can make yourself like it.  I went into this like I would a blind tasting in the wine business, or at least as close as I could, and didn't have any preconceived ideas. 

I'm just glad I did it!