Beovision L 5500 / 4500 – Alternative theatre
A classic Bang & Olufsen TV has always been a good investment. However, if you didn’t need the advanced features that Beovision LX had to offer, the alternative TV was the ‘L’ range. It offered same design, same engineering, same quality, but different pricing and different colours.
Beovision L 5500 / 4500 – Alternative theatre
A classic Bang & Olufsen TV has always been a good investment. However, if you didn’t need the advanced features that Beovision LX had to offer, the alternative TV was the ‘L’ range. It offered same design, same engineering, same quality, but different pricing and different colours.
The sound reproduction achieved by Bang & Olufsen’s CD 3500 CD player was truly outstanding. It played both 12cm and 8cm compact discs and had an ingenious ‘step’ function which allowed you to go straight to a chose track selected from anywhere on the disc. The CD player was one of the most technologically-advanced pieces of hi-fi on the market at the time and yet was one of the easiest to operate. The explicit display always indicated what the CD player was doing all the time – for example, which track was being played, and how many tracks there were on the played compact disc.
Beogram CD 3500 could be used as part of the Beosystem 3500 hi-fi system.
It’s better both for your records and for sound quality to play a record the way the master was made – in a straight line from the edge to the centre. This tangential arm record player did just that, giving a far more precise reading of the signals in the groove. The MMC4 cartridge made a vital contribution too; it was feather-weight, with a stylus pressure of only 1,2 grams, giving outstanding sound quality but minimising wear and tear on your records.
There’s more protection too – invaluable for all-night parties. The electronically controlled tangential arm was suspended so that it isolated mechanical vibrations from the cartridge. The suspension chassis was also thoroughly engineered to neutralise vibrations. So keep on dancing – the record player can take it! Beogram 3300 was part of Beosystem 3300 although may be used as a stand-alone item.
One of many tangential decks all utilising the same basic design, the 3300 was noticeable mainly for its grey finish and slightly lurid graphics. Very much a child of the 80s, it was replaced by the 3500 and 4500.
With Beocord VHS 91.2 Bang & Olufsen created a stereo video tape recorder which, in 1987, was close to studio equipment in terms of sound and picture quality. And when it came to design, operation and uses it was a natural, integrated part of home entertainment and communication.
Beocord VHS91.2 could record up to four hours of video or eight hours of stereo hi-fi sound on just the one four-hour tape. And it could of course be remote-controlled regardless of which Bang & Olufsen TV and music system you put it to work with.
The many picture functions included such things as distortion-free single frame pictures, play back just one picture at a time, ‘flickerless’ breaks between recordings and automatic picture search with the help of the tape counter. And Beocord VHS91.2 could also be programmed to record daily or weekly for an unlimited period of time.
With a completely new recording technique and one built-in stereo decoder, Beocord VHS 91.2 provided unlimited possibilities for combining TV, video and music systems, such as recording stereo simulcasts.
In terms of design, colours and uses, Beocord VHS 91.2 was created to harmonise with Beovision MX2000. And the same remote control Terminal could be used to control both units.
Beocord 3500 was part of Beosystem 3500, a budget-priced system for those who wanted to get onto the Bang & Olufsen bandwagon but could not afford, or did not want to have, the extra features that say, Beosystem 4500 had to offer.
It included specifications such as Dolby B Noise Reduction and a Sendust head for longer life of the recording/playback head, otherwise the features were identical to the Beocord 4500. Its only difference was the grey finish instead of its more expensive brother’s polished surfaces.
You had the benefits of the very latest technology with this cassette recorder when it was first introduced. Such as the patented HX Pro recording system which enriched the sound image by giving vastly superior reproduction of the treble range.
You were certain to approve of the wealth of useful features too. For example, if the record finished while you were recording, the tape stopped automatically and restarted automatically when you turn the record over.
When you pressed STOP after a recording, a four-second pause was inserted between tracks with the automatic search system. Clever stuff – all designed to make life easier and more fun. Beocord 3300 was part of Beosystem 3300 although it could also be used as a stand-alone item.
Beocom 2000, the classic telephone from Bang & Olufsen… what else is there to say?
Beocom 2000 was unlike anything which had been introduced by Bang & Olufsen before.
All the parts of the phone were made by the company itself and not imported from other manufacturers. A well-equipped telephone with extraordinary sound quality, a tradition carried on with all of the Beocom range of telephones.
The design is truly timeless. The display gave information on which number your were calling and the time connected. All standard functions were of course, also available, like volume control and numeric memories, and for the more advanced user there was a special headset available!
This phone was also available in a more simple version, Beocom 600, which didn’t have the display but had the same sound quality.
The memory bank of the Beocom 2000 enabled you to store your personal top twenty, and at the touch of just a few buttons you were connected. With display, bass reflex speaker in handset, 20 numbers of memory, quick call key for an often-use or ’emergency’ number, redial of last 3 numbers called, pause function, adjustable volume control, microphone mute (for secrecy), built-in speaker for listening, adjustable tone ringer with 8 settings plus off. There was even a hidden note pad which could be used by raising the lid on the right-hand side of the unit!
Up to 1993 Beocom 2000 was produced with different coloured keys. However, from this time a more mellow design was offered with all the keys complementing each other. On its bright display with large characters the Beocom 2000 could offer you the last three numbers for redialling
BeoCom 1000 was similar to BeoCom 2000 but it was not fitted with a loudspeaker or an LCD display. This lowered the cost while at the same time offering the usual high quality sound There was a choice of four colours: black, blue, green or red.
Bang & Olufsen did not invent the telephone. They just developed it a little further Bang & Olufsen’s Telecom Vision is to “constantly question the ordinary in search of surprising, long-lasting experiences”
Earphone coupling loss factor, receiver loudness rating value and acoustic leakage are technical terms that mean little to most telephone users. They are just some of the things that Bang & Olufsen test for to determine the sound quality of a BeoCom telephone.
The enhanced sound of the BeoCom telephone range is the result of Bang & Olufsen’s long-standing specialisation in the miniaturisation of high-performance loudspeakers. Every BeoCom handset contains a built-in pressure chamber loudspeaker that ensures optimal natural sound reproduction while minimising distortion and sound leakage.
But Bang & Olufsen telephones are not only the result of theoretical calculations and complicated acoustical analyses, the final test is the human ear itself. A listening panel made up of people with an extraordinary sense of hearing provides the most crucial evaluation of BeoCom telephones.
Telephones are used a lot more than other electronic equipment and sometimes under tougher and more hazardous conditions. Design and technological features mean little if your telephone lets you down when you need it most, so the anticipation of what can happen to a telephone has been turned into a fine art at Bang & Olufsen.
Our telephones are exposed to extremes of heat and cold, we spill coffee over them, blow dust at them, step on them and subject them to a whole series of bumps, vibrations and falls.
And it’s not only the unexpected that’s tested for, a robot assesses daily wear and tear by methodically lifting and replacing the handset of a telephone 100,000 times, while a mechanical finger dials telephone numbers over and over again. In a space of days, we simulate the life of a telephone and everything the modern world may throw at it.
Beocord VX4500, Type 4535 was a basic version of the BeoCord VX5000. It lost the digital video effects but looked very similar outwardly.
