Bang
and Olufsen's BeoPlay A6
Luxury
audiovisual brand Bang & Olufsen (B&O) has just announced a pricey
wireless speaker, the $999 BeoPlay A6. The style evokes the back of a chair,
gently curving and covered in designer fabric from Danish studio Kvadrat.
Apparently, this isn't all about looks, though. B&O says its unique shape
"enables sound to fill an entire room whilst creating ambience in multiple
areas of a house." The interface for the A6 is pretty interesting too.
It's all based around swiping and tapping the top of the speaker. A swipe
right, for example, turns the volume up. Holding the center mutes, and a quick
tap skips the track. Perhaps not the most intuitive control scheme ever, but a
cool talking point nonetheless.
Inside
the BeoPlay A6 there's a pair of 60-watt 5.5-inch woofers, a pair of 30-watt
0.75-inch tweeters, and a single 60-watt 1.5-inch "full-range"
speaker, each with its own amplifier. That full-range unit's actually
positioned in the opposite direction to the others; B&O says that
"allows us to maximize the spaciousness of the sound you experience,"
which is another way of saying that they're bouncing sound off the wall behind
the speaker. That music can come from a number of sources: It supports AirPlay,
DLNA, Bluetooth and has "integrated access" to streaming services
like Spotify, Deezer and TuneIn radio. Of course, it'll also play nice with the
company's new multi-room setup, allowing you to look down on those
"cheap" Sonos users from your penthouse.
So
there you have it. B&O has made a very pricey take on the wireless speaker.
It looks very attractive; it probably sounds good; and it costs a small fortune
by regular standards (although it's a fair bit cheaper than some of its other
products).
