Are active speakers worth it now?

@erik_squires in the case of commercial active speakers for the residential market how would you calculate the portion of the markup you are highlighting that is attributable to the work of matching the amplification to the speaker?  For many responding to your original question, they value the flexibility to do that work themselves (i.e., matching external electronics, and in some cases DSP, to passive speakers), but objectively, that work has value (or cost, even if it is *fun* for them).

Isn’t the seller of actives in part offering a service of doing that work for the buyer, who, like @fastfreight ’s son, values *not* doing that?  

Put another way, assuming you were willing to do it, how much would you charge over the cost of the components to build a 2 channel pair of actives for a stranger  (i.e., someone for whom you were not inclined to do favors)? And can you break out the pure labor time for assembly once the pieces are chosen from the time necessary to choose the right pieces for the best synergy? (And I suppose there is also the additional time needed to design the enclosures to account for the vibration issues others have mentioned?)

@kirkwallace Obviously, you can’t make a single dollar if you attempt to sell your products based on part costs without markups. I’m not about to begrudge anyone that. 

However, to counter your argument, passive speakers have a great deal of work done for matching the drivers to each other and the cabinet via the crossover network, so I don’t expect there to be a markup from passive to active just for the crossover.  Both require careful tuning to work correctly.  

From the buyer’s perspective, a Dynaudio Confidence 20 is a speaker and amplifier together.  Is that worth $24,000 a pair, which I believe is a $12,000 markup based on the passive model? 

This is a case where being a buyer I might say no, I’d rather spend $4-6k on my stereo amplifier and get the passive version, or would I? 

@erik_squires i genuinely wasn’t trying to advocate for a “yes, they are worth it” or a “no, buyers are being gouged” position.  I was just trying to see, because you have actually done the work, to what i am guessing is a pretty high level of success, as how much R&D is involved in going from passive to active. And we know that a manufacture will try to recapture R&D cost (plus profit margin on it) quickly. (For extreme examples, see pharmaceutical pricing in the US.)   

So, for example on your point about crossover network, cabinet and drivers, is it the case that one can pretty much just add in an amp (after deciding which one matches best), or are there modifications (even modest one) to those features that going active requires? And if no material modifications are likely needed, how hard is it / how many trials are needed to choose the right amplification?

I'm not sure about good value but I do know ATC makes some incredible active speakers if buy in a heartbeat 

+1 ditusa - Active all the way so long as all of the electronics is external to the speaker enclosure.