The best soundbars are designed to be heard, not seen. However, this new aluminum monster from Bang & Olufsen demands to be heard. And seen, and its price is as high as its attractive “sculpted” design.
It's slated to go on sale next month for a whopping $5,800. Beosound premiere from Bang & Olufsen comes with 10 speakers, as well as support for immersive Dolby Atmos audio.
Beosound Premiere's internal speakers include a quartet of 4 x 3-inch racetrack-style woofers for bass reproduction, a pair of 2-inch front-firing drivers, two more side-firing speakers for surround-sound effects, and an upward-firing driver located beneath 1,925 milled perforations that the company says pay “tribute to B&O's 100-year heritage.”
In total, these 10 speakers provide seven channels of audio, ideal for streaming Dolby Atmos soundtracks, while Bang & Olufsen's “Wide Stage” technology uses “driver-specific acoustic data” to help increase the perceived width and height of the Premiere's soundstage, and the Advanced Bass control system is designed to add oomph to the built-in woofers.
The $5,800 Beosound Premiere soundbar from Bang & Olufsen boasts an upward-firing speaker that sits beneath 1,925 milled perforations.
Bang and Olufsen
In terms of ports, Beosound Premiere offers one HDMI eARC connector, which can handle lossless audio from a Blu-ray player connected to the TV, as well as a three-port Gigabit Ethernet switch (a premium connectivity feature for a soundbar) and dual-band Wi-Fi. You can stream music to the soundbar via Bluetooth, as well as Apple AirPlay, Spotify Connect, Tidal Connect and Deezer Connect.
Finally, there's the Beosound Premiere's “pure” aluminum body, which as a whole is “a sculptural masterpiece and a bold expression of acoustic prowess,” boasts Bang & Olufsen CEO Christian Theart.
The nearly 19-pound soundbar will be available in three options: Natural Aluminum, Gold Tone, and Anthracite Black, and the included stand allows you to either place the unit on a desk or mount it on a wall.
You'll also be able to add an optional speaker case: a gray marl fabric case, available for $325, or a pair of wood cases (oak and dark oak) made from solid pieces of wood, which retail for a budget-friendly $1,650 each.
If the standard $5,800 Beosound Premiere configuration isn't your thing, Bang & Olufsen also offers a “Haute Edition” of the soundbar with “precision-milled grooves resulting from a complex milling process” that takes 17 hours to complete, the company says.
B&O says it's only producing 25 units of the $15,700 Haute Edition soundbars, which will be individually numbered and come with their own certificates of authenticity.
This story is part TechHive's In-Depth Review of the Best Streaming Media Devices.
