Powered speakers show audiophiles are confused

I wonder about a company that can go with a wireless option and still sell such a cheep speaker

I have these types of speakers/amps/preamps around the house as part of the Playfi ecosystem. When I am on the patio I run them in wireless mode. When in the LR I connect via ethernet and RCA inputs.

If you wonder about Dynaudio speakers they sell passive (The Confidence line for example), active that aren’t wireless, and active that offer both wired and wireless connections. Take your pick.

A few things confusing in the audiophile world:

I find just one thing "confusing" and the rest a matter of personal taste.

The MOST confusing thing is why would someone invest $$$$ in speakers and practically nothing in the room and room treatments because most of what you actually hear from that speaker is reflected sound, not direct sound.

This is fine of course, but what if you did the opposite? Spent $$$ on the room like @fleschler did and a more modest set of speakers. Would @fleschler like to weigh in on that one?

http://www.filmsound.org/terminology/direct.htm

When we looked at WiFi modules, the cheapest were <$2.00 those were chip antenna based. The module we eventually settled on was still < $10 but allows an external antenna. Software extensions allow microsecond level synchronization between speakers. Latency is is sufficient for almost all applications and getting better. Acceptance is slow but growing. Live music applications will be slower to accept, the risk is high, but control functions will be the leading edge, then wired, then wireless where failure costs are contained. Leveraging mass adoption technology while maintaining private networks is hard to beat for cost, features and reliability.

My experience with microphones is it is all proprietary, low latency, was mostly analog if I am not mistaken. That price likely includes the microphone too?

Wireless transmitter/receivers have existed for speakers at <$1000/pair for a long time. All proprietary / low latency. Probably not audiophile quality. 

@kota1 That is a great point, if you spent the money on acoustics rather than equipment. I think the answer is you would be surprised how good some lower priced speakers can be. Paradigm for instance has Canada pumping in lots of money because they are partnered with the government for acoustic research giving Paradigm an unfair advantage against other speaker manufactures. Very few manufactures can afford to build with beryllium. My Paradigm B speakers are 7k each for surround sound speakers but they really hold up as a main speaker with a sub. All to say small speakers with a good sub can sound great. So yes putting money into the room is a good idea, with 1 huge caveat. Acoustics is not a science in that it's completely objective like speaker cables there is a lot of science that can't quite state that this room will sound good. A room that is 12 x 18 x 8 is practically impossible to make sound good because of so many common denominators some rooms have no hope and can't be fixed unless you make them very very dead and move the speakers very close to you effectively wearing headphone with speakers. 

"A matter of personal taste". We both know you need good cables that shield RF and we both know that smart and reasonable people list their cables as components but in blind tests no one can tell the difference, sure everyone has a story about the audiophile who takes the test " ok are we now using the good cables or the bad ones" and they get it right. That is not a good test a good test takes the physiological testing out of the equation. When you look down the grocery isle at the market and see a beautiful woman then you realize it's your wife that is a good honest test, not setting up a picture of you wife and your old girlfriend with all the psychological bagger they both bring into the picture. The things I mentioned in confusion are not scientifically valid unless you are selling them then somehow they have all the science in the world on their side. 

@kota1 Also as far as wireless I assumed you and the man on the video were talking about transmitting the main signal vie RF or bluetooth to the speaker from the wireless transmitter that is a far different story than using a code like FM Play or a format like that using wifi for Roon of something like that is very different than sending the entire spectrum of music via a transmitter and receiver via RF. 

@thespeakerdude Were these wireless connections RF or were they a coded signal like bluetooth or the like. I can't imagine such a cheep circuit in an RF transmitter with no compression. And of course the FCC is squeezing wireless microphones into oblivion with it's huge sale of RF spectrum to large companies and outlawing people with hundreds of thousands of dollars or wireless equipment that just happens to be in the wrong block. The FCC during the last administration was very cruel to people who owned equipment like churches and performing arts buildings that needed good RF.