I have been a buyer of Bang and Olufsen for years. They have always remained a big option for me when it came to sound and controls. Now granted I have always purchased them at discounted rates, after many months or years in the market. Why? Well, to be honest they have never lived up to the cost they originally asked upon releasing. They always seem to be highly overpriced for the overall ability of the earphones vs others on the market. They either did one or two things higher than most but turn around and have 3 things worse than everyone else. They never could get the complete package right.
Even with my current Bluetooth favorite, the EX, they had years of complaints about battery issues, and connection issues and yet for the majority of the time never fixed them nor dropped these expensive earphones prices down. It wasn’t until years after the release when I found them for amazing deal of $170 that I jumped on them. Along with this came stability in connection and good battery life thanks to this being a later model with better firmware availability. This is the benefit of waiting. The Ex is now arguably the top 1 or 2 earphones on the market even after over 3 years on the market.
But now Bang/Olufsen have announced yet another earphone but this one is going to run you $1500-$1999. That’s right people the world most expensive Bluetooth earphones in the world is by none other than Bang/Olufsen, called Grace. Now, I’m not sure if they are calling it Grace as much as they are asking your for Grace for charging you so much:). So what does this get you. More ANC, and a gimmick tap the side of face by your ear to change tracks. Something other earphones in the past have already done. Now I say $1500-$1999 because according to chats online they want an extra $400 for the leather case.
That’s right for a whooping $400 extra you too can have this styling purse pouch. A case style you have seen on Amazon for years for under $12 is now $400 on top of the $1500 they already want for the earphones. They won’t even include it if you are wondering. So what else besides ANC does the $1500 get you? Dolby atomos sound ability and a tube design with a whooping 4.5 hours of battery life. Once again, nothing we haven’t seen years back and yet for some reason Bang and Olufsen believe they can get away with this for no other reason than their name.
Spoiler alert, this is not going to be a earphone that changes Bluetooth sound and makes IEM’s finally run for cover. In fact I’m willing to bet that the sound quality doesn’t even surpass the Bang/Olufsen Elevens which are only merely marginally better than the EX, but only if you feel that the EX doesn’t deliver enough bass(which it does). In my opinion, I would buy 64 Audio Solo’s or Thieaudio Monarchs V’s, or Vahalla before I would buy a $1500 piece of branding on a outdated designed of a earphone from Bang and Olufsen. IEMs will run circles around every single Bluetooth in the world, not debate and no possible outcome is left when comparing these two formats.
Look at the end of the day it’s your money. But please use common sense. Don’t let any company overcharge you for things that others already do and have been doing, and yet they call it a break through. Don’t let them get away with having no filters or care about overcharging needlessly. The only way companies finally get this is when their wallet is hurt. And at this price they deserve every bit of put down they can get.
Tech-N-Things 