Bang & Olufsen's BeoVision 10: something awesome in the state of Denmark (update: video!)
By Joseph L. Flatley 
posted Oct 19th 2009 1:19PM
posted Oct 19th 2009 1:19PM
If you're an HDTV buff with style, taste, and money to burn (and if you're reading Engadget we have our doubts about at least two of the three) then you've probably been waiting impatiently for Bang & Olufsen to make this one official. The BeoVision 10 is a wall-mounted LCD flat screen that boasts 40-inches of real estate, a brushed aluminum frame, and bottom mounted speakers that are available in a variety of colors. As the company boasts, "every aspect of the design is thought through." It also said something about "vægplacering," the definition of which we will leave to your imagination. On sale now at the B & O store on Kongens Nytorv in central Copenhagen for 43,495 Danish Kroner (roughly $8,700) -- not shockingly expensive, as far as this company is concerned, but still far too dear for you. No word on stateside pricing or release date.
Update: As several astute readers pointed out, the translated source for this one listed the price in British Pounds when it should have been listed in Danish Kroner (DKK). The thing is far less expensive now -- so feel free to send us one for an early Christmas present! You have the address. Oh, and a vid is after the break!
Read - Here is the new B & O television
Read - B & O's new flat panel
Update: As several astute readers pointed out, the translated source for this one listed the price in British Pounds when it should have been listed in Danish Kroner (DKK). The thing is far less expensive now -- so feel free to send us one for an early Christmas present! You have the address. Oh, and a vid is after the break!
Read - Here is the new B & O television
Read - B & O's new flat panel
I'll take two!
Ugly.
Hey Engadget - Currency translation FAIL - it's going for $8732.67 at the current exchange rate...
@Phemoum... Yeah. If it had been listed that way. But, Alas, it was listed in British Pounds.
I believe you fail kind sir
43k pounds = $8.7k? lolwut
Google Translate turns Kr into £ and treats the exchange rate as 1:1 i.e. it just ignores it. Phenoum is correct, Engadget is wrong.
Neither Engadget or 'sir' fails, Google Translate just translates kr. into £. End of story :)
@BK
well shoot me for being Norwegian and reading the mouseover Danish from the read link....
and alas, the fail is on Google here - or is it on those who trust it so blindly... :o
Ah....It seems a though I stand corrected.
Sorry Phenoum.
lol, $70k for a 40" LCD is absolutely shockingly expensive, even for B&O.
Vægplacering = wall placement (directly translated).
Recession Antidote please?
I was thinking it was a 40" OLED for a second when I skimmed and saw the price. Yea $71,000 LCD lol.
"Vægplacering" - placement on the wall. B&O might just be talking about something aesthetic.
Nice TV though - but I'll not consider buying it, even though I'm a dane. Way to expensive!
vægplacering = wallplacement
Not £43.000,- but dkr 43.000,- You only got it wrong with a factor 7.5ish
So that would be 8,632.29, not as bad.
(hopefully that converted right)
Funny how it's written - $71,000, "far too dear for you". Odds are its correct, but there has to be SOME rich mofos reading this. Hell, if I hit the Powerball, I'd still read Engadget, ya know?
Ludicrously rich or not, hopefully all Engadget readers know how to get themselves a 40" HDTV + speaker for well under $71,000 (and even the corrected $8,700).
$71K for a 40" LCD TV with some mediocre speakers underneath...they grow some good weed over there.
So it's a 40" TV for $71,000? I don't even see anything about resolution, though it is using the ridiculous, price driving but completely worthless in any practical sense 240Hz refresh rate.
I want the pumpkin orb
It's a Fluoro Shade floor lamp from Tom Dixon. Runs about $450.
And on that note, the chair is an Eames Lounger from Herman Miller ($3800 /w ottoman) and the rug looks like a Cuks (around $3100).
Denmark may not have adopted the Euro yet, but we for sure don't use Sterling pounds - kroner/kronor is used throughout Scandinavia and the original article says the BeoVision will cost 43,495 (Danish) kr. I have no idea why Google Translate translates kroner into £ though.
Currency conversion:
Price of BeoVision 10: $8,732 or £5,323..
Just so you know, quite a difference ;)
...Denmark doesnt adopt the euro because it doesnt need the euro...
...denmark is older than the euro...
...it is wiser and knows better...
@sven,
I'm not aware of an European state younger than the Euro.
Just a quick Q from Norway...
Jeg regner med at du holder med meg når jeg sier at Engadget tar feil i overskriften, Danmark er vel ikke en stat, men heller kjent som et land?
;D
Danish medie are reporting the price to be: 43,495 DKK (the dansih currency), wich is worth a lot less than £.
1 DKK is only woth $0,2. So the price will "only" be $8716.. ;)
Looks kind of boring to me. For reference I have owned Bang speakers in the past.
I was expecting something cool like having the speakers cover the TV when it is off or choosing between that and having the TV cover the speakers so you can display art. I could engineer it just give me a call. I'm guessing $2k on top of a $1500 40" TV like the one they are selling.
Update: $8k not $71k. Still more that my bad ass $3500 idea
wrong currency, please refer to BKM72s post above
although google translate might be messing about ;)
Can someone direct me to the Engadget currency exchange store, I have some Pesos I want Dollars for HA HA HA HA HA .....43dkk for that TV is CHEAP!....got one on order in black...
Joseph, something _is_ awesome in the state of Denmark ;-)
Since the speakers are black, it just looks like the bottom part of the screen is broken.
I want that chair. It will be around for a lot longer than the TV...
Eames chair ftw. I have a knockoff in my dorm room :D
Mmmm... B & O.
You'd have to be mad to spend eight or nine thousand dollars on a forty inch TV... even the Olsen's would know that this TV isn't any better than the highest end Samsung or Pioneer.
I don't know why B & O makes bezels for these other companies panels. It's probably a Samsung panel in there!
My grandmother bought that not too long ago. She is going senile. Thankfully my uncle noticed and forced them to return it. Crazy Danes...
Damn those Scandinavians sure know how to dress up a room. That looks awesome.
The state of Denmark?
It should be The Kingdom of Denmark i´d recon.
BTW. "vægplacering" means it´s suitable for mounting on the wall, just like those images.
...og forresten er det dejligt at se nogle Danskere inde på Engadget :D
-Michael from DK
The State of Denmark would be correct. It's a Shakespeare quote from Hamlet, rewritten though. "there's something rotten in the state of Denmark"
Men jo du har ret det er sgu dejligt at se nogle danskere her inde også :)
I skulle ikke glemme de amerikanere der kan læse og skrive på dansk. :-)
You know that's somebody else's panel and video processor encased in all of that glass and stainless steel, right? They (along with Runco) use or have used Panasonic Professional series plasmas in their self branded displays.
I'll take one without the speakers so it doesn't look like an ugly square and more like widescreen.
Oh, and when it hits about $1500 too!
How is it that a country with a socialized medical system can produce such wonderful and expensive a/v equipment?
There must be a connection.
Maybe that connections is HDMI.
Universal Healthcare for all!
B&O is a lot like BOSE: that is to say it's overpriced and made to look better than it sounds. I laugh at people who brag about their Bang & Olufsen.
Eh, overpaid designers.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tRucJ-A1gIg CHECK IT OUT ON YOUTUBE!!! SWEEET!
I'd rather just buy a Samsung, and get the Eames Lounger with the rest.
@Zyg: Yes, it is the latest panel by Samsung. B&O buys only the panels that are quality-wise in the top 10% of the Samsung production line, i.e. no clouding is ever there. The video processing is B&O's own (which explains why B&O's picture quality is superior to Samsung's and most other LCD-TV's out there). It's not stainless steel, it's diamond polished aluminum. The TV sounds better than any other flat-TV (@ little over 2" thick) on the planet (talking about the built-in speakers here - they are genuinely Hi-FI). Pictures do not do justice to the build-quality or the finish of the materials (like the anti-reflective coating on the front glass).
As you've guessed by now, yes, I'll buy one, but with the motorized floor-stand, which makes the TV look even more stunning :)
The panel is for sure from Samsung, but the video processing is clearly not from B&O. The company is toooooo small to own a chip design and software design needed for video processing. In any case, video processing is largely "commodity", coming from fabless (and often, almost nameless) chip companies from the far east. Yes, video processing (100Hz and 200Hz, Natural Motion, infinite colors, infinitesimal contrast ratios, sharpness improvement, n bit processing etc etc etc are all commodities... stuff that every MTK, MStar and Trident can offer. What B&O does is design - all things you can touch and feel - such as the aluminum bezel, the remote control, the manuals, and most probably the menu structure. Traditionally B&O has descent audio - so I expect some B&O touch in the monstrous speakers that make the TV look as if it is only half lit ;-) but engadget readers and writers dont qualify to critic B&O, so I take my remark back.
quoting sven vollstag
...Denmark doesnt adopt the euro because it doesnt need the euro...
...denmark is older than the euro...
...it is wiser and knows better...
You are correct on all 3 of them, and hopefully it'll stay that way.
But i'd have to say the tv is a looker, as most things from b&o are, and 43.500 dkr isn't really that bad, they've made way more expensive stuff through the years.
Sjovt at se alle de danskere der hænger ud på engadget. :)
There is one of these in Billund Airport...
hehe yeah it is most likely Samsung that has provided the panel, but thats like saying you dont want to pay for a Lamborghini because VW makes the engine. Come on if you have ever seen a B&O tv you know that a TV is a lot more than just a panel
@insomniac:
Actually, the video processing is from B&O, their very own patented technologies called "VisionClear". They've been developing the picture improvement technologies for decades. Avant, B&O's flagship tube-TV from few years back, was considered to have the best picture in the world due to B&O's very own picture competences, the core of VisionClear. B&O's prices, and the fact that they've been in the business over 80 years, have given them amble resources to work on both video and audio technologies. Some of the latter, for example ICEpower, they've since licensed to the likes of B&W, Martin Logan, Pioneer, etc. In co-operation with Sausalito Audio they developed the Acoustic Lens, which makes the BeoLab 5 speakers uniquely the cream of high-end, and this is again one technology exclusive to B&O.
The panels are outsourced -- as is the case with most manufactures outside the Sony/Samsung/Philips/LG realm -- but the processing most definitely is not.
Taken to the extreme: have a look at Beosystem 3, the audio & video engine that beats just about everything out there; then again, the engine alone (with no screen or sources) costs more than for example Pioneer's or Panasonic's top-of-the-line TVs.
Do a little research, I urge you. It'll be a surprising learning experience ;)