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B&O Speakers-Opinons?

nelsress

nelsress

Super Member
On Saturday evening I got a call from an antique dealer friend of mine who told me he had some speakers for me. He told me a year or so ago that he had some B&O speakers in one of his storage facilities but he wasn't sure where and asked if I'd be interested in them. I told him I'd like to see them. Well, this morning I met up with him and he had a pair of Beovox 3702 speakersin excellent condition in their original box and styrofoam fitted packing material, a pair of Beovox 4703 speakers, also in excellent condition and a pair of Beovox P30 speakers in very good condition intended to be wall mounted.

I realize that B&O audio equipment doesn't get a lot of love from most folks seriously into audio, but I also know that there are some fans of B&O out there. Personally, I've owned a couple of their turntables and got great service from them so I believe theirs to be serious audio equipment.

Does anyone have any idea if any of these three pairs of speakers are any good? Has anyone reading this ever heard any of them? I haven't had the time to test them yet but was just wondering about others' opinions on them. Thanks in advance for any info any of you can provide.
 
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Just had a quick look on Google. The 3702 have philips tweeter, goodmans mid, and what looks like peerless woofers. Depending on how well the crossovers have faired, they have potential to be very good indeed. The 4703 seems to also have good drivers, I believe the tweeters are Seas, iv seen the mids before and I'm thinking Peerless again but not 100% on that. The P30 looks like it has the same Seas tweeter but with a philips woofer. All in all a potentially excellent haul at the right price :-)
 
Thanks 2ndtime, I've been playing the 4703 pair in my shop all week, they sound pretty good and the surrounds in the woofers appear to be rubber so they're in good shape that way. The 3702 and 4703 speakers have grills held on with magnets, which is a nice feature. Both of those pair have the speaker wires hard-wired inside the cabinets. The P30 pair however have no wires but have a strange plug on the back that I believe has three prongs on the back that I've not seen before, presumably to attach a speaker cable?

I haven't gotten around to listening to the 3702 pair yet but I expect they'll sound somewhat similar to the 4703 pair. And until I find a source for the proper speaker wires, I won't be able to test the P30 pair out. On a down note, it appears I've broken the things that hold the grills on the P30s as I can't get the grill to go back on and stay put. I don't know if the price was right but seemed reasonable to me at $145 for the three pair and judging from how just the one pair sounds, I feel I did okay and am satisfied.
 
B&o

As a big supporter of the brand i have a complete setup with a 6000 receiver and a 8004 cassette deck a Beogram 8002 and a set of S75 speakers. We sold B&O back in the day and their speakers always sounded good. Well made and a design that matched their equip. You cant go wrong the will give you good service for your money. Tight bass solid mid range and accurate highs.
 
I have a pair of 3702's. They had the Goodman's midranges but one was bad. Kind of hard to find anywhere close to home but I discovered that there were at least two versions of 3702's. Another version used a SEAS mid which fit's into the same cutout and back cup. Got a pair of the locally. I think the crossover was slightly different between the version, but they sound very nice with just the driver swap. Quite smooth and easy listening.

John
 
Carefull Beo stuff is 'stylish'
It was intended to be. Their Avaricious (Legality skirting) pricing policies are designed to keep the Prices exhorbitantly high.
High Price = Good.. right?
Truth is their stuff is Mid Fi.. pretty but inarguably mid fi .
Any gear that costs as much as Beo is a whole world better sounding/performing.. true, like it or not.

That said: IF you can get it for Peanuts? Fill yer boots :-)
Just don't be foolishly paying large in anticipation.
 
bare said:
Carefull Beo stuff is 'stylish'
It was intended to be. Their Avaricious (Legality skirting) pricing policies are designed to keep the Prices exhorbitantly high.
High Price = Good.. right?
Truth is their stuff is Mid Fi.. pretty but inarguably mid fi .
Any gear that costs as much as Beo is a whole world better sounding/performing.. true, like it or not.

That said: IF you can get it for Peanuts? Fill yer boots :-)
Just don't be foolishly paying large in anticipation.
Click to expand...

I think the older B&O speakers can be an excellent value, even a steal sometimes.
 
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The B&O pieces I had experience with sounded good, were well designed and made. Sound was quite good. Did have a problem with their pricing, though. Seemed quite overpriced. But then again many find McIntosh quite overpriced whereas I do not for much of their equipment. Value is in the eyes of the beholder.
 
Back in the day, their entry level tables were around $200. I seem to remember us selling RX's for $195. MMC 5 was $60 but was usually discounted with a turntable purchase as they had a $19 cost. So you are looking at about $235-$250 when the average Jap table sold for about $150 plus another $40 or so for an average cartridge. So you are looking at about a $40-$50 difference to move to a B&O. Many people thought it was well worth it.

I would agree that most of their receivers were pretty much mid-fi with the exception of the 6000 and 8000. They were something special, especially the 8000.
 
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very under-rated

I'll admit their pricing has always been high and is now strataspheric. But with some notable exceptions - they've produced well designed and built products -just REAL expensive. On the used market it's a differnt story - if you can find working models ( not a whole bunch of experienced B&O techs out there) -there is some fine sounding well built equipment out there for about a 1/10th. of what it sold for at retail.
Their speakers are IMO very under rated.
 
My brother in law had a complete B&O setup with S45 speakers, a smaller 3 way design, they sounded excellent, as someone said they use top quality drivers and are well designed, pricey when new but good value used IMO.
 
I have two sets of B&O speakers., S-45/2's and S-75's, they both sound nice but the S-45/2's do sound better than the 75's. They both look great with rosewood and quality drivers but I don't see them replacing anything I currently have in use.
 
I used to sell the stuff. I never owned it because they were too expensive. Much of the price was for the "art". Back then I didn't care about that stuff. I was a kid. I could get better sound quality (if not the appearance) for the same price. But I would not say they are not fantastic speakers, when applied as intended.

And your comment about "most folks seriously into audio" cracked me up. One can be seriously into audio equipment, but not really into the music, and vice-versa. Or a mix. I took my grandson to the Axpona audio show in Chicago this year and one of the things I warned him about was that all the "esoteric" system demos will be using weird and unheard of music to demo their stuff because it's not really about the music, but about the recording quality to show off the equipment. He commented about it after every display.

I used to be an audiophile. I still have a ton of records I call "Bad music recorded really well." I eventually got into the music and now I'm a little of both.

The B&O speakers are not only good sounding, but look really cool and unique. They are a wonderful niche product, especially now.
 
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