Bang & Olufsen Beosound Balance Review
Bang & Olufsen Beosound Balance
Introduction
Continuing with our coverage of the entire B&O speaker line today we have a review of the Bang & Olufsen Beosound Balance a multi-room speaker with a very high price tag. I’ll tell you right from the start that I’m torn on this one, but that it’s also a very capable hard-hitting speaker with some incredible sound considering it operates by default as a stand-alone unit.
Design
The design of the Balance wireless speaker is not as bold or daring as we say on the Beosound 1&2 lines. I think that’s the point. The futuristic almost Dialek looks of the Beosound 2 can be polarising and not suitable for all environments. The Balance is safer, more forgiving, and less jarring to the eyes. It blends in with the environments of neutral-toned rooms. It’s softer and less of a statement yet it’s still beautifully constructed.
For me it’s when I’m split, I like the all-metal cone bodies of the Beosound 1&2. It feels like a spaceship, a toy from my youth. The Beosound Balance drops the metal and replaces it with wood and fabric. The cord is color matched to the body its shape is cylindrical rather than conical.
The top of the unit is a huge glass panel with transparent capacitive touch controls. This is where you can change stations, tracks, volume, etc when not wanting to fumble for your phone or another source device. It’s easy to use, reacts instantly, and most importantly accessible in its location.
The midsection is the body of the unit and this houses the 0.75-inch tweeter just like the one on the Beosound 1 but then we get to the tricks up the Balances’ sleeve. The differentiation here is the space in the balance, from not sharing the conical design, allows for more speakers. A lot more. Peeling back the fabric grill cover, deep in the housing sits 2 2-inch full-range drivers, 2 3-inch full-range drivers, and an insane 7 class D amplifier.
That alone would be crazy enough before moving on to the beautiful solid oak base where we have 2 monstrous 5.25-inch drivers tuned to act as subwoofers. Strangely this speaker starts to look like good value when compared against the 1 & 2 Beosounds. More drivers, bigger drivers, and more power to drive them all.
Functionality
Having tested the Beosound 1, Beosound 2, and Beoplay A9 all at the same time I have to say Bang & Olufsen have made using the speakers together in a multi-room home audio system a joy. The Beolink app available on Apple’s App Store and the Google Play Store makes connecting and controlling different speakers in the B&O family a breeze. They really focussed on getting the user experience right and it’s one of the most intuitive software solutions I have seen from any major manufacturer.
To add further control of the device you can connect to google to make the Balance works as a google assistant speaker. It adds a range of functions like controlling google home as well as your usual music playback functions. Testing it in open spaces surprised me as to how well the speaker picked up my voice, I would say it’s comparable to how loud you would have to be when speaking to someone at a similar distance so the microphones do a great job.
Bang & Olufsen continue to flex their useful software with the adaptive room function. The speaker basically scans the environment and location in the room and adjusts the sound output to optimize performance. Furthermore, if you buy two Balance speakers you can pair them in stereo to create a monstrous HiFi system without the need for external amplification. The two speakers will sense their spacing and adapt to create a linear sound profile.
Out of all the Beo speakers we have tested here at Stozz Audio this has the most advanced Bluetooth (currently at 5.0) so there is better latency performance. The wifi standards are 2.4 and 5 GHz and you can also input direct via ethernet and 3.5mm auxiliary cable.
Sound
I didn’t think the Beosound 1 or 2 lacked any juice but when it comes to just pure fullness and depth the Balance is in a different league. It absolutely envelops a room with sound and given my testing space was over 100m it filled it so well it was hard to detect where the sound was coming from. This is a big-sounding unit despite its diminutive size.
Distortion was nonexistent even in excess of 90% volume. At that point things are so incredibly loud you would need to be a significant distance away from it to enjoy the music.
Bass hits hard, almost on a par with my own Devialet Phantom 108db. It rumbles and thumps providing adequate sub-bass while keeping composure and staying distinctly separate from the mids. Its dynamic bass is punchy when it needs to be but also articulate and rich when required.
The midrange is clean spacious and detailed. It’s a musical-sounding speaker that fills up the space more than the Beosound 2 thanks to the extra layer of midrange drivers. This helps with the one aspect lacking in that model. Male vocals. There is now more gravitas and power with a man’s voice, impactful and deep. Yet at the same time, the excellent tuning and presentation of female vocals are retained.
The speaker works well with every genre, nothing feels lacking, and for its size, I’m sorely tempted to say it’s the best-sounding speaker in its category.
With all that said it’s not going to match a Hifi system with dedicated speakers and amps. I could put together a seriously powerful audiophile system for a fraction of the price but at the same time, the Balance is not trying to compete in that area. Let’s not forget that this incredible sound is coming from something just a bit bigger than a soccer ball.
Our Verdict
Again it comes down to price. If you have the money and are looking for something that can fill a room with sound while not taking up the same amount of space as floor-standing speakers this is it. The styling I think is more neutral than other Beosound and Beoplay models but with the more traditional shape comes to the space to utilize more drivers and thus creating one of their best-sounding models.
Official Website of B&O Beosound Balance: www.bang-olufsen.com
