I’m sure there were high-end speakers made ingeniously and with exacting standards that warranted high prices and reverence by the community back then, but to look at tear downs of many of the speakers shown in here, I find it difficult to believe that there was really all that much justification for very high prices.

Particle board, paper cones, magnets, simple circuits. Or improved materials and gold plated contracts. Solid wood with nice wood grain stained and chrome or flat black fasteners.

Sure, R&D, scarcity of some materials, labor costs for hand made components. There’s some justification there. Some. But not all that much compared to how products are made in any industry.

Worth $300? $3000? $30,000 a pair?

Hmmm.

  • John_Crypto_Rambo@alien.topBEnglish
    1·
    10 months ago

    Speakers have generally become smoother, more 3-dimensional and much smaller. This means that they are less dynamic on the whole and rather toy like compared to good stuff from the 60s and 70s. Unlike electronics, miniaturization is not a good thing with loudspeakers. There is no substitute for size and horsepower. Nothing much has changed with the laws of physics in the last 100 years so what it takes to make dynamic life-like sound is unchanged. There have been some advances in magnet materials and a bunch of progress in adhesives but not much else.

    ~Greg Timbers, JBL legend

    As I sit here in awe of my new to me JBL 4311 speakers I have to agree. I’ve never heard anything remotely as good as these.