Probably 99% of the speakers in the world have drivers in a box, aka, an enclosure, either ported or sealed. Flat panel speakers don't have enclosures, other than the frame. The drivers consist of thin metal ribbons, or thin metal conductors attached to thin plastic ribbons (called "quasi-ribbon"), thin plastic sheets (i.e., larger than ribbons) with conductors running in narrow loops up and down, and thin plastic sheets suspended between perforated metal sheets called stators (electrostatic speakers). In the case of ribbons, there are permanent magnets close to the ribbons, and the music signal passes through the ribbons, creating a magnetic field that pulls or pushes the ribbon back and forth to create the music. Magnepan is a manufacturer of flat panel speakers, and in the past, at least one of the drivers was a large surface with the conductors running in loops. Perhaps their most popular model of recent years was the Magneplanar MG 1.6. At $2,000/pair, this was nirvana for flat-panel speaker aficionados. They now have announced the MG 1.6's replacement, the MG 1.7, which is the subject of this review.