I don't feel the cabinet on the CSB-1 is poorly made. They did some really cool things with it such as the magnetic grills, slanted face/back and the port is perfectly blended into the cabinet during construction then painted so it looks like its all one piece. It may not be the best braced or the thickest but I think its more than acceptable. It has a significantly better cabinet than that on the CBM-170s for example, and that speaker seems to be a crowd favorite. It seemed like the A1bs, Wharfedales and CSB-1s had the best cabinet while the CBM-170 and the RC-10 had the worst(not absolutely terrible by any means, just not great compared other speakers in their price range). I truly feel that the CSB-1 is not a $900 speaker, or at least a very poor value at that price. It does have some design aspects that I've seen on $1,000 speakers, and if I hadn't opened them up I may have been fooled into thinking they were a lot better than they actually were. I noticed some corners cut, such as the port only being flared on the outside and not on the inside, lack of significant bracing, etc. If I had to guess I would say ~$500 is a fair retail price for them. With the customer service and quality control issues aside I am fairly happy. I can't say I would buy from them again and I am probably not going to be raving to all my friends about how great they are, but anyone looking at speakers under ~$500 should give them some consideration.