The plastic faceplates are moulded, using an aluminium mould. The mould, which is made with a very complex process involving CNC machining & other stuff (Rob know more about this than me) costs well over $30,000 - for *one*.

Of course, once it's made, the plastic is cheap and you can make faceplates out of any colour of plastic (clear, silvery with some metal content - like the current mk2 buttons, etc).

Making a *metal* faceplate is harder. You would either have to CNC machine each one indidivually (ie a big machine under computer control takes thousands of passes at the same bit of metal, grinding bits away which aren't supposed to be there) - which would cost a fortune. Actually, $1000 is probably much less than this would cost...

The alternative is casting, which is how the handle is made. However, this doesn't work as well for complex shapes like the front panel.

In mass production, you'd get a stamp made and punch flat metal into the right shape (eg, how a minidisc player's thin metal housing is made). The cost of such stamps is well into 6 or even 7 figures.

Hugo