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
Friends,
After seeing Andrew Robinson's review of BL28, I wondered what he would think of BL50. And then I thought... what's next for BL50?
When will it go EOL? BL5 had a roughly 15yr lifespan. Will BL50 have the same? This seems hard to imagine given how the Mozart platform is evolving and bringing significant functionality improvements. Will B&O update BL50 to include Mozart functionality?
Or will it be replaced entirely by a Mozart-family product?
Any thoughts? :)
Currently: BeoLab 17, BeoLab 18, BeoSound Core, Beosound Level, Beosound A1 2nd Gen, BeoPlay S8 Connection Hub, Halo, Essence Remote
Previously: BeoSound 1 non-GVA
AR gave the BL28’s quite a glowing review. However, a lot of what he said was quite “intangible”/difficult to describe compared to the language/description of more mainstream products he reviews.
However, his approach – rather like John Darkos is to push away from traditional Hi-Fi separates to the one-box, two speakers approach or as per the BL28, the two speakers approach with everything inside approach. They certainly push the Active Loudspeaker angle - which B&O has been out of the gates for nearly 35years. Unfortunately, his viewers have still not caught up to the way the world of HiFi is certainly going.
As per the BL50 and BL90, I suppose the life cycle is dependant on sales and those sales I believe are targeted at the more “serious” listener (i.e. those who are prepared to commit to a significantly higher expense, foot-print, room dominance for a more refined sound output or one who wishes to go into the half-way house of B&O and third company products) rather than the BL28 which I would say is for the more traditional attributes required by the B&O connoisseur.
I believe the BL90 has been to a custom build to order for a long time. I don’t know about the 50’s? I doubt they will be upgraded to that functionality because they were probably never designed that way from a hardware perspective, and because of the product targeting. If you have the BL90/50, additional separates is the way to go in my opinion. Good selection of equipment and you will get the best out of the Labs, plus an ability to play vis the network etc...
Sandeep, great point about updating the Core to Mozart. Great idea.
But as far as you and Mr 10Percent both suspect 50/90 won't be upgraded to Mozart... does it make sense to have the entire product portfolio bifurcated somewhat significantly across two systems?
Maybe when NL/Multiroom is added to Mozart, it will matter less which platform your products are on.
Now that I think of it... I guess that is really the largest separating factor, isn't it? So perhaps you're both right.
True re a bifurcated offering.
But speakers like the 50s / 90s take so many years to develop, that I doubt they'll dump those years of development in the bin.
What, just for a bit more consistency across the portfolio?
After all, a decent proportion of 50s / 90s buyers won't be driven by having AP / CC and B&O radio built in. They're the sort of clients who quite like / dont mind having to get an additional piece of hardware.
I'm pretty sure there will e a connection unit / box that brings older speakers into Mozart capability - its not just recent speakers like 50s / 90s, but also others such as 18s / 20s etc etc.
Curly: Sandeep, great point about updating the Core to Mozart. Great idea. But as far as you and Mr 10Percent both suspect 50/90 won't be upgraded to Mozart... does it make sense to have the entire product portfolio bifurcated somewhat significantly across two systems? Maybe when NL/Multiroom is added to Mozart, it will matter less which platform your products are on. Now that I think of it... I guess that is really the largest separating factor, isn't it? So perhaps you're both right.
Sandyb: True re a bifurcated offering. But speakers like the 50s / 90s take so many years to develop, that I doubt they'll dump those years of development in the bin. What, just for a bit more consistency across the portfolio? After all, a decent proportion of 50s / 90s buyers won't be driven by having AP / CC and B&O radio built in. They're the sort of clients who quite like / dont mind having to get an additional piece of hardware. I'm pretty sure there will e a connection unit / box that brings older speakers into Mozart capability - its not just recent speakers like 50s / 90s, but also others such as 18s / 20s etc etc.
While I do agree that
and while "speakers like the 50s / 90s take so many years to develop" may be true, nothing prevents B&O from using the same acoustic architecture in a "2nd Gen" version by just upgrading the "smart" part (and leaving drivers, amps, etc unchanged), so they don't really necessarily need to dump years of development in the bin :)
"You think we can slap some oak on this thing?"
leosgonewild:Flagship products like Bl50 and Bl90 should be upgraded for free to Mozart. New motherboard or upgrade to motherboard.
I see no realistic reason why they *should* be upgraded for free to Mozart.
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Correct - updating the Core, or a making a Mozart Core type product is relatively easy.
Making the 50s / 90s like the 28s is a monstrous pain in the ass.
And no, whatever high expectations I have for B&O, they have no duty to do this for free.
Mikipidia:I see no realistic reason why they should even consider updating these speakers to the mozart platform. A mozart platform core type product makes way more sense.