(I still think soft cork is not the best material to be mounting binding posts in though. A metal/porcelain/wood end cap with a cork or rubber seal would have been better.)

That said, all of the components used to build the speaker would likely run you about $40-60 dollars, with the exception of the ceramic enclosure which im guessing he also got a sweet deal on. $500 bucks is way too much to ask for a questionably designed speaker system. You can buy a T-amp in an aluminum enclosure for about 30-40 bucks on ebay which likely uses the exact same electrical components as this and a for another 100-200 dollars you can buy or build your own speakers which would blow these out of the water.

I’d love to see where someone could get custom made ceramic chambers for $2.50/ea; you can barely get cheap terracotta flower pots for that and these look a lot more complex, heavier, are a more durable material, and are made in much smaller than million-lot batches. Even Wal-mart grade mass produced ceramic pots are $20+.

Plywood is cheap, working with it is not. Do you look at a $551 Eames molded plywood chair and say “that’s no more than $2 worth of materials. I wouldn’t pay more than $4.”

But really it all boils down to this: you can’t break a design piece down to its component materials and slap a price tag on it. The truth is that this is a striking looking piece, and that’s worth a lot to people with any aesthetic sense. If your house isn’t full of $5 plastic chairs and milk crates, then you’ve paid way beyond materials cost for something based upon its looks.

Of course BB can post about them, but I hope I can also say that they’ve been covered to death almost everywhere, to the point that it’s begun to smell like spam.

Kickbacks (not that I’m suggesting that here) or successful marketing/lobbying? I don’t know.

The only thing worse than the protracted, saturated coverage is the cheap-ass-looking plywood stands. Kinda undermines the whole aesthetic, if you ask me.

but I imagine it was fun to build as was his tea kettle!

Available in “natural finish,” and I’m sure as hell going to respect Eames and Herman Miller’s design decisions long before yours. (No offense intended, of course!)

Can’t use plastic (cause it connotes cheap?) lets plunk a chunk of wood down for the volume control! Can’t be bothered to cast a piece of aluminum for that.

The on/off switch is in the back of the control unit with a bright blue LED contributing to someone’s insomnia. How fast did bright blue LEDS go out of style?

The control unit tries for the brushed aluminum esthetic but has cheap easy (and steel) phillips screws interrupting every face of brushed aluminum.

Oh your control unit needs more heft… Add a slug of cast iron to the base!

Everything going into or out of the control unit can’t be centered either. You can’t even center the volume control!

Pink PAIRS of wires ending in banana plugs? The receptacles for some of those banana plugs are jammed into cork in the back of the speakers?

The ceramic, the drivers, and their stands look O.K. but everything else is a design failure. Easy choices that make for a bad design. Seriously a design that would fail in a sophomore industrial design class.

I am a non-audiophile, so maybe this is a beginner’s error, but notice that volume knob doesn’t go to 11.

However, I think your numbers generally miss the mark: standard Tang Band drivers alone retail for about your suggested price.

Also, you didn’t need to disclose that you’re an engineer. As soon as you suggested that manufacturing is 100 percent of operating expenses, it became quite obvious!

You’re looking at a minimal cost of materials as far as any sort of wood goes. He could’ve used Mun Ebony and charged the same. Granted they are his speakers, his design, his choices, I’m not gonna say he’s “wrong” but my two cents is that he could’ve sprung for some solid maple.

Why not make a nice 5 piece laminate if your own? It just seems like a strange choice.

for my opion, there are too many different materials (and therefore too many colours, surface structures) used in the design. a more minimalistic version and reworked sizes of some parts (slider knob – or a rotary knob for better handling from distance, thinner cables, smaller ports, cables from amp going hidden from the back, no blue leds!) could make a solid product.

im also interested in frequency response, resonance freqs and other audio tests.

greetings and my full respect for your work!
marc.

He has NOT offered these up for review or accomodated requests to review these from any blog or publication that specializes in audio.

I wonder why?

It’s amazing to me that so many people are missing the point of this review which is: if you like the looks of this product, but are afraid that it’s going to sound terrible, don’t worry. The review isn’t about trying to argue that the looks of this should be aesthetically appealing to everyone. It’s not trying to argue that this is the last word in fidelity or even that it’s the best sound at the price point.

It’s in the article itself, “People are going to buy them because of the looks, and then worry about whether the audio quality lives up to the price tag. So, does it? It does, so long as you’re happy paying a premium for design.” and “To be blunt, if you’re concerned about the existence of equally good-sounding gear at lower prices, you’re probably not the intended audience.”

Why is it impossible to have a post on audio equipment on any general purpose gadget blog without engendering infinite discourse on value?

As far as aesthetics, I think I now see the point being made about the plywood. What the Eames and others did was use the malleable nature of wet plywood to bend it into beautiful organic shapes. Looking at these stands again, there’s nothing that was done that took the inherent properties of plywood into consideration. You could have accomplished the same with a solid block of wood. It’s not something I would have seen if it weren’t pointed out, but I do agree that it’s a reasonable criticism. On the other hand (and the only thing stupider than arguing aesthetic is arguing aesthetic online), to me these are far better looking than the Focal system that was linked to above, which looks like a million other products in Best Buy.

Sorry for my bad english.
greetings from Mexico.

However, as my Mac is an older G5 Dual Processor, with a 21″ CRT Studio monitor on a plywood topped card table, the Creative Labs speakers I was given many years ago are more than good enough for my somewhat bad hearing.

fixed the title. :)

Frankly, anyone like Joey Roth could get this sort of coverage if they just asked for it — then you can all complain about there being too many gadget posts! There used to be a lot more on the review front at BBG, of course, and we’ve all been unusually busy with the redesign and merge and all that.

That said, you’d be surprised how unresponsive many consumer electronic makers are to interview and review requests. PR people are understandably averse to coverage they can’t control.

So they don’t get it.

I feel incredibly fortunate to be a designer at this point in history. CAD software, access to manufacturers, and communities of likeminded people conspire to allow unlimited design freedom. At the same time, uninspired or boring designs can no longer be saved through marketing. This encourages my natural tendency to design things that I love and can obsess over, but won’t appeal to everyone, and aren’t intended to.

The Ceramic Speakers came from more than two years of whittling down an endless number of possible components, features, and designs into the most simple, direct form a speaker system can take. Nothing, from the color and grain of the plywood to the curvature of the ceramic shell, is unintentional. I worked with an audio engineer to optimize the drivers and enclosures for clarity, since this is the most enjoyable way for me to experience music. I wanted to cut through the increasing bloat that suffocates most modern sound systems and create the most direct path from source to ear.

Porcelain, cork, and Baltic birch aren’t typical materials for speakers. I chose them to create a harmonious contrast with the electrical components, and to be as acoustically neutral as possible. The materials are minimally finished, left to add their natural beauty to the design. Pure, basic materials like porcelain and birch ply are more interesting to me than polished veneer or shiny plastic. They also look better over time. Again, this raw, unfinished look won’t appeal to most people. It’s not supposed to.

re: kickbacks/ spam: One of the reasons I got into designing products is my complete disgust at how companies, through their products, disrespect and underestimate the intelligence of their customers. If my work couldn’t stand on its own without marketing and an ad budget, I would want it to fail. I sent Rob an email, then a system to review. If I had to do anything else to get this coverage, my energy would have been better spent making the product better. If I ever rely on anything other than the product’s quality and singularity to keep my company going, it will be time to quit.

-Joey

These reminded me of the nOrh as well, but I do not believe that manufacturer has anything in the desktop range. Nor do those speakers come with their own amplification. In fact, it’s the included amplification that suggests to me that the market for this speaker doesn’t really include audiophiles who often like to try optimizing sound by changing out some component or another. Instead, this looks like it’s more intended for the B&O crowd: people who will give up some acoustic design for visual design.

The fact that the design is not to everyone’s liking, but that some people love it is probably the best evidence that visual design is a profound part of the product; some people despise all of the mid-century modern designers. To me, the speakers are nice enough, but they wouldn’t really be at home with the rest of my decor.

Since anyone can see what the speakers look like, Rob’s review answers the only real lingering question: do they sound good? While it seems that he hasn’t a lot of experience with truly high end gear, perhaps that’s for the best. Given that this doesn’t really seem to be an audiophile product, the opinion of someone with less specialized taste might actually be preferable. I’d never recommend these to an audionut, but I might consider recommending them to someone for whom visual design is important, but who also will appreciate better-than-Best Buy sound.

Finally, I just wanted to think Rob for generally being the most open minded BoingBoinger when it comes to admittedly sometimes ridiculous stereo stuff. Rather than rush to judge a product without actually hearing it, as so many “skeptics” do, I appreciate that he actually gives it a listen and tries to evaluate these things on their own merit. Hopefully, someone will reward him with a demo unit of something truly high end so he can start to appreciate what’s just over the hill.

I’ve spent the last 10 years designing DVDs. When they get posted online my design (jacket , cover, menu system) is gone. Some clients want it done so cheaply or so horribly (with ads before the menu) that I know my design isn’t important to everyone.

I also know how to design phisical things and have a 4 year degreee in that…

I know it’s easy to criticize but I laughed at the sight of this. Seriously the wood on the volume control was laugh out loud funny.

I know how to quickly make physical things. This is not too different from what I might knock out quickly for a one-off. I would be ashamed if I was making even hundreds of these.

I see it’s driven by a utilitarian need plus a desire for “real” materials, but it’s just not a super design. It tries to be an “honest” design to the point where it’s painfully self-conscious but not self conscious enough to go back to the drawing board and improve itself.

So what we have here is not audio fidelity, the specs say 70khz-20,000khz reproduction so no deep sound. What we have here is not design but “honest materials” showcased in painfully ridiculous ways.

It’s easy to see, it’s obvious, and it not a crime or even rude to point that out. I trying to do everyone else a favor by pointing out there is nothing worth buying here. After the endorsement of the article above corrective action is so deeply needed.

And……you represent a syndicate of all the world’s audio-specializing blogs and publications? It’s hard to avoid the impression that he didn’t provide you with a freebie.

Also, after reading all the comments in the course of my duties, I finally looked at the speakers. Having studied furniture design with a top designer, I think they’re quite snazzy. The anti-plywood comments are hilarious. It’s been a featured material in some of the best design of the last seven decades. I recommend Adolf Loos’ Ornament and Crime as a cure for design-luddism.

This is my opinion only, and not meant to be taken as The Truth. I happen to like dark-stained wood. Hence: plywood, LOL.