Speakers age just like all things do my friend; old wiring for the woofers will darken (hopefully just to light brown) and tweeters may pop. The amp & crossover circuitry can fail especially, as they tend to get warm--and in fact warming/cooling cycles that gear is subjected to when put to use does much of the damage, which is part of the reason why it's important to eliminate DC signals before your speakers.
At the same time components can be replaced/resoldered (solder ages too!), woofers can be re-coned or rewound and tweeters can be repaired or replaced. Unfortunately in today's world the ability to repair gear is disappearing from the general marketplace as people gravitate towards crap that is just as easy to replace (and companies tend to charge enough for out of warranty repairs to push people to spend the few extra just to buy whatever new bauble is being sold anyway.) So in musical circles people who are skilled with electronics and know how to source harder to find parts are going to be more & more in demand imo.
You are making incredibly gross generalizations. It totally depends on usage such as how loud you play them, how frequently, and how long they are turned on. Once again you are only partly telling the truth.
Braincell, you're over the top again with the 'incredibly gross.' Of course he is generalizing, it's appropriate for this conversation. He is not telling partial truths, his comments are vali(s)d. Your statistical sample (yourself) is tiny, and apparently very lucky. To your credit, you apparently take extremely good care of your equipment. Even given that, electronic and audio devices will break down (which is why you are lucky, if it hasn't happened to you).
everything is NOT improving in quality. in fact, it's the exact opposite. i have been buying, trading and selling gear for more than 20 years and i can say that without question. a good friend of mine is the TOP repair tech in southern California and he'll tell you the same. gear used to be expected to last several lifetimes. now it is made to be replaced in a year or less. much of the new gear is made to never be fixable if it does break, which is entirely different from 20 years ago...
it IS smaller, and sometimes more useful, but it is NOT better. it IS cheaper, just like disposible lighters are cheaper than non-disposible ones....
