LATEST ADDITIONS

January 11, 2007 - Modern A/V systems are so complex, it's easy to miss a setting and end up with an experience that is less than ideal. Setting aspect ratio is a perfect example.

Bang & Olufsen is showing their latest plasma TV product—the Beovision 9, shown here with B&O NA President Kim Gravesen. On the surface, it appears to be just a good 50” plasma with unusually advanced styling, but underneath it’s really far more. B&O claims it’s run by the fastest picture engine in the world. Various parameters (black level, sharpness, white level, etc) are controlled dynamically to maintain an optimum picture regardless of source content. An integrated center channel speaker has an acoustic lens to provide extremely wide horizontal dispersion. Aside from these basics, the Beovision 9 also serves as a home cinema master fully integrating and controlling music files, photos, net radio, and other web media, plus controlling lights, screen, and drapes—all with one remote. An HD video output will drive a projector in a separate dedicated theater. Up to 10 Beolab speakers and 2 subwoofers can be connected simultaneously. It’s not cheap (about $20,000) but then it IS B&O.