I guess we are suckers for good design.

A friend of mine has a flat screen Toshiba, in front of which he has had to put an ugly sound bar (another make) to try to improve the sound output.

My BV11 has superb picture and sound and swings out on its motorised hinge to face wherever I want to sit. No competition, regardless of price.

Technology keeps moving on and there will always be something of higher spec around the corner.

As far as secondhand prices are concerned you can probably buy a fantastic Avant for £200. They are out of demand because of fashion rather than lacking in technical capability.

Graham

Is an fairly confident that if I came into your house there will be things you have purchased, and from which you get pleasure, which I could never understand.

Whether it be watches, cars, phones, wall paper, sofas, furniture or food, there will be items where you have spent more than I can justify or understand.

If I don't "get it" you will never change me.  I guess the same goes for beautifully designed televisions with stunning sound, beautiful natural picture, and a whole host if ither useful features.

The problem for B&O is that those nasty cheap looking TVs, are suddenly looking much more palatable. One of the big crazes at the moment is not just the sound bar, but the "sound base"

Essentially a speaker system that your TV sits. It can only be so long before the big manufacturers label their TVs as "Kef inside" "Bower and Wilkins sound" etc. then whole game will change. Personally I'm in it for the Beovision, and everything trickles down from there. If the Beovision goes, so does everything else.

If I was spending £7-8,000 tomorrow, and as a big fan, I'd probably get an LG OLED and some speakers.

You are correct in stating that on the basis of price, a second hand older B & O TV is uncompetitive with a current generation TV from one of the major manufacturers where the trend is towards ever lower prices.

That trend does result in corners being cut to meet ever decreasing price points, which can result in something of a lottery as to the quality of the TV acquired by a buyer.

 B & O's use of quality materials, components, and a stringent quality control does not come cheap and is therefore reflected in the price to the consumer.

As with any premium product, it is up to the individual to decide if the price is justified by considerations such as quality, performance, and after sales service from the manufacturer.

 

4k is pointless as there's no source material available , it's just hype to sell another pile of boring tv's , the last gimmick was 3d , look what happened to that..lol , oled is interesting apart from the blue diode problem & the 3 year screen life..

I had my avant for 12 years , 12 years of trouble free watching , in that time i had a philips ( blew up ) , a loewe ( rubbish ) , 3 x sonys of varying quality from excellent to awful and a sharp that wasn't very sharp

The avant is still working , looks amazing AND they're giving me £850 trade in on a stunning new BV11 ( a really impressive bit of kit , technically up there with anything from samdung etc ), designed by David Lewis 

I do agree that some of the modern gear is weird looking , the drum kit speaker does nothing for me , but I'm sure they are just feeling their feet design wise. eventually another David Lewis will come along and revolutionise B&O , hopefully.

A few years ago I was ready to give up on them , now my faith has been renewed. Tue really does seem to be the man with the plan !

Okay...  Here's where I answer on used values.

When a person buys, say, a BeoVision 10-40 for circa £6250 in 2011, then offers it for sale after having hardly used it - how do you value it?

Well, all I do is say to myself "what will someone pay for it?" then work back from there.  I have fixed costs, I have to go and collect it (two men, a van, fuel), I have to clean and test it, I have to pay any reconditioning costs, I have staff to pay, I put a warranty on it, I buy the official transport packaging, I have to arrange delivery (usually at a subsidy as people don't realise how much it costs to send things these days), I pay Corporation Tax and VAT on anything I do make.. I think I've made my point.

So - let's say these are going on eBay for £2,500 as reported on this forum.  So, do I bid say £1900? £2000?   If I do, I get told to get lost - in not so polite terms usually.  People expect B&O items to be worth almost what they paid for them if they're under 3-4 years old - they simply will not accept that they lose circa 50% as soon as they leave the showroom in most cases.

So - we end up (in order to get stock) paying more than the TV is worth on the open market - and then have to add our margin. What can we do?  If people won't pay the money there's nothing much we can do except slash margins.  If that carries on the business will become unviable and I'll shut the doors rather than lose money..  That'll leave an eBay free-for-all which will smash prices even lower - to the point where buying a brand new Bang & Olufsen TV becomes financial suicide.

The market dictates.  The market will have to live with the consequences, so will I, and so will Bang & Olufsen as a company.

Lee

 

All very good replies which I am enjoying reading, please keep them coming.

When I see the ever rotating listings on eBay that never sell, then get resisted again and so on, I can't help but wonder don't people get the point?!! Nobody wants it! BeoVision 9s, close to 10 year old plasmas, with an asking price of £3000+, in one or two cases on eBay over £4,000! If somebody did buy that I would like to know why? And I am the biggest fan of the BV9 believe me. For me, £1,500 is the maximum price I would offer for a BV9 of that age and even then I would want to know that I was covered by some warranty if the screen had any issues, which I would expect with such an old set.

A couple of posters have talked about the BeoVision Avant and that is my current television. I have decided to keep it. I don't want as its only 32" and having had the 55" Sony 4K its fair to say I have got used to such a large and exciting screen size, but that developed light bleed issues and was returned to the retailer for a full refund, hence the reason for this thread as I now find myself back in the market for another television. I am very tempted to go the OLED route as suggested by one poster, I just think its too early. I also agree with Flappo that it is still too early for 4K as there is little content around although that will all will be chaining in the next couple of months and then again in August as Sony are really pushing the technology (which they want to label as there own!) as much as possible. They are releasing a network server to download directly from Sony so that will change things dramatically. Of course Netflix are also working closely with them and Sony and Panasonic are working together on building the next generation Blu-Ray discs to cope with storage capacities etc.

My frustration is that there hasn't been a right time to buy a tv since 2007 I don't think. Although I do accept that many do like the BV11s but it doesn't too much for me personally as I find it a bit flimsy looking in appearance. I like a more solid brushed steel finished product.

Simon.

@ Lee,

Isn't it just the same with cars? Depreciation from retail to trade price in 12 months can be 50%, but the garage reseller will reprice it at about 10 or 20% below original retail. Of course, there are exceptions like Morgan where you might pay more second hand simply because people don't want to wait 5 years or whatever it now is for a new delivery.

At least B&O does have a thriving second hand market. Other makes go for even less in percentage terms, or more usually are taken straight to the tip!

Graham

I agree to a point with the OP.

 

Mostly the problems with TV's today is the development. Never has anything like it been seen, not with any technology... I think even mobile phones gets second place...

 

I love my BV9 mk3, and will keep it until it dies. Even if it dies I'll try my best to revive it!

I don't get the running after the latest technology, as with TV's at the moment it is chasing the end of the rainbow.

At the same time, I see the problems the OP presented and sympathize. B&O's TV's grow less and less desirable as the competition rolls out ever bigger/better screens (not the sound part) at ever smaller price tags.

I actually cancelled my cable TV this week. Completely. I won't even get the free channels. I've watched normal TV exactly 0 times since I moved houses... All my content comes trough the Internet. Be it netflix, apple TV or my own ripped films on my home NAS.

None of these source I use have to my knowledge 4K resolution, so what would I do today with a 4K TV? Nothing!