Bang & Olufsen’s bank-breaking Beolab 90 lands in SA from 28 November

So you think you’re serious about your sound systems? Unless you’re seriously eying Bang & Olufsen’s newly-announced Beolab 90 you’re just deluding yourself.

The company’s 90th anniversary speaker is a monster, weighing in at 137kg. The weight is to be expected from a unit that features 18 drivers, 18 amps (one per driver) and two digital signal processors, really. The Beolab 90 uses something called Beam Width Control to manage where optimum sound should be placed but it’ll also automatically manage your rooms to place perfect sound where you’d like it. This is called Active Room Compensation and it takes into account walls, furniture, the phases of the moon, etc. in order to give you accurate sound reproduction.

And now serious audio nuts can peer into the depths of their bank accounts hoping to raise enough cash to actually buy one of these things, because they’re available in South Africa. Or rather, they will be. From 28 November the Beolab 90 will be on display at the Bang & Olufsen store in Melrose Arch in Johannesburg, with the first deliveries of the speaker system happening from the end of January.

And you’d better believe that there’s going to be a wait, as you’ll be shelling out R595,000 for a Beolab 90. Yes, that’s correct. No, there are no extra zeroes. Yes, we wish we had the cash to grab one of these smart, omni-directional speakers.