I've had my BS5 for about a year and a half, and, for me, it has been great.  I rarely use my BS9000 any more.  I think most of the "complaints" on this forum about the BS5 are not from owners, but rather from people who wish the product was something it is not (video server, touch screen, support for Apple lossless or Apple iTunes with DRM, etc.).  At least one user on the forum bought one and returned it because he couldn't warm up to the interface, but most seem to like the interface just fine (I do).  My general advice about the product is that if you are very particular about building playlists and playing a specific song at a specific time, then you'll probably be disappointed.  Or put another way, if you must have the search/organizational capabilities of a computer program, this is not it.  Personally, I don't want a computer (or computer type interface) in my lounge, and I enjoy spinning the wheel even if it is not the most efficient means to find a specific song.  There is serendipity in spinning the wheel - I often find another song I'd rather hear before I find the song I set out to hear. The beauty, to me, is that it mostly plays a wide variety of music I like with minimal input from me - MOTS works as advertised - it's not perfect (long songs > ~20 minutes aren't analyzed, sometimes it seems to play a few songs a bit too much), but I think it works very well.

Apple support is not great.  There is a program to transfer songs from MacOS to BM5 that works fine, but the Apple lossless format is not supported.  FLAC is supported, but is not 100% gapless (the gaps are not nearly as bad as MP3, and, I have to listen very closely to hear the the gap, but it can be heard on some song transitions).  WMA is the only gapless, lossless format supported at this time.  I'm also not sure how one would edit tags, etc. once songs are loaded (sometimes you need to edit the genre, artist, album, etc.), but there might be a way - I have a mixed Apple/Windows home so I tend to use Windows for this task.  This also goes to your experience about nothing under genre and artist being messy - the interface only knows what it has been told, via file tags.  Keep your tags in order, and I think it works great.  Messy, incomplete tags lead to a messy incomplete interface experience.

There is no customization of the navigation.  I don't even see a "Genre" selection, at least not on the BS5 - I think it is there when accessing via TV and definitely there from BeoPlayer, but, again, no customization - it's the B&O way or no way.  On BeoPlayer (so I assume the TV interface works the same), you do get exactly the navigation tree you suggest.

There are iPad apps, but I'm not using any... I will probably buy the Beo6 remote which just recently added 2-way, graphical interaction with the BS5.  I also think the ripper is a great device, and will probably get one of these as well.  Again, the less computer involvement the better (for me - I work with computers 8-10 hrs a day so this is why I don't need to see them when I relax with my music).  Also, it will allow the wife and kids to add their own music without my help.  Right now, I must first fire up my laptop, fire up BeoPlay, rip the CD... not hard, but the ripper should be an improvement for the instant gratification set.  Then again, if you rarely buy CDs, then it probably wouldn't add much.

For me, I'd buy it.  In fact, I already did and have been very pleased with it so far...

Stan

Stan has written a very good response to the questions asked - I can second every statement.

My experience with BS5 dates back to the purchase in Feb 2009. Since then - no regrets, the system has made great leaps, courtesy of an ongoing update process. Although we would like to see new capabilities added more quickly, the "general vector"with the product is great. It learns and improves over time. I have a "direct access system" with BS 3200 ... however, since owning the BS 5, it is hardly ever used again.

Just added Beo6 WLAN last week - it adds a nice reach. However, I always enjoy the "mechanical and sensual" process of flipping the wheel on Beosound 5 itself, then \scrolling through the album covers to inspire me to the artist / taste of the moment. MOTS then takes over and does the rest. It is quite relaxing to "float" and have your music system do the work to keep you entertained...

Additional benefit of BS 5 is N.Radio. Very enjoyable to follow your genre radio stations and your favorites.

 In short. Great system with just a few minor "capability gaps" ... The more you use the system, the more you get used to or even embrace the underlining philosophy of effortless listening. I hope B&O keeps up the enhancement work - this will keep Beosound 5 an attractive proposition for the future.

pf85 wrote:

 Although we would like to see new capabilities added more quickly, the "general vector"with the product is great. It learns and improves over time. I have a "direct access system" with BS 3200 ... however, since owning the BS 5, it is hardly ever used again.

Are the Beosound 3200 and Beosound 5 connected to the same Masterlink system? 

I have a Beosound 5 and 3000 and can not get them to both function well as part of the same Masterlink system.

Razlaw wrote:

Are the Beosound 3200 and Beosound 5 connected to the same Masterlink system? 

I have a Beosound 5 and 3000 and can not get them to both function well as part of the same Masterlink system.

 

see "Beosound 5" forum below

Maab wrote:

Thank you for your sharing your thoughts.

 

I really want it to like it and I do in some ways.

 

But please tell me, I understand and I don't expect it to be like a sooloos or else. It's a B&O. I do t care for playlists, I never made one. I don't want to use the computer but it reasures me if I know that moving flacs from my nas to the bs5 is easy enough. But I would like to be able to listen, let's say, an entire album, as an example, again Mahler, the 2nd symphony. How would I find it? Is it possible to play the entire album?

 

 

Sorry the silly question, but I read some archives were users could not do that.

I think that's a very fair question. You can select an entire album to play. HOWEVER, if you select a single song to play from within that album, the rest of the album does not logically play as one is accustomed to happening when playing a CD. Rather, MOTS kicks in and the BeoSound 5 selects some similar song. This can be very frustrating. In my opinion, B&O could easily remedy this by presenting an option to "play through remainder of album" when one makes a long press to select such a song. Just one more feature to add to the wishlist of features for the BeoSound 5.

Maab wrote:

Thank you for your sharing your thoughts. I really want it to like it and I do in some ways. But please tell me, I understand and I don't expect it to be like a sooloos or else. It's a B&O. I do t care for playlists, I never made one. I don't want to use the computer but it reasures me if I know that moving flacs from my nas to the bs5 is easy enough. But I would like to be able to listen, let's say, an entire album, as an example, again Mahler, the 2nd symphony. How would I find it? Is it possible to play the entire album?Sorry the silly question, but I read some archives were users could not do that.

You would select "Album", "Covers" or "Artist" using the "lever", then spin the wheel to find the Mahler 2nd Symphony by Album Name, by recognizing the album artwork or by finding the "artist" that performs the music, pressing "GO", then scrolling thru the albums by that artist.  Once the album is identified, you must press "GO" while the album is selected, not an individual song.

With classical music, the default tagging for "artist" can be difficult.  I generally don't remember classical albums by the symphony/conductor, but that seems to be how most of my albums are categorized - it gets worse when you have different songs from the same album performed by different symphonies, then they sometimes have separate entries.  This goes to my earlier point of sometimes needing to edit the tags to make it easier to use.

Stan

Razlaw wrote:

Are the Beosound 3200 and Beosound 5 connected to the same Masterlink system? 

I have a Beosound 5 and 3000 and can not get them to both function well as part of the same Masterlink system.

It probably has to do with the option settings.  I cannot get my BS9000 and BS5 to "play nice" when the BS5 is set as "master".  In my setup, the BS5 must "slave" to the BS9000.  This works fine with some small exceptions - I must use a remote to listen to N.Music and if the BS5 is ever turned on manually (spin the wheel or press the power button), the BV8 in the other room comes to life and plays the music - or worse (when others are watching TV), it switches source to N.Music (which is much louder than the normal TV).  There might also be issues if you have older software in your 3000 - I seem to recall reading on this forum that there are some versions that don't support N.Music.

Stan