Radiient Elara Build Quality

The Elara system came in two boxes, one for the mains and one for the center and surrounds. If I hadn't already suspected that these speakers were bookshelves, the size of the boxes would have given it away. Each of the speakers was packed in molded styrofoam and arrived undamaged. The mains have a tweeter on top that sits in an empty spot in the endcap. I'd like to have seen some sort of protection specifically for them as well.

The speakers are constructed out of 5/8 inch MDF and are front ported (except for the center which is sealed). Between the port and the woofer is the single brace in the speaker (no bracing at corners). The speakers are liberally glued together and covered with a vinyl wood-grain veneer. The center speaker is an MTM design with no internal bracing. The mains and surrounds have a true 6.5" coaxial driver since there is a real tweeter in it. The woofer basket is stamped metal and the interior of the cabinet is lined with sound foam (grey, egg carton type) to help reduce cabinet resonance at ¼ wavelength of the cabinet's vertical dimensions which is certainly a good thing and sometimes lacking in speakers of this price class. The crossover is made of decent parts including: film resistor, machined air core inductors, and electrolytic caps. The mains have an additional soft dome tweeter on top of the speaker in a plastic housing that I couldn't get into without risking irreparable damage. The center speaker has two 5.25" woofers with dust caps and one soft-dome tweeter. Each of the side walls of the speakers are scored with thin vertical cuts to allow the wood to be bent into the trademarked trapezoidal shape. The center channel has four, half-spherical rubber feet while the rest of the speakers have threaded holes for provided spikes which can be covered with little sticky felt rounds if so desired. The mains and surrounds have two sets of binding posts so that the speakers can be bi-amped while the center one has one set.

One thing I noticed when disassembling the speakers is that all of the screws are simply driven into the wood. There are no threaded inserts glued in to make disassembly and reassembly easier. At first I didn't think much of it until I reassembled a speaker for the second time and noticed that the screw felt like it wanted to strip. This got me thinking, with heavy use, could these screws come loose by themselves? With all the vibrations it seemed possible.