BeoLab Penta was the top-of-the-line speaker from Bang & Olufsen. It was around from the late ‘eighties to the mid-1990s and was upgraded several times. The last version of the active Penta was the Penta 3. In the late 1980’s – when the Penta range was introduced – there was also a passive version, Beovox Penta. But since Bang & Olufsen decided in the 1990s just to concentrate on active speakers, these and some other models, such as the Beovox 4500 and most of the RedLine speakers, were discontinued.
Did you know that the display in Penta I and Penta II was orange and and on Penta III it turned green?
Why build amplifiers into the loudspeakers instead of keeping them separate?
Because you can reduce the size of the cabinet volume to one-third of the size of a conventional loudspeaker with the same sound capacity.
The principle is called Active Loudspeakers, and what you get is a compact loudspeaker that can play at high volume without distortion or damage to its drive units. Furthermore, when amplifier, treble and bass units are paired for the same task, they can be tailored to compensate for each other’s shortcomings. What you hear is music that sounds exactly like the instrument it originally came from.
BeoLab Penta had nine individual loudspeaker units that were accurately positioned in a vertical line to produce a sound dispersion which was so precise that reflections from the floor and ceiling were eliminated. Consequently, Penta speakers could be placed almost anywhere in a room, irrespective of its size or furnishings. The operating panel at the base of BeoLab Penta allowed for the fine tuning of the bass reproduction at three levels.
The speaker’s cross section was a pentagon. The benefit of this design was that it cannot house standing waves which normally are a problem in speakers. The choice of using polished stainless steel was made to help the speaker blend into its surroundings by reflecting them. This gave the speaker the same colour as the surroundings which helped to make the speaker more of a subtle fixture,
Sound with as many facets as a diamond
The location of the speakers within the column was carefully planned to control the sound waves so that they weren’t reflected by the floor and ceiling. The resulting sound quality simply beggared description.
BeoLab 150: Controlled overdrive
At the base of BeoLab Penta was the BeoLab 150 amplifier with a power output of 175 watts DIN/IEC. This could give your music a tremendous boost, both to the quality and the actual power output. It was ideal if you love partying but had a relatively small music system. Big power needs careful control – so the amplifier was equipped with Dynamic Soft Clipping system. When there was any overloading, the system softly rounded off the sound; distortion becoming a thing of the past.
Speakers that more than measure up
Top quality music systems need the best speakers available – or you’re missing out. BeoLab Penta was the natural partner for Bang & Olufsen’s Beosystem 5000 and Beocenter 9000, with their built in CD players. The laser-pure quality of compact disc makes heavy demands on speakers, and both these systems had extremely fine amplifiers. Using BeoLab Penta with these systems and you’d enjoy some of the best sounds in the world. You’d also appreciate handy features such as the light display at the base of the column, which indicated which music source was being used. Of course this was even more useful if you installed Beolink® to give you music all over the house.
