Doctor wrote:
I must confess that although I like the thought of all B&O being made in Struer , the reality has long been that large parts of the products have been bought in and only the final assembly has been in Denmark. All TVs have long been made from Far Eastern parts, much of the electronics are assembled in China, and very little except the alumium originates from Struer.
The Century was of course based around a Philips cassette deck made almost entirely from plastic and based around a twin cassette design, the Dolby chip was made by Sony, and the CD was again made for B&O by Philips.
The Beosound 8 may be assembled in China , but the sound performance is quite fantastic and the circuit design and general form are all B&O. I am still giving serious consideration to getting one, especially with the news that it can be included as a link speaker, via Steve at Sounds Heavenly. The remote may be cheap, but you can use a Beo4, 5 or 6 if you want. The Century was £1150 when last sold and the BS8 will outperform it by a country mile.
I'd agree; it seems to me that the upset here seems to be one of perceptions - a psychological issue rather than a material one.
People buy value added specialist products, where the perception (value added) is of greater quality, style, and/or performance over 'lessor' mainstream products.
The reality is that certainly in the electronics/HiFi/TV/Audio world, perhaps only the mainstream majors such as Sony, Matsushita (Panasonic), Yamaha, and Phillips etc have the resources to build much of what they make more or less totally in house, including LSI's, chipsets, DVD/Bluray drives etc.
The specialist will likely make some parts in house, but the rest will be all OEM parts bought in, and final assembly take place in their factory. This is a fact of life given global manufacturing and marketing in a global business community.
Given that the specialist is selling value added products to a niche market, some potential buyers in that market are likely to feel upset if they realise that the product they are buying is often made in a factory, or has parts sourced from the same OEM parts suppliers, as more mainstream, cheaper and less 'prestigious' products.
My experience of the High End audiophile world, is that many so called specialist manufacturers, who are in reality assemblers, would like you to believe that their, and only their product, is the best engineered, best sounding product in the world. However, none to my knowledge have yet submitted their products to blind, level matched ABX testing to prove it - so their 'take' on sound is purely subjective at best, and what one ends up buying is often the perceptions of a difference in sound, which is marketed as being better than 'lessor' products, and nothing more, apart from the usually very fancy box and elevated price tag. As such, my experiences would lead me to believe that much of high end audio, along with mega buck cables, stands, and attendant voodoo and witchcraft, is a marketing con for gullible, obsessive HiFi anoraks, chasing HiFi nirvana at the end of a very expensive golden rainbow.
So, if B&O plays in the world of HiFi & Audio, is a specialist in that they use OEM bought in parts, assembled either in their own factories or elsewhere, does that make their products a con as has been suggested earlier in the thread?
I believe quite emphatically, no, and on two important counts.
The amount of R&D that B&O have put into audio and visual products is almost without peer, discounting perhaps large multinational companies such as Harmon International and the work of Floyd Toole as regards acoustics and psychoacoustics.
B&O's R&D team are all tertiary educated, highly qualified professionals - not an enthusiast come amateur technician with entrepreneurial skills starting up an value added 'specialist' operation in the kitchen. People such as Geoff Martin, with a BMus in Organ performance, a further tonnmeister degree, and a PHd in acoustics. Research projects into acoustics such as the Archimedes project; the R&D facilities such as the cube - the largest anechoic measuring space in Europe, and the collaboration with leading universities into psycho-acoustics. And certainly the use of a listening/viewing panel, who all have their hearing checked, and have to attend a fixed minimum of live concerts so as to be continually familiar with live sound as a reference, along with blind testing.
I know of no other manufacturer in the so called high end of audio who go to such lengths in the pursuit of the closest approach to the original sound - rather than the most impressive sound, or the one with the most PRaT (Linn & Naim anyone?) or air and space etc. No, the emphasis is firmly on scientific logic, research principles and objective analysis, and for that fact alone, B&O are worth the price of admission IMHO.
Secondly, style and ergonomics.
It is one thing to build something of quality. It is another to build something that could stand alone as a piece of industrial art. And in these days of increasing complexity as regards home electronics/Audio-Visual, it is so refreshing to find a manufacturer who considers the end user re the interaction and intuitive ease of use of the product as it fits into ones everyday life and attendant lifestyle. Very few high end specialist AV manufacturers put these three elements together; quality, style and intuitive ease of use if we are talking AV systems for the home.
As such, B&O IMHO stands alone in the specialist AV scene; the combination of audio and video quality backed by the most painstaking objective research, the modern yet timeless quality of design, materials and manufacture, and the intuitive operation sets them apart from the specialist crowd in a way that causes me to accept and be willing where possible within my means to pay the price of admission.
Best Regards
John... 😐
