very simple its business, does matter what market your in, reviews of products preference given to company advertising in their mag i was inthe food industry same applied

malcolm

The links previously posted to 'The Gramophone' magazine archive show that B&O equipment was once regularly reviewed. B&O these days may be relying more on direct mail and their own website, so Malcolm's comment on the tendency to review only companies placing regular advertising may be true.

There is a tendency for 'Audiophiles' to dismiss B&O out of hand........... just look up B&O on other forums, but usually it is done by people whio have never owned B&O themselves.  This tendency to dismiss the brand, coupled with high prices, is another reason why magazines might think that reviews are a waste of their resources (that might only result in a negative Audiophile response!)

Graham

To me there are several reasons why the AV press do not review a lot of B&O products:

- first, B&O dug their grave themselves, when choosing to open exclusive shops apart from other brands and advertising in Architectural Digest & Habitat, rather than in hi-fi magazines; obviously the publishers decided to ignore B&O for that will to stay away from the crowds;

- second, the best reviews in the "professional" magazines are the ones from the best advertisers, that is no secret, it applies to all sectors unfortunately, that's why I no longer buy those magazines, I remember some of them fighting for true hi-fi when bitsream filters were launched, and calling MP3 standard a crime against art, and nowadays all these magazines review 80% of their products among home cinema equipment and Ipod docks..😎;

- third, B&O is not releasing a lot of new products each year, look at 2009: apart from BeoSound 5, you had BV4-103 in mid-year and now BV10 + BV 7-55, that gives you 4 main products in a year, 3 TVs and only one audio system, and no new speakers at all. So obviously the magazines could only review BeoLab 9 or 5 when they were launched, but not later.

Anyway, most reviews can be summarized by "great design, excellent performance, but very expensive and technically obsolete" : am I wrong?😛

I disagree with you vikinger only in your last sentence. It is not a matter of high prices. They make categories of different price listing and on the high priced one you always see something like KEF and Paradigm,and and and.... but no B&O. For sure you can find it in some reviews but here i am talking about the general rule. And i cannot understand why all this so-called Audiophiles seem to hate or better to say not touch B&O products...😮

On the other hand what Chrisreunion says...is true i believe...

Sometimes you can read articles about one product but brought in perspective with the concept that is synonym for B&O. This is in my view the right approach. Comparing B&O on product level isn't the right approach. 

How would you compare the BV10 with competition including the Samsung that delivers the panel? These reviews typically do not value enough the real attributes of B&O products.

I did look at it from a concept point of view before deciding to spend, sorry invest, that amount of money. It took me time for this. A couple of years ago I still wasn't fully convinced.

It might even be dangerous for B&O to accept the product reviews as it might have a negative effect due to the reason mentioned above. At least this was the case for me. I did my own "review" and started to like the whole concept. My BV10 probably does not have the best picture in the market even though it costs a multiple. But I do not care as it's a good picture and it wasn't the reason why I did purchase it.

Now to pure hifi, that is what you're talking about, I can agree that comparing B&O loudspeakers with competition makes sense. And not. For the price of my BL8000 I probably would have bought Sonus Faber a couple of years ago. Friend of mine does own them. Though, again, in my view, the SF wouldn't have integrated as well in my concept of a good quality design AV installation in the main room.

Patrizio

Also B&O need to make test samples available to the press for review! Below is a post from the Audio Editor in response to a thread on Whathifi forum about the BV8-40.

Posted on Aug 26, 2009, 9:00 PM

Hi-Fi World regularly review B&O - Tim Jarman is now a writer for them. One of the issues is that B&O do not release as much kit as most manufacturers, being happy to keep updating products rather than changing the design every 6 months. There is also unlikely to be many group tests as not many companies do direct competitors. The Beolink system means that for instance a BeoCenter 2 is quite tricky to compare with a non B&O product. Without speakers, it makes little sense.

I nearly forgot to say - one of the other editors, Adam Smith, is also a member of this forum and has a fair B&O collection himself - this months edition mentions the Beomaster 2400. There is also a picture of the Beocord 2000 Reel to Reel in the letters page with a most attractive young lady behind it! 🙂

I would have to agree on chrisreunion comment about  big corporations always getting good reviews in hifi magazines which to me seem biased

I do like gramaphone reviews and hifi world  these seem unbiased and did review some vintage equipment last month

I would like to see a giant test between meridian and beolab 5 and other active speakers like A.C.T.

 There doesnt seem much imagination in journalism these days.