Tekton Ulfberht 3.1 System

[Shimei]

Hello, 

 

Sharing my newly setup Tekton Ulfberht system. This has been my long anticipated system [end game to justify the costs] as I've waited nearly a year to move into my new home. I've been listening to the system now for 3 days. The system consists of: 

 

1. Onkyo PR-RZ5100
2. Onkyo DXC390 6 Disc CD Changer
3. Emotiva XPA Gen 3 5 Channel
4. Tekton Ulfberht L + C + R
5. Tekton 4-10 Subwoofer
6. Sony XBR-65A8G OLED
7. Sony UBP-X700 DVD/Blue Ray 4K player

The amplifier made by Emotiva is an XPA-5 Gen 3 5 Channel [490 watts/channel RMS into 4 Ohms; two channels driven]. The amp is configured to run 4 channels into 4 ohms to the Left and Right Ulfberht towers in Bi-amp mode from the Onkyo Preamp. The last or 5th channel by the Emotiva amp runs the Ulfberht center channel [4 6.5 inch and 5 speaker compression array matched to the Ulfberhts]. Connecting everything source wise are HDMI [ARC] and XLR balanced cables. Subwoofers, besides the L and R tower's 4 12 inch woofers is complemented by Tekton's 4-10 which is an active design [300 watts rms] housing 4 10" subs equaling the same displacement as 1 single 18" driven from 20hz to 120hz. Calibrating everything is the AccuEQ Room built in calibration of the Onkyo PR-RZ5100.

 

In just a few days I am totally captivated by the breathtaking soundstage which despite the sheer size of the Tekton Ulfberhts disappear in the music. This is the first time I've actually listened first hand to Eric Anderson's patented compression array consisting of two 7 speaker compression drivers above and below one tweeter of each tower. Each tower also consists of 4 7" mid drivers and 2 12" woofers. The 55 speaker system disappears before the listener as the towers are powered in the 3 channel system which has a toed in position and distance separation of 14.7 feet between the L and R. I decided to begin with an equal triangle of 14 feet 7 inches between not only the two towers but also between them to the listener's ears. The house has vaulted ceilings and hard flooring so to say that the sound is lively currently is an understatement. As things are moved in namely plants trees etc to the open floor spacing sound dispersion will follow. In the future I'm pretty sure I'll be experimenting with sound absorption/dampening panels that are both effective as well as cosmetically appealing [form and function].

 

Visually, video wise I installed the Sony 65" A8G OLED which I have to fine tune. Looking for any recommendations of personal tweaked settings etc. 

 

 

 

[Shimei]

2 hours ago, coot said:

How do you keep kitty from clawing the grilles?

 

So far so good but in the event they start clawing the grills I'll replace the speaker cloth with a metal mesh. 

 

2 hours ago, coot said:

sn't it bass-heavy in the left? Not only due to a corner being only on that side, but you placed the sub also on the left.

 

Bass heavy? No, bass, mid, highs etc are in proportion [flat]. Does the bass get really loud? Yes, but in proportion to the midrange and highs. I may build a custom rack and move the subwoofer and add 3 more 4-10s for a total of 16 ten inch subwoofers. 

 

 Below certain frequencies @coot sound is not directional as you probably know. I've only had this system set up now for a few days. I'll be experimenting with placement and sound absorption such as bass traps in the corner. As for now the AccuEQ built into the Onkyo Pre-amp "sounds" as though it is doing a fine job. Later on I'll do some manually tweaking but for now I'm just acclimating to the towers whose sound will change as the speakers break in. 

 

Enjoy!

And thanks for your inquiry,

William

[Shimei]

2 hours ago, coot said:

I plan to get a pair of Moabs but I have cats who would ruin cloth grilles in no time so will make some perforated steel grilles.

Folks seem to be pretty happy with Tektons.

 

That's exactly my plan too, that is, steel or other material grills. Long as the steel doesn't "ring" I'd actually like a transparent look. 

 

2 hours ago, coot said:

Just one more question: What made you think the Ulfs need more bass? Did you hear them before buying the sub? Just curious.

 

What made me want more bass is the "shock factor!" when guest demo the system. The system already has a percussion you can feel in your chest whenever a kick drum hits or an explosion while watching a movie. I know I won't be happy though until I can get the hair standing up on the back of guest's necks.  I debated on a pair of Tekton 21" but decided to go smaller but more in quantity to equal the displacement for tight tight control. And, the 4-10s are active so no more amplifier channels are needed. 

 

Enjoy,

William

[Shimei]

2 hours ago, firedog said:

I've always wanted to hear Tektons but don't have anywhere I could audition them. 

 

I'm in Nampa Idaho. If you are ever in the area let me know 🙂

[Shimei]

On 12/3/2019 at 3:27 PM, coot said:

I plan to get a pair of Moabs but I have cats who would ruin cloth grilles in no time so will make some perforated steel grilles.

Folks seem to be pretty happy with Tektons.

 

I spoke too soon! Curiosity got to my cats and now there's a blemish on the cloth speaker grill. I just contacted a supplier that offers acoustical metal mesh sheets of various designs for speaker grills. I think the best way to have these made will be to take the sheets and stock grills [to use the frames] to sheet metal fabricator. I'm sure they can bend the sheet metal around the stock frames to make them perfect. In case you're interested or in need of a supplier for the sheets: 

https://metlx.com/markets/speaker-grilles/

[Shimei]

On 12/16/2019 at 9:06 PM, tmtomh said:

Wow, that's some system! Glad you are enjoying it - it's very satisfying to have one's "end-game" setup.

 

One question: are you considering an acoustic absorption or dispersion measures? Like a rug on the floor, fabric window coverings, additional fabric pillows on the sofas and/or acoustic panels? Just curious.

I'm trying other means of sound dispersion at this time. Simply adding objects which are meant to break up sound waves such as trees etc. Here's a pic of some placed in front of the windows minus the Christmas tree. 

 

[Shimei]

Added two Atmos speakers ontop of the Ulfs. Now the system is 3.1.2. Noticed a slight rise in the sound stage during Atmos playback but it's not working as intended due to vaulted ceilings. I observe the sound stage rises rather than the presence of an object overhead. Added wife for perspective in order to show how tall these speakers are. My wife was concerned after the photograph was taken that she may not be the center of attention after having taken the photo. 

 

[Shimei]

On 12/16/2019 at 9:06 PM, tmtomh said:

One question: are you considering an acoustic absorption or dispersion measures? Like a rug on the floor, fabric window coverings, additional fabric pillows on the sofas and/or acoustic panels? Just curious.

 

I believe in form and function. Something may have function but if the thing is blatantly ugly then I reject it. I mean I could egg crate the whole room etc. Ya gotta draw a line and most often my wife tells me when I've crossed it. I thought about going with Acoustical panels like this but I'm almost where I want to be now without them. I'm supplying the below link because these sound panels clearly have form as well as function.

 

Enjoy,m

Shim

 

https://www.soundandvision.com/content/home-theater-puts-acoustics-front-and-center

[Shimei]

Finally pulled the grills off for some dusting. Pictures of Tekton's "battleship mode". 

 

 

[Shimei]

23 minutes ago, firedog said:

I've always wanted to hear some Tektons. Like the concept. Your system looks insane without the grills.  Like you got it from the Borg Collective from Star Trek (and I mean insane in a good way!). 

 

Thanks, 

 

We live in an open floor plan house so on one end are the Ulfs and on the other end is the kitchen. I just had the kitchen cabinets sprayed the Ulf color "silver half dollar" in order to pull the entire living space together. 

 

If you're ever in the Nampa Idaho area let me know [18 minutes from Boise airport]. We can arrange a demo. 

 

Enjoy,

William

 

[Shimei]

Trying my hand at reviewing as well as amateur blogging. If you're interested in some of my reviews of Tekton products:

 

https://www.disqus.social/

https://www.disqus.social/2020/02/review-tekton-design-ulfberht.html

https://www.disqus.social/2020/02/review-tekton-design-4-10-subwoofer.html

[Shimei]

On 3/2/2020 at 9:13 PM, coot said:

Hey William-

I am impressed! Not just by your setup, but by your writing talent. I like your style, man. Your humor make this a good read. Looking forward to more!

Thanks! I actually began working on the review again after having several months with the Ulfberhts. The article review is a work in progress, I'm taking a different angle while having fun as an amateur reviewer: 

 

https://www.disqus.social/2020/09/review-tekton-design-ulfberhts.html

[Shimei]

On 9/25/2020 at 10:59 AM, coot said:

Hi William,

Nice progress on the system. I like the dark/light absorbent pieces on the wall behind - reminiscent of piano keys. 

Re: Kitty

I see no damage to the grilles or sub speaker surrounds. How do you keep kitty from clawing those? The temptation must be strong.

 

-Al

An abrupt NO! if "they" dare even look upwards before the mighty towers. Also there's a tall clawing post nearby. 

The newest guy Asher is already trained and seemingly understands his claws are only to come out on his clawing post.

Kinda funny in that both Asher and Abigail come running no matter where they are in the house to the prime listening position when they hear the click of the system powering on. Both will lay down and listen while falling asleep. I mean, it's every time. Guess the system passes the feline listening test! 

 

 

 

Seen below is Asher after he was kicked off the couch so I could take a picture from center. 

 

[Shimei]

Here's an updated picture of the room treatment as I begin making way up the left side wall. I'm going to need round 8 more panels I think to finish up the walls. Then I may begin removable/hanging panels for window coverings and the television for those critical listening times.  

 

[Shimei]

5 hours ago, Ben-M said:

Hi Will. Thanks for posting up all the pictures and detailing your journey with the Ulfberhts. I'm also awaiting a new home to be built and I've pretty much desided on the Ulfberhts for my combination music/entertainment room. My home won't be done for another 2 years in order to line up with a few other schedules, so I've got a bit of time to figure out the details. I already got in touch with Eric about the build several months ago and I'll be getting back in touch with him in another few months to work out some more details. 

 

I wanted to ask a couple questions:

1. I am also reading up on your blog. What are the top binding/grounding looking posts on the back of the Ulfberhts? Shown here, above the binding posts:

 

2. How are things going soundwise with your Be tweeter swap?

When I connected with Eric before, we discussed putting a ribbon/AMT tweeter in the Ulfberhts in place of the standard Scanspeak one you also removed. He has already done that for another couple clients with good results. And in my case, I got hooked on AMT tweeters about 3-4 years ago and wanted to see if Eric would go for it, which he agreed to and said they'll be at least as good as the Scanspeaks from a performance perspective. Those AMTs are bigger then regular dome tweters, though, so I'm interested to see what Eric may have to do about the physical size of the speakers. 

 

Hi Ben, 
The top terminals are for resistors to tame the high frequency tweeter. I haven't experimented myself but was curious how a potentiometer might fare there offering variable resistance to tune. 

The Be tweeters are absolutely beautiful sounding. I made the upgrade myself replacing the stock Scanspeak softdome w/ the Be Illuminator from ScanSpeak est $500.00 ea). After about ten hours of break in the Be became rather "hot" and needed taming down. I decided to use the MiniDSP to achieve this, but do recommend your route by contacting Eric and having your tweeter of choice installed and tuned by him through the crossovers. For me, this was highly impractical given the sheer size of the Ulfberhts, that is, having to package them back up and send them back to Tekton by Semi-Truck to be fitted w/ custom crossovers for the ScanSpeaks. Eric does offer different Bes w/ crossovers from Satori. 

As to how the Bes sound they reproduce high hats, cymbals, etc w/ a realism I never personally heard before. I am not positive about how low the high frequency tweeter in the 15 tweeter MTM begins rolling on but speculate bout 3500hz. At such frequency w/out proper crossovers for the Bes or equalization I found that certain artists began speaking w/ a lisp ..... rolling off a little sizzle from the end of their tongue. After equalization such went away and now I'm in love with the realism reproduced through the Bes. Mind you the Tekton Ulfberht MTM array w/ all soft domes were incredible to begin w/. Before the upgrade I seriously pondered whether they could be made better and even now have a difficult time expressing the value of $1500.00 just to replace three tweeters in the LCR MTM arrays. 

Enjoy,
William

[Shimei]

4 hours ago, Ben-M said:

Thanks for the feedback on both fronts, Will. That's interesting that they're for resistors to flavour the highs. I haven't looked into it, but I haven't see any Tekton owners talking much about that. That seems like a prime Tweekers Delight opportunity~

 

I don't know enough bout the terminals to hook anything up [safe ranges etc]. Terry London mentioned them briefly in his review just stating that they accept resistors to tame a hot sounding amp. As delivered the Ulfberhts were incredible as delivered and only became better after breaking in. Owners not tweaking the speakers might be testimony of how good these speakers sound as is. I think a lot of people see the Be price tag and out of curiosity want to try them. I mean, installing them myself I can easily go back to the stock soft domes. The Bes are definitely different sounding, however, different isn't always better. From what I hear [unconfirmed], Eric held out on releasing Be upgrades at first, allegedly not being sold on the Bes. I suspect sometimes a company may offer things [design and parts] according to customer demand and not always based on what they find best. Anyhow, I enjoy the Be tweeters. 

Look forward to hearing from you and your experience w/ the Ulfs should your purchase fall into place. 

 

Enjoy,

William

[Shimei]

On 12/1/2021 at 8:25 AM, Ben-M said:

Hey Will, I'm still kicking around the Ulfberht scene, getting ready to move into the new house in about 10 months and that'll be when I get my pair. Fingers crossed. 

 

But, I saw on one of the other forums that it must have been you that listed your custom, white Ulfberht Center channel, and I'm not sure if I also saw your 4-10 subs listed too? 

 

What happened there? I'm putting my Ulfberhts into my combo basement home theater/rec room and I need to put them into the 7.2.4 Atmos setup as the Fronts, which I also have to get a Center channel for and have been told to do my best to make sure the Center and the Fronts are the same line, if possible. 

Just listed my Tekton Ulfberhts and 4-10s for sale if you might be interested: https://www.avsforum.com/threads/for-sale-tekton-design-ulfberhts-and-dual-4-10-subwoofers.3227384/