ARCHIVED FORUM -- March 2012 to February 2022READ ONLY FORUM
This is the second Archived Forum which was active between 1st March 2012 and 23rd February 2022
So I have been thinking like many of you about this new platform that the Beosound Balance is built on.
So the old CEO Henrik Clausen, had many times said that "he" or by his command have built a new audio platform, that was cheaper and would make it much easier to make new products in the future.
So when he launch the Beosound Stage, I was confused, nothing had seemed to change, so what up?
I talked with a Dealer, he said no new audio platform had been developed???
But then the Beosound Balance came and I understood that new is not always better.
The new system is properly as he said, cheaper and faster to built on, as it is properly a standard chip. But it is also a downgrade of function.
What are the horizon of good things to come out off it?
It looks like cheap speakers as Beoplay A1, and Beolit 17 will be upgraded with multiroom.
That will make a whole new clientele off "B&O" multiroom, and B&O in quote as it can blend in all multiroom system based on Airplay or Chromecast.
And they will also save a ton of money on app development.
But was it the right choice, I have not settle on a opinion yet.
But one thing for sure the information to the dealers have been a big joke.
Beovision Harmony 77" 2nd Gen, Beolab 5, Beolab 17, Beosound 1, Beoplay M3, Beoplay Portal, Beoplay Earset, Beoliving Intelligence
The Balance is not built on a new platform.
Where most recent speakers have had NL, AP2 and CC - the Balance has just had NL removed.
I certainly hope B&O dont attempt to describe that as a new platform.
But who knows - the job ad for the developer posted a few months ago suggested something more substantial than just a set of AP2/CC capable speakers.
I'm pretty sure though that, as I was told 2 years ago, the strategic decision had been made to release on AP2 and CC.
So anyone hoping for a replacement B&O protocol to NL, well they'll be most likely very disappointed.
At least NL products will remain supported for quite a while yet.
Hallo Sandyb,
I think that Henrik Clausen meant new platform=New Hardware chip.
I do also guess that NL is no more in future products.
The statements from Henrik Clausen, was not to customers, but to stock holders.
It is from newspapers here in Denmark.
I am well aware that the generel customer do not care, but I am not really writing for them as very few are on Beoworld.
But I guess we can debate the choice of a new hardware platform anyway.
I have expressed my ‘fears’ before, that it will be so - it will be the new normal.
Presenting that as ‘a new platform’ is the easy way to go for a marketing department’.
However, that does not make it new - it is just a common platform....one that allows for integrating with non-B&O devices (with AP2/CC) and with the smaller B&O ones (the rumoured upgrade of the A1).
And for most current/previous B&O users it is abnormal, when we think of what we are used to from B&O in terms of multiroom.
@Sandyb
With the Balance I am not only missing the NL functionallity, but also the easyness of using a beoremote with it.
I guess a lot of users are using their modern B&O gear for listening to radio stations. With the missing built-in TuneIn netradio provider and no remote control for that, it must be a serious downgrade.
Just think of how proud B&O was to introduce the feedback of the TuneIn favourites and the operating these from within the remote.......not very long ago.
As you write, we will have to get used to it.....or not ;-(
Disclaimer! If they really have ‘a new platform’ up their sleeves, they better sonn tell us about it!
MM
There is a tv - and there is a BV
First:
NL is B&o DNA and gives much more and better multiroom functionallities than AP and/or CC.
Second:
My biggest concern with loosing NL is: say Apple and/or Google change their protocols in about 2/3 years. The Balance's hardware, for example, does not support this change.............so it becomes obsolete?
Agreed - although anyone can change their protocol, meaning a ticking clock for products.
It happened surely with ML to NL, though support continued for a while I guess.
And with Apple, they are pretty good at supporting products for a good while.
But I agree with the broader observation - expensive speakers / setups should be work (and not start to feel suddenly inferior) after 5 years, and should be good for 15-20 years.
With the good of convenience (streaming I guess) comes the bad - lack of control over your hardware and its uses.
Brave new world eh.
Carolpa: First: NL is B&o DNA and gives much more and better multiroom functionallities than AP and/or CC. Second: My biggest concern with loosing NL is: say Apple and/or Google change their protocols in about 2/3 years. The Balance's hardware, for example, does not support this change.............so it becomes obsolete?
Sandyb:It happened surely with ML to NL, though support continued for a while I guess.
New platform...
A couple of weeks ago - shortly after the launch of the Balance, I had asked the support some questions.
Here is something from one of their responses:
’Men kan ikke anbefales da det vil kræve tilkøb af en Beosound Core.Ud over det er der desværre ikke noget at gøre da Beosound Balance kører på en helt ny streaming platform der ikke kan understøtte Beolink.’
I did Google Tranlating for you, so just read on ;-)
‘But not recommended as it will require the purchase of a Beosound Core. Beyond that, unfortunately, there's nothing to do since Beosound Balance runs on a brand new streaming platform that can't support Beolink’.
Seems they are talking about this a ‘brand new streaming platform’.
Exactly - the OP may be right in that the communication to all dealers may have been unclear, but its pretty clear to me what this means.
The deprioritisation of NL was well flagged a good while ago - it was just a question of how soon it would be removed.
That removal has come a bit sooner than even I expected, and remans disappointing.
But as many others will respond - pick up phone, start streaming, job done, what's the issue? (no need to answer that question).
Millemissen: New platform... A couple of weeks ago - shortly after the launch of the Balance, I had asked the support some questions. Here is something from one of their responses: ’Men kan ikke anbefales da det vil kræve tilkøb af en Beosound Core.Ud over det er der desværre ikke noget at gøre da Beosound Balance kører på en helt ny streaming platform der ikke kan understøtte Beolink.’ I did Google Tranlating for you, so just read on ;-) ‘But not recommended as it will require the purchase of a Beosound Core. Beyond that, unfortunately, there's nothing to do since Beosound Balance runs on a brand new streaming platform that can't support Beolink’. Seems they are talking about this a ‘brand new streaming platform’. MM
Millemissen: With the Balance I am not only missing the NL functionallity, but also the easyness of using a beoremote with it. I guess a lot of users are using their modern B&O gear for listening to radio stations. With the missing built-in TuneIn netradio provider and no remote control for that, it must be a serious downgrade.
BV Harmony 65 / Eclipse 55 / BL 50 / 19 / 18 / BS 2 all brass
BV Horizon 48 / V1 40 / BL 17 / Beoplay S3 all black
V1 / BL 3 / BS Essence MKII / Beoplay A3 all white
BS Moment / BS 3000 / BS 3200 / BL 400 all silver
Headphones / bluetooth speakers / BLC NL-ML / BLGateway
I know…B&O virus has grown on me !
Just got the link to the new B&O catalogue from my dealer this afternoon.
http://publication.bang-olufsen.com/bang-olufsen-home-speaker-system/multiroom-hoejttalersystem/?mc_cid=6d3975304e&mc_eid=ffa41ed77a&page=1
Not much talk about NL there.
Fansastic:I”ll remain one of the biggest criticasters of the NL functionality being pulled out. My elevated pitch for management board -if the situation would ever occur-, bring back NL no matter what!
Carolpa:+1
Beolab 28s Beolab 9s Beolab 12-3s Beolab 1s Beolab 6000s 2 pairs Beolab 4000s Beovision 7-55 Beovision 10-40 Beoplay V1 32 inch Beovision Avant 32 inch Beosound 1 (CD player) Beosound 3000 Beosound 5 Core Essence MKII Beoplay M5
We'll see if the bets B&O are making now are the right ones. What is the multiroom functionality offered through NL that AP2 or CC can't do? I believe BO is also looking to add Alexa as a platform. When was the last time Apple or Google changed their wireless protocol? What B&O is trying to do is to make it easier to sell their products into homes that are running on other platforms.
From what I can tell, B&O products for a few years were too expensive relative to their performance. The newer products - particularly the Balance and Stage are closing the gap rapidly. I was trying to buy a New York Edition of the BS 1 and it is completely sold out. Also, unlike in the past there are almost no discounts to be had for the A9 or BS 2 here in the US 🙂
I clearly cannot afford to buy BL50, 90s or Harmony. So I might not be a good judge of B&O's market. But in the past year or so, I have bought new A9, P6, H9, BS 1, BS Core and Stage. I am seriously considering replacing my BL 6000s with a pair of Balance vs. BL 17 or BL 18 (as I thought earlier) mainly because I have been so impressed with the recent products. I hadn't bought any B&O gear for 7 years prior to that. But there may be a market for folks like me that want something better than Sonos, but with the convenience of something like Sonos...
B&O in my life 😊:
I think B&O have a lot to do to explain the possibilities of an NL-less world. We badly need a new Idea Catalogue!
For example: now that AP2 is included on many television sets, it becomes a lot easier to sell e.g. an LG OLED with some Wisa-BeoLabs and a Balance for the dining room. No cabling required, clients can retain their other AP2 speakers and enjoy multiroom music without extra boxes. If you want to upgrade to a BeoVision, that's an option and not a prerequisite for entering the B&O world.
Jaffrey2230:What is the multiroom functionality offered through NL that AP2 or CC can't do?1. Join from destination speaker, not from source player. 2. No accounts needed. (BTW, I think this is why you have no trouble with multi-iPad control whereas others do -- they haven't made them all the same AppleID & Apple Music (or iTunes) music source. Just a guess.) Jaffrey2230:When was the last time Apple or Google changed their wireless protocol?June 2018. (Shipping, actually it was announced June 5, 2017.) AirPlay *was* flaky, which AirPlay2 isn't. Alas, back-compatibility is not 100% perfect. Jaffrey2230:From what I can tell, B&O products for a few years were too expensive relative to their performance.No argument there. And have you noticed that amazon.com has raised the price for BeoSound 1 to $1900 from $1750? Maybe they know something we don't... [Edit: No, it's back. Looks like they spread the special-edition price to all the SKUs by mistake.] Also no argument that the Stage is closer to acceptable pricing. Still it's a lot of money for beauty and you just have to decide whether to accept the reaming.
Jaffrey2230:What is the multiroom functionality offered through NL that AP2 or CC can't do?
Jaffrey2230:When was the last time Apple or Google changed their wireless protocol?
Jaffrey2230:From what I can tell, B&O products for a few years were too expensive relative to their performance.
1990:I think B&O have a lot to do to explain the possibilities of an NL-less world. We badly need a new Idea Catalogue! For example: now that AP2 is included on many television sets, it becomes a lot easier to sell e.g. an LG OLED with some Wisa-BeoLabs and a Balance for the dining room.
For example: now that AP2 is included on many television sets, it becomes a lot easier to sell e.g. an LG OLED with some Wisa-BeoLabs and a Balance for the dining room.
trackbeo: But on your second point, that TV is not a first-class Airplay2 citizen: It is still an *output* device only: it can receive audio (and video) and render it; it cannot transmit the TV audio to your HomePods or Balances. Yes, it may have WiSA to transmit audio to some speakers, but it is *not* using Airplay2 to send to them.
But on your second point, that TV is not a first-class Airplay2 citizen: It is still an *output* device only: it can receive audio (and video) and render it; it cannot transmit the TV audio to your HomePods or Balances. Yes, it may have WiSA to transmit audio to some speakers, but it is *not* using Airplay2 to send to them.
Indeed. TV audio is the major loss (except for those of us using an Apple TV as main tv source).
1990: For example: now that AP2 is included on many television sets, it becomes a lot easier to sell e.g. an LG OLED with some Wisa-BeoLabs and a Balance for the dining room. No cabling required, clients can retain their other AP2 speakers and enjoy multiroom music without extra boxes. If you want to upgrade to a BeoVision, that's an option and not a prerequisite for entering the B&O world.
BS Moment, BS Core, BG 4002, BC 4500, BS1, BL18, BL19, BL8000 + RCV1, A6, M5, M3, A1, P6 (tks Botty), H5, TR1
How about this?
Now that B&O is ditching the Touch to Join function, it should be possible to sell off this technology.
I guess there might be companies interested in this smart feature.
Millemissen:How about this? Now that B&O is ditching the Touch to Join function, it should be possible to sell off this technology. I guess there might be companies interested in this smart feature. MM There is a tv - and there is a BV.
You keep asking this question, get sensible responses and yet the same question is asked again.
And I'm pretty sure the answers given / scenarios outlined are pretty clear.
So I'm not sure why this is proving so difficult.
And thats not to say some of us dont use AP - many of us do, for certain sources.
But the ability to walk up to a dormant speaker and get it to cycle through and join anything else going on on other B&O rooms is not something AP can do. Its pretty simple. And yes, we understand that using an iOS device (s) you can easily control music across rooms - but that requires (as explained) an iOS device always to hand, be it for Siri or otherwise.
And yes, we also understand that B&O has made a strategic decision - but for some of us, becoming just another me-too producer of Airplay speakers, is less interesting as it's not obvious how the deeper integration of multiple B&O products, be they audio / video, can be achieved in the future.
Jaffrey2230: We'll see if the bets B&O are making now are the right ones. What is the multiroom functionality offered through NL that AP2 or CC can't do? I believe BO is also looking to add Alexa as a platform. When was the last time Apple or Google changed their wireless protocol? What B&O is trying to do is to make it easier to sell their products into homes that are running on other platforms. From what I can tell, B&O products for a few years were too expensive relative to their performance. The newer products - particularly the Balance and Stage are closing the gap rapidly. I was trying to buy a New York Edition of the BS 1 and it is completely sold out. Also, unlike in the past there are almost no discounts to be had for the A9 or BS 2 here in the US 🙂 I clearly cannot afford to buy BL50, 90s or Harmony. So I might not be a good judge of B&O's market. But in the past year or so, I have bought new A9, P6, H9, BS 1, BS Core and Stage. I am seriously considering replacing my BL 6000s with a pair of Balance vs. BL 17 or BL 18 (as I thought earlier) mainly because I have been so impressed with the recent products. I hadn't bought any B&O gear for 7 years prior to that. But there may be a market for folks like me that want something better than Sonos, but with the convenience of something like Sonos...
Fansastic: You want to AP2 your music from your phone to Balance: check it will work. You want your music also on a LG OLED, not sure if this will support AP2, but you also want your BL18’s to play music through WISA: on what connection. Wisa on Oled LG is new to me and as far as I understand not possible. Hence, you need a BV, Moment or Core (or another B&O source) to feed the BL18’s through wisa. And from that point there are more cases to be made (easier) through NL then through AP2. And more important, use the remote or touch to join or other interaction with an B&O product instead of your phone.
You want to AP2 your music from your phone to Balance: check it will work. You want your music also on a LG OLED, not sure if this will support AP2, but you also want your BL18’s to play music through WISA: on what connection. Wisa on Oled LG is new to me and as far as I understand not possible. Hence, you need a BV, Moment or Core (or another B&O source) to feed the BL18’s through wisa. And from that point there are more cases to be made (easier) through NL then through AP2. And more important, use the remote or touch to join or other interaction with an B&O product instead of your phone.
From the C9 and up, the LG OLEDs can do Wisa. Xbox can do Wisa too. So as a dealer you really can sell the BeoLab/LG combo without the need for a Core or a BeoSystem 5. For Android-based tv’s there might be some integration possible in future too...
Look, I mourn the loss of integrated NL-speakers too. But I hope they have the capability in their new hardware to make the Balance and future speakers “PL-capable” so anyone with an NL setup can add a Core to get their full NL-experience. The “premium” alternative to the standard setup of AP2/CC.
IMHO these companies are notoriously unreliable and for B&O to be dependent on their technology is not very wise. Modern B&O products are priced and build to last 2 decades but internally rely on services from companies that can go in any direction they please. They can also make strategic decisions to drop certain support, and B&O is small and will be at the end of the line.
Remember Spotify in Beosound 5? All very nice until Spotify changed their way and the Beosound lost a major feature. B&O quickly abandoned that ship.
Next to that there are technological advancements that will probably render modern B&O products obsolete before you know it. E.g. the move from Airplay 1 to Airplay 2 changed how things work (my iPad 1st generation cannot stream anything to my appleTV 4th generation, 10 years later). Are we sure that a future "Airplay 3" device will still work with a speaker you buy today? Even Sonos' proprietary protocol changed so old and new speakers cannot talk to each other.
The future is not very bright for a product that relies for the majority of it's functions on popular services that run on semi-disposable devices such as iPhones.
I am not saying that B&O should write their own front-end software, as we have also seen that they are not super good at doing that, but their embedded software for multiroom solutions (MCL and ML) were and still are superior to what Sonos and co. can come up with. But instead of continue to lead the multi-room discussion, B&O now follows and seems to have forgotten what they were capable of in the 80's and 90's, both in performance and backwards compatibility.
My 2ct of rant...
Beosound 5 Encore + Beosystem 5500 + S45.2; BV7-40 MKV + BL7.1 + BL14.4+ AppleTV4; various link rooms with MCL2 A or MCL2 A/V + RL60.2 / CX100 / CX50 & Cona / IWS2000; BG4000; Beosystem 1200 + BV1600.
Hi all, I am currently filming a living with review of Balance and have some exciting news that I think you'll like.
Should be ready in a day or two. Considering a solo live stream too, see if I can do one without it screwing up!
Take care all, John.
Just curious if you have heard the Balance. For one, it is priced exactly the same as the Beosound 2. If someone has compared the two and it can be determined that the Balance is worse, then your argument is true. All companies need to make trade-offs. So I'll look to reviews before judging. In my case at least, I am more likely to buy a Balance over a 2.
https://bocopenhagen.dk/en/beosound-balance-vs-beosound-2-blog-post/
John: Hi all, I am currently filming a living with review of Balance and have some exciting news that I think you'll like.
Exciting! BTW: can you confirm the line in on Balance has auto sense? Steve couldn’t confirm, maybe you can?
@John
Good to hear from you....was beginning to get worried ;-)
I wouldn't worry about the future of BeoLink Multiroom.
BeoMatthew: I wouldn't worry about the future of BeoLink Multiroom.
Glad to hear that you are somsure about that.
In a former post you wrote (in a different matter): ‘from my many years on the inside’ - so you seem to have some insights?
I am afraid though, that some people in the forum want to hear that directly from the company.
I've decided to have another crack at a live Q&A tomorrow evening (Friday 24/04/2020 at 20:00). Had long enough to lick my wounds after the last car crash attempt!
I'll tell you all what's going on then if you would like to join me.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IVfhxUQrXUs
Millemissen: BeoMatthew: I wouldn't worry about the future of BeoLink Multiroom. Glad to hear that you are somsure about that. In a former post you wrote (in a different matter): ‘from my many years on the inside’ - so you seem to have some insights? I am afraid though, that some people in the forum want to hear that directly from the company. MM
I've urged as much, but I'm on the outside now. Maybe our friend from Manchester will be authorized to say more (-;
But I think the rumors of the death of BeoLink have been greatly exaggerated. Take another possibility (totally hypothetical of course!) that a cash strapped company can release their next high-margin product ahead of some of the firmware that makes it a complete product, but require the capital from the sales to help do so. Surely a first for a technology company!