After recieving the new B&O newsletter I remembered the discussion from about one month ago that B&O's new AST technology would only work with Beolab 5 because of their build in microphone. Now on http://www.bang-olufsen.com/adaptive-sound-technology AST is shown with a pair of Beolab 8000/6000 I have read the explanation on the B&O website two times but I have no idea how it should work so maybe it depends on the TV...? Or will B&O release a complete new speaker with this technology?

AST doesn't use the mic on the BL5. You must have a BeoSystem 3 mkII with the latest s/w to use AST, or upgrade (hardware module) the previous BeoSystem 3 mkI. Most BeoSystem 3 mkII's distributed after January 2010 should be ready for AST out-of-the-box.

You simply set two points along two of your walls, A and B, as described in the setup manual: A and B must be at least 2 meter appart, and all speakers must be visible from A and B. It is fairly clever and very impressive. You can have a default video focal point, and a different default audio focal point - worth the AST invesment alone IMHO. And you can assign listening positions such as Dining, Cleaning, Reading, Party etc.

What you do need is more than 3 speakers and a Beo5 (you assign names to the listening positions, these can not be selected from a Beo4).

Roger

Does anybody have any experience with it and comments on how well it works?  We have a new BV7-55 coming next month and are eagerly looking forward to trying it. Curious to see how it sounds if I add two more speakers, for a total of seven, but not located in the correct places.