Speakers for newbie

Considering the size of your room, I recommend the Tekton Lore. The Marantz receiver should drive this speaker extremely well, and create a very wide dynamic range due to its high sensitivity.

part of the fun is to go out and listen to as many pr of speakers as you can. Talk is cheap, people that recommend Tekton, I doubt that they've even seen a pr of Tekton in person, nevermind even listen to a pair. I've never heard of Tekton until few weeks ago in another forum due to issues with the owner, and delay with orders, so you might as well avoid them.

Talk is cheap, people that recommend Tekton, I doubt that they've even seen a pr of Tekton in person, nevermind even listen to a pair.

Sorry, not the case here as I have a friend that has a pair of Lores. Appears that the delay is due to high demand,

http://tektondesign.wordpress.com/
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05-29-13: Philjolet
GoldenEar have gotten rave reviews in the mags

I have heard both the GoldenEar Triton Twos and the stand-mounted Aon 3's.

While the Triton 3's are too much money at $3K, the Aon 3's come right in at the OP's budget at $999/pair. I heard them just this past February and they are fantastic at that price point--linear, clean, bass extension and clarity you wouldn't expect from that size enclosure, yet they would have no trouble filling an 18x22 room. Their specs rate them as 8-ohm compatible. They also put out 89 dB at 1w input, so your receiver should be OK with them.

Frankly, however, the Aon 3's are so good you'd do well to move your electronics slightly up to the Marantz PM8004 integrated amp. *That* would be a great match.

The Aon 3's are excellent in several ways, but the one that really distinguishes them at this price is their excellent motion transformer ribbon tweeter. It is so smooth and clean without the usual overshoot and ringing we have become so accustomed to in dome tweeters. Normally, you just don't get a ribbon tweeter with treble extension out to 35 Khz and no inertia artifacts in a $1K pair of speakers, but the GoldenEar Aon 3 *really* delivers.

GoldenEar has many authorized dealers across the country, so auditioning them shouldn't be difficult and is highly recommended before you buy anything.

my point is that telling a newbie to buy a pr of internet direct speakers is not a good advise. Do you know Tekton's return policy? 15% restocking fee and you have to pay return shipping, and "Returned speakers must be in new condition – no signs of damage or abuse, including scratches, fingerprints, dust, etc. " this is a line directly from their website. good luck getting your money back if they find a speck of dust or "etc" on them.