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ARCHIVED FORUM -- April 2007 to March 2012
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This is the first Archived Forum which was active between 17th April 2007 and 1st March February 2012

 

Latest post 01-20-2010 8:55 AM by Flappo The Grate. 181 replies.
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  • 12-20-2008 6:27 PM

    How to save Bang & Olufsen

    Let's start fresh!

    1. Fire David Lewis. I like him just fine, but good lord. He hates computers! That's like hiring a vegetarian as a butcher! We want MEAT!

    2. Diversify video. I think anyone reading these boards can tell what a powder keg our video segment is. Kill the BeoVision 4. Panels are commodities. Stop trying to push a boulder up a hill. Make a BeoSystem 3 "lite" without a picture engine and automation for a single panel instead of dual viewing modes. These features are rarely used and could potentially halve the price. I think a $4k surround sound processor would tickle many of the BeoWorlders I usually spar with.

    3. Kill BeoSounds. Drastic, but reflecting reality. The BeoSound 5 should have been a remote and not a stereo. There. I'm out of the closet. The BeoMaster 5 should be a media server. Music lives in your hands or on a screen. There's just no place for a stereo across the room any more. If the BeoSound 5 was a wireless controller that could move around the house and play to any room it was in, our stock would explode. Right now its a worrisome artifact from a strange time for a strange company. (that felt liberating)

    4. Build a game changing media engine. Not a glorified NAS device, but a true game changer. This is how we'd become the Apple of AV. I look at it this way. Video is a cluster-____. Every service has a corresponding set top box with its own menu, remote, cords, etc. Now some services are stowing away on other STBs, like netflix creeping into blu-ray players. Now I can have the crispest video along with the worst video! All in the same box!!!

    Let's build a platform instead of a product. I know that we've got something like this in the works, but it will fail unless it's comprehensive enough to do the job. We'll never build enough sockets on a device to support all the services, so build a dashboard (like the iPhone did for applications) where television, DVR, on-demand, Netflix, YouTube, etc. can plug in. Put a computer in the TV and then give it a menu to navigate services. No more boxes stuffed in a closet or hanging on a bracket. No bundles of cable. Just software and ease. Sounds crazy, but it makes total sense and last time I checked, wireless internet was pretty stable. Computers have worked this way since the GUI was invented. Icons on a desktop, not boxes attached with cords. 

    5. Wireless. Making ML wireless was never a good idea. It's still ML. Even if the connections were robust, it has all the same limitations on flexibility that ML did. Imagine turning on a product and seeing it register on your BeoSound 5 and then being able to welcome it into the ecosystem and operate it? Sounds like the bee's knees, right? (also sound a hell of a lot like Sonos) It may not make sense to turn on a TV in another room, but now that we do so much with home automation, it seems more relevant then ever that we control rooms we're not standing in.

    There's loads more, but these, for me, are the big ones. This is the dream list. Doesn't mean I won't defend current products, but I certainly have my own bones to pick!

    There is scarcely anything in this world that some man cannot make a little worse and sell a little more cheaply. The person who buys on price alone is this man's lawful prey. - John Ruskin

  • 12-20-2008 8:48 PM In reply to

    Re: How to save Bang & Olufsen

    Trip... I like your style!!!!! Can't find myself in everthing you've written up... BUT.. as a whole... Yep.. that's the way forward!

    The race for quality has no finish line- so technically, it's more like a death march.

  • 12-20-2008 11:21 PM In reply to

    Re: How to save Bang & Olufsen

    Dear Trip:

    Nice post.  The idea of a post Beosound area sounds intriguing.  I agree with your assessment of the BS 5; hopefully, it is just the beginning.  

    I agree with B&O going with less 'boxes' & more software based interfaces.  However, B&O needs to improve its software writing/GUI mojo.  Beoport can make a grown man cry.  

    Getting rid off the BS is nice & just let the legacy BS holders know that there system will no longer be supported past a certain.  I will have let my BS 9K & BV 7 (mk III) sit in corner for other purposes. 

     

    Opportunities to sale & also anger many.  

    Dario

     

     

    When I hear music, I fear no danger. I see no foe... Thoreau
  • 12-20-2008 11:42 PM In reply to

    Re: How to save Bang & Olufsen

    I sort of like the way our software has matured. I like its look. And while BeoPlayer is a frustrating disaster, I really like the natural motion of the BeoMedia's menu. It's just limited in multiple modes of sorting. BeoSound 5 is a huge improvement and does what it needs to quite well. 

    Otherwise it appears that there is some great talent hiding in IdeaLand. Hopefully they're allowed to run wild the same way the physical designers have been for so many years. They're undoubtedly the future as there are simply less boxes to give form to. 

    There is scarcely anything in this world that some man cannot make a little worse and sell a little more cheaply. The person who buys on price alone is this man's lawful prey. - John Ruskin

  • 12-21-2008 4:59 AM In reply to

    Re: How to save Bang & Olufsen

    Trip, I'm pretty sure your refreshing strategy is the right thing for B&O at this moment.

    Beoworld's twenty-eighth ninth prize winner and fifty-first second prize winner. Best £30 I've ever spent!

  • 12-21-2008 5:28 AM In reply to

    • stotty1111
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    Re: How to save Bang & Olufsen

    Possibly a man of vision?

    tony

    I always try to operate using/following the KISS principle --  Keep it simple stupid!

  • 12-21-2008 6:55 AM In reply to

    • TWG
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    Re: How to save Bang & Olufsen

    I agree with some of your points, too.

    But in my opinion the physical design and engineering is the personal favorite for choosing Bang & Olufsen.

    Look at the iPhone: It's just amazing when it's powered on. When shut off it's just a fine plate of glass.

    I LOVE the physical experience on the Beosound 5, the Beo 5 or the Beosound 3000, 9000 etc. I'm a human with healthy hands and I want to use them for physical controls!

    Nobody only wants black boxes that only come to life with a screen ... that's simply awful. The professional music industry (digital mixers, "virtual analog" synthesizers etc.) understood this some years ago and started offering physical control units for their software sequencers, sampler etc. and people LOVE it.

    Have a look at the german Virus TI synthesizer. It's a computer that emulates the analog synthesizers from the 1970-1980 ... with the options of modern devices (storing your sounds, computer control etc.) and it acts as a controller for the software on your PC/Mac, too. There are MANY parameters accessible and imagine how awfuly it is if you have to control every single knob just with  your mouse.
    So they designed a surface  that looks like a great analog synthesizer with modern computer power under the hood and simply great physical controls over your sound AND your software:

    http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/dec04/images/virustidesktop.l.jpg

    Bang & Olufsen went the same way with the Beosound 5 controller and I think it's the right way! It's made in Denmark with high quality physical design which you'll love to touch and you'll simply SEE what you pay for.

    A computer product with up/down buttons and a simple box is simply boring ... and nobody understands why a black box with a little software should be expensive.





     

     

     

  • 12-21-2008 9:19 AM In reply to

    Re: How to save Bang & Olufsen

    Great thread: Let's save B&O. Here are my suggestions:

    1. Add full AV media capability to the Beosound 5 with a hidden CD/DVD/BluRay slotdrive. Make a wireless connection with the Beomaster 5 that should also work as a HD recorder. With this, there is no need for other B&O peripherals.

    2. Focus on Beosystem 3. Make Beosystem 3 your main B&O hub. Improve it's digital picture quality. Integrating Apple TV, Playstation 3 is it's best feature.

    3. Drop the clunky and useless Beo5. Improve Beo4 with backlit keys, color display and customizable user interface . Don't expect customers to accept the Beo5 concept for programming.

    4. Focus on  speakers with acoustic lens.

    5. Adjust prices of  BV4 panels and add some BV4 LCD panels. If not, everybody will buy Panasonic or Pioneer displays for their Beosystem 3.

  • 12-21-2008 10:31 AM In reply to

    • plagente
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    Re: How to save Bang & Olufsen

    erg4000:

    Great thread: Let's save B&O. Here are my suggestions:

    1. Add full AV media capability to the Beosound 5 with a hidden CD/DVD/BluRay slotdrive. Make a wireless connection with the Beomaster 5 that should also work as a HD recorder. With this, there is no need for other B&O peripherals.

    2. Focus on Beosystem 3. Make Beosystem 3 your main B&O hub. Improve it's digital picture quality. Integrating Apple TV, Playstation 3 is it's best feature.

    3. Drop the clunky and useless Beo5. Improve Beo4 with backlit keys, color display and customizable user interface . Don't expect customers to accept the Beo5 concept for programming.

    4. Focus on  speakers with acoustic lens.

    5. Adjust prices of  BV4 panels and add some BV4 LCD panels. If not, everybody will buy Panasonic or Pioneer displays for their Beosystem 3.

     

    I fully agree.

     

    http://p-lagente.blogspot.com/

  • 12-21-2008 10:44 AM In reply to

    • Dave
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    Re: How to save Bang & Olufsen

    TripEnglish:

    Let's start fresh!

    1. Fire David Lewis. I like him just fine, but good lord. He hates computers! That's like hiring a vegetarian as a butcher! We want MEAT!

    Good point!! 

    “Quality is never an accident; it is always the result of intelligent effort.”

    Your health and well-being comes first and fore-most.

     

     

  • 12-21-2008 10:51 AM In reply to

    Re: How to save Bang & Olufsen

    I've wondered what would happen if we made the BeoVision 4s LCD instead of plasma. If it would give us any leverage in pricing from the OEM, I would say go for it. Our best selling TVs are LCDs and I see no reason to keep plasma for plasma's sake any more. 

    I think that a 25% reduction in price of the BeoVision 4 panel has to come naturally, though, not just by slashing out margin. We added the camera system and kept prices the same. What if we hadn't? What if we made the development goal of the BeoVision 4 to sell more units and keep the price competitive instead of anchoring the price and adding features? It seems to ignore the face that panels are too commoditized for anyone to compete. Electronics aren't like wooden chairs or leather bags. You can't just make a few and that be that. 

    I think, though, that more important than the panel price, is having two variants of the BeoSystem 3. I.e. a full cinema model and a more stripped out model with source switching, surround sound, and PUC. Just the basics. Leaving out automation, pixelworks chipsets, aluminum case, etc. could get the price in around $4,000-$4,500. I say that will move more video systems than a slightly cheaper panel. My worry is that we'll never be able to make the panel cheap enough, but should sell a profitable model of our own.  

    There is scarcely anything in this world that some man cannot make a little worse and sell a little more cheaply. The person who buys on price alone is this man's lawful prey. - John Ruskin

  • 12-21-2008 1:20 PM In reply to

    Re: How to save Bang & Olufsen

    Seriously I think people are not that put off by the prices that B&O charges but more of the performance, build quality and functionality that it gives. They are just way under par to justify the price tags. B&O should focus on being a serious company instead of a rip off. 
  • 12-21-2008 1:26 PM In reply to

    Re: How to save Bang & Olufsen

    It's like he's asking to be bonked with a clown mallet. 

    There is scarcely anything in this world that some man cannot make a little worse and sell a little more cheaply. The person who buys on price alone is this man's lawful prey. - John Ruskin

  • 12-21-2008 1:32 PM In reply to

    Re: How to save Bang & Olufsen

    No?

    In a place where $10,000 bags are getting very common, why will a $30000 tv with all the built-in high-end functions be overpriced?  

  • 12-21-2008 1:35 PM In reply to

    Re: How to save Bang & Olufsen

    I can't understand a word you're saying.

    There is scarcely anything in this world that some man cannot make a little worse and sell a little more cheaply. The person who buys on price alone is this man's lawful prey. - John Ruskin

  • 12-21-2008 1:44 PM In reply to

    Re: How to save Bang & Olufsen

    I am saying that B&O shouldn't be doing price reductions but instead focus on how to make its products better. If B&O prices are lower than they have to B&O runs the risk of competing with mainstream brands. Look at Meridian, they seem to be doing okay despite the recession and have just recently acquired Sooloos. And why? Cos it offers something that many mainstream companies can't offer. B&O's aesthetic are overrated now, they are not offering something that other companies are not offering. 

    B&O is meant to be expensive and it has to be.  

     In fact, when I was walking pass a B&O boutique several days back, I was thinking to myself "God what happened? It looks cheap!" 

  • 12-21-2008 2:00 PM In reply to

    Re: How to save Bang & Olufsen

    I'll give you the benefit of the doubt here. 

    I don't necessarily disagree that it is the prices that are the problem full stop. But I also don't think value for the money is the issue. There are no better made pieces of kit in the AV world than B&O. Our metalwork alone is in a class by itself. So fit and finish is really not the issue. I also don't think performance is an issue. Take any ALT speaker and try and match the sound in a blind test for the same money. Won't happen. If you want to take a swing at a BeoLab 8000, which has been on the market for nearly 20 years, go ahead. Same goes for the TVs. Find a publication anywhere that rates it less than best-in-class or top five. You won't.

    The issue, in my estimation, is flexibility and capability. It seems as though we've focused on some very exotic things, like low voltage triggers to run home automation, and avoided the basic capabilities that are revolutionizing AV, like wireless distribution with GUI feedback in "link rooms." Our distribution system hasn't improved flexibility along with more diverse sources and listening habits. See my OP for my ideal solution, but I'm sure there are many that would make me happy.

    The reason I suggest cutting features from the BeoSystem 3, is not to arbitrarily lower the price, but to provide a solution at a scale that majority of (even current) purchasers use. I will never suggest taking a cut in margin or cutting corners in quality, but you can't make a BeoSound 1 on the audio side and say there's no room for basic surround sound systems on the video side. The BeoVision 8 is more like a BeoSound 3 than a BeoSound 1. There has to be some intermediate step in functionality if not only in price.

    I think that at heart we are more like Apple than even we realize. We're not (historically, at least) a pretentious brand and we're not for tweaks. I've always liked to say that we're for people who like music and not people who like stereos.

    So I don't think that we need to vanquish high price-points, just fill in the gaps that were filled to begin with. I've taken in a few BeoSound 2000s at my new shop so far and each time lamented that we never really replaced it. Now you have to triple the price of the cheapest audio system to get to the first "separates system" that sounds basically the same! The BeoSound 4 with BeoLab 4s isn't a rip-off, it's just an unsuitable next step after the BeoSound 1.     

    There is scarcely anything in this world that some man cannot make a little worse and sell a little more cheaply. The person who buys on price alone is this man's lawful prey. - John Ruskin

  • 12-21-2008 3:30 PM In reply to

    Re: How to save Bang & Olufsen

    You think B&O is like Apple? I bet to differ. I don't see B&O taking bold moves and creating new markets like what Apple did or even offer the level of quality at the price level that Apple is offering. I think B&O is more like Microsoft than anything else. B&O is more of a product of careful marketing and calculation. It is more cerebral than passion. B&O actually thought that it could get away with good branding and marketing alone.

    PS. I happen to own the Beolab 4s and it is kinda of a rip off. At this price you can cheap plastic housings, bad grounding and wiring. Beolab 4 is an original idea that has fallen into the wrong hands. Check out the Harman Kardon's GLA-55 : bulletproof acrylic and quality construction at a lower price.

    At the price level of the Beolab5s, you should be getting carbon fiber enclosures instead of the ABS plastics. Carbon fiber offers similar properties of being easily molded like plastics but of course it is way more inert. B&O has the advantage of manufacturing at the economy of scale unlike many boutique brands so in theory it should be offering way better construction and performance.  

    Just how well can you lay claim to the quality of your construction when you are using materials that all other mainstream brands are using?  

  • 12-21-2008 3:49 PM In reply to

    • benjnz
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    Re: How to save Bang & Olufsen

    It's true, that old chestnut of prices just doesn't wash. After all the main times I buy B&O is when am changing jobs/being made redundant - LOL just nmade redundant again so whatch out B&O here I come for more. Big Smile

     Anyway moving forward Trip certainly is in the right area. B&O shouldn't put loads of sockets in things and should allow bolt ons into their products. Ideally the best way to do that would be to have as Trip says software that allows things to be rocegnised and plugged in. The best way to deal with the plethora of stuff people may need to plug in (including old systems for the moving forward) would be to buy a multiport device that just plugs in. You could also have these devices with differing number of plugs depending on what you want. As long as the software on I would presume your TV can cope, you're on a winner. Then again you have the issue where it's not always going to recognise everything, so I'd suggest either an eothernet socket/wifi so it can get updates to it. Also updating TV's this way would reduce the need for B&O staff to wander into peoples homes, and could also potentially remotely warm a store of any hardware issues!

  • 12-21-2008 3:53 PM In reply to

    Re: How to save Bang & Olufsen

    Carbon Fiber? Good god. I resign from this argument. 

    I would like to continue the thread for a few more pages and hear from a few more people on their thoughts on my suggestions as well as their own suggestions. I think there is a lot to offer from this group and would love someone in the Danish hinterlands to read something more than to simply make it cheaper. 

    (And by the way, wonderful, as far as bulletproof acrylic goes. Anytime you want to stand behind a sheet of acrylic and have me fire a bullet through it, I'm at your beck and call.) 

    There is scarcely anything in this world that some man cannot make a little worse and sell a little more cheaply. The person who buys on price alone is this man's lawful prey. - John Ruskin

  • 12-21-2008 3:57 PM In reply to

    Re: How to save Bang & Olufsen

    benjnz, this is really and issue that I feel is confronting everyone. The singularity! The convergence! So many services and devices and no thought has been given to a universal operating system. An OS for your television. Whether they're programs running in a software environment or boxes connected with USB, there has to be a better way. 

    Whenever I'm connecting IR repeaters to peripherals from the BeoSystem 3 I sort of groan at how little anyone has done to have a better system. I've mentioned it a few times, but HDMI CEC seemed to offer a lot of promise but seems to have stalled. Just like cable card II here in America. We're so close to ditching physical boxes we can taste it.

    Someone is eventually going to figure out a way to run an OS on a television (or just make giant iMacs). I'd sure like it to be us. We'll see, though. 

    There is scarcely anything in this world that some man cannot make a little worse and sell a little more cheaply. The person who buys on price alone is this man's lawful prey. - John Ruskin

  • 12-21-2008 4:06 PM In reply to

    • benjnz
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    Re: How to save Bang & Olufsen

    That's true, I was kinda hinting at that. Am sure embedded Windoze would be the way to go in your tv for the moment, at least that way devices are relatively easy to update.

    Also you'd get a smarter interface, ideally the way to go would be use solid state drives with the OS pre installed, least it'd be slightly faster boot times, and more resilient to shipping! This is where B&O really needs to go and go asap.

    Added to the convergance of boxes at least with your OS in your tv, the hub could offer a series of plugs or IRs for commands, and as I said at least offering a network plug would allow easy updating.

    Physical boxes being ditched - a nice idea, although I think it's going to take a few more years. At least with B&O did embedded OS they'd have a running start at the removal of those boxes when it finally happens.

  • 12-21-2008 4:12 PM In reply to

    Re: How to save Bang & Olufsen

    Totally on point, methinks. 

    I look at Netflix & Blockbuster here in the US as well as Bit Torrent and think, "These guys don't really want to be in the hardware business, but stowing away on X-Boxes or PS3s doesn't make that much more sense." If we gave them a software environment to build for, why wouldn't they? Especially if, unlike Apple, we licensed the thing out. Put a computer in your television and we've got the software to upgrade. Seems like a lot more beneficial to our long term strategy than tossing speakers at any car manufacturer that will give us the time of day.  

    There is scarcely anything in this world that some man cannot make a little worse and sell a little more cheaply. The person who buys on price alone is this man's lawful prey. - John Ruskin

  • 12-21-2008 4:16 PM In reply to

    • benjnz
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    Re: How to save Bang & Olufsen

    Well true, and you could do exciting things like configure your Beo5 off the TV, with it knowing what you have plugged in and where!

    Oh well looks like we'll have to create a spin-off, go run if for them and promote the end results!

    OH and BTW B&O I'm fully trained in AGILE project delivery so it'll show benefits straight away rather than waiting 3 years for unfounded and tested deliverables - lol Stick out tongue

  • 12-21-2008 4:21 PM In reply to

    • Puncher
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    Re: How to save Bang & Olufsen

    wonderfulelectric:

    At this price you can cheap plastic housings, bad grounding and wiring. Beolab 4 is an original idea that has fallen into the wrong hands. Check out the Harman Kardon's GLA-55 : bulletproof acrylic and quality construction at a lower price.

    At the price level of the Beolab5s, you should be getting carbon fiber enclosures instead of the ABS plastics. Carbon fiber offers similar properties of being easily molded like plastics but of course it is way more inert.

    Acrylic is, in fact, "cheap plastic" too.

    Carbon fibre cannot generally be injection moulded in the same way as engineering polymers such as ABS and complicated 3D structures would need to be fabricated from simpler component parts rather than moulded as a single component.

    Generally speaking, you aren't learning much if your lips are moving.

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