Quote Originally Posted by Woochifer
Did you read the rest of my post? Paradigm does NOT outsource their drivers (except for the tweeters on their entry level models), nor do they make OEM drivers for anyone else. They make ALL of their own drivers for the Monitor series model that got pulled apart in that article you cited. You cannot place a dollar value or do a qualitative assessment of components that are unavailable to the general public except as part of a finished product. It just seems curious and unsubstantiated to me how those arbitrary dollar values got assigned to those particular drivers.
Well IMO maybe they should buy good drivers rather than make their own. The previous owner implied that once taken apart the materials in the drivers are cheap. Of course none of the costs necessarily mean much since you can buy Vifa and Scanspeak drivers for well under $100.00. The Alnico drivers on the top of the line AN E is supposedly the best ddriver available from anyone on the planet and even they are ~$500.00 a driver(which is still the retail proice to the DIYer. The speakers are $20k. There is more to a speaker than the woofer/tweeter and crossover.

most speakers at $500.00 have no more than $50.00 worth of materials including the cabinet. This SNB surprising to anyone and it applies to mostly every product sold on the market. It's a matter of what the market will pay which drives the price.