Lexicon BD-30 is a Oppo BDP-83

[Frank Harvey]

hmtb:I'm not sure all the things David listed as possible reasons for the price can be accepted in a scenario where the machine being "manufactured" (used very loosely) has simply been dropped into a different casing (if this indeed the case), largely unchanged from another manufacturer (not used loosely).

Some of those I mentioned were referring to manufacturers in general who make their own players based on existing ones. I wasn't saying that Lexicon have done this in this case. In most cases, except this one it seems, there are many extra 'processes these manufacturers have to go through - their own software, casing, chassis, sometimes transformer and circuitry tweaks etc all cost time and money. Anything like this will cost more in the US and the UK than done anywhere else, so will add far more to the cost than if performed in countries like Malaysia and China for example. R&D are one of the main consumers of time, and money.

 

[Big Aura]

from my scan of the article - going to read it properly later, it seems they didn't do anything other than cosmetic. There's a difference between re-working another product, and simply sticking a different cover/badge and charging an extra 3k.

 

[Anonymous]

FrankHarveyHiFi "What I'm trying to get at it that you don't know the full process for a manufacturer to produce a Bluray player, whether it's built by them from the ground up, or more commonly, based on an existing player. There's far more to it than most people think"

If it is not built by them ground up, it depends how much they alter the stock design. It could be as simple as reading the spec sheet, signing a contract with the original manufacture, which will stipulate a minimum price they can sell at, so they do not undercut the orignal manufacturer. Paying THX to certify it. Branding, packaging and promotion. Or as complex as major new engineerign design and testing. Since even hi-end products that have been improved beyond the standard design usually only involve swapping out components with functionally identical components, that may be higher rated, and cost a few $10s or $100s dollars more, I doubt many hi-end manufactures have much in the way of R&D departments.

Somepeople are willing to pay extra for styling or buy into claims of improved performance. Many hi-end manufactures are open about what their kit is based on. Go into great detail about how their version is different to the stock design it is based on. How they believe they have improved the products performance and styling and generally added value to it. The problem with Lexicon`s situation is they led people to believe they had improved the performance of the stock design. But appear to have only added branding and styling.

FrankHarveyHiFi "Far from it, we're here to be unbiased by recommending products that suit the customer's needs. There are no secrets. If this was easy, and everyone knew it all, there'd be no forums and no need for retailers"

I can think of one obvious secret. Trade prices. The markup on an Oppo I expect is alot less than on a Lexicon. The claims of improved performance by the Lexicon enabled it to be honestly recommended by dealers as a superior product. I expect custom installers who recommend Lexicon products would have been the worse effected by this if it had come out latter rather than now, due to accusations of having had a vested intrest in recommending the product with the highest dealer markup. When they would have been just as in the dark as the end customers.

 

[John Duncan]

Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the Townshend TA565CD...

(a Pioneer in a different box)

 

[The_Lhc]

JohnDuncan:Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the Townshend TA565CD...

(a Pioneer in a different box)

Box being the operative word. What is it, cardboard?

 

[Big Aura]

JohnDuncan:Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the Townshend TA565CD... (a Pioneer in a different box)Very kind! Your subscription department should have my home address for postage. Thanks again.

 

[hammill]

The hometheatrerreview review is very funny.Apparently, sticking a player inside another box gives it a "a more natural contrast and color palette" Worth $3000 of anyones money. Of course, Hifi does not suffer from the placebo effect.... Many of the members of this forum will tell you that because others cannot see/hear differences between cables,stands etc it is due to their inexperience and/or lack of a hifi "palatte". I bet they would find the Lexicon had a far superior picture, particularly if they had bought one.

 

[Frank Harvey]

I'm not saying that Lexicon have built this from the ground up - I'm making a general point, which I have been from the start. I haven't once defended Lexicon, as I don't know the story. I'll only comment on something specific if I know the facts.

All manufacturers have an R&D department - do you think they just cobble it all together and hope for the best?

Of course trade prices are a secret! Regardless of the margin a dealer makes on a specific product, everyone would moan the retailer is making too much - I've seen all that on the 'other forum' - if you told them we made 5% they'd complain of excessive profit margins. Trade prices vary from manufacturer to manufacturer, product to product. As it stands, the customer doesn't need to know trade prices, it's a confidential thing. Walk into JD Sports, pick up a pair of Timberland boots and ask them the trade price, see what they say. This industry is going down the pan because of lack of profit. There's been enough dealers lost to this - if profit margins get any lower, you'll be left with about 10 stores in the UK. Then prices would go up. Anybody want that?

 

[Anonymous]

david its been known for twenty years that only two companies supplied cd drive mechanisms ie sony and philips and that what companies like marantz arcam rega and so forth did was change the dacs and other parts of the circuitry but not the drives

this appears to be a case where its the original unit just repackaged so its different if the story is true

the oppo unit is used in a few other companies units but they make substantial changes which apparently in this case lexicon havent

also lexicon is an hk company and theyve naturally used hk components before but this appears to be substantially different

 

[Anonymous]

FrankHarveyHiFi:

All manufacturers have an R&D department - do you think they just cobble it all together and hope for the best?

Depends on your definition of an R&D department. Hi-end AV manufactures have R&D departments so they can make claims about improved performance and cutting edge design. But they don`t need an R&D department to read someone elses spec sheet and repackage and rebrand their products or buy in bulk and have the supplier brand them and just have to package them like some specialist cable manufactures. They also do not need an R&D department to replace functionally identical components with more expensive components and claim improved performance. Manufacturing hi-end AV that looks prettier and cliams superior performance for the discerning customer seems to be more about creating a brand identity, marketing, and catering to customers egos, than making technological advances to the quality of AV products. You need an R&D department to develope new innovative products, real R&D is an expensive and high risk investment.

As for the customer does not need to know trade prices. In theory the custom installer - dealer reliance on word of mouth recommendations and referalls from existing customers should keep them honest. But being cynical I think it would depend on how much money I was spending and how much I was relying on the impartial advice of the custom installer- dealer whose impartiality I might doubt if there are massive differnces in markups between products. But then thats just me, other people may have more faith in human nature, or so much money they do not care.

 

[Frank Harvey]

Thanks one off, but having been in this industry for 20 years I'm fully aware of that and everything else you've stated.

knightout:Depends on your definition of an R&D department. Hi-end AV manufactures have R&D departments so they can make claims about improved performance and cutting edge design. But they don`t need an R&D department to read someone elses spec sheet and repackage and rebrand their products or buy in bulk and have the supplier brand them and just have to package them like some specialist cable manufactures.

I'm sure small hi-fi companies can keep a whole department and pay them all a salary just for fun.....

Manufacturing hi-end AV that looks prettier and cliams superior performance for the discerning customer seems to be more about creating a brand identity, marketing, and catering to customers egos, than making technological advances to the quality of AV products. You need an R&D department to develope new innovative products, real R&D is an expensive and high risk investment.

Next you'll be telling me that all Yamaha do to a Z7 to make it a Z11 is add 4 extra channels.

 

[professorhat]

It does make me laugh how people assume they know everything there is
to know about how a company rip people off because all they do is "replace functionally identical components with more expensive components and claim improved performance". So, you admit you don't really know anything about this apart from what you've read in a review, but you're more than willing to state the "fact" they've done no R&D, (in fact claim they don't even have an R&D department), but all they've done is just ripped some bits out, put some new stuff in and blindly hope it's going to work?

It's like those who say this piece of wire only costs a few pounds to make yourself, and yet they'll charge you £50 for it - what a rip off! Because clearly, in any industry, it's always the raw materials which are the highest overhead. People and salaries are cheap as chips! When I'm budgeting for an IT project, I generally don't even worry about how much it'll cost to resource a project because the cost is so low. (I wonder why my budgets are always so vastly under estimated...

)

 

[Anonymous]

A short note of thanks to knightout for a continuously well-reasoned and argued series of points across his many posts on this subject.

 

[John Duncan]

knightout:Hi-end AV manufactures have R&D departments so they can make claims about improved performance and cutting edge design.

No. That's what the marketing department are for. Strangely enough, the function of an R&D department tends to be actually improving performance and cutting edge design.

 

[Anonymous]

FrankHarveyHiFi:

I'm sure small hi-fi companies can keep a whole department and pay them all a salary just for fun.....

Next you'll be telling me that all Yamaha do to a Z7 to make it a Z11 is add 4 extra channels.

Lexicon production staff going by the photo in the dealer sheet is what 6 people. How big do you think their R&D department is? According to your previous post it is too small to fund a bottom up design solution so has to upgrade others designs, now it has an entire department, doing what?

Yamaha has a turnover in excess of 10 billion dollars, I would not put it in the same category as small niche high-end av manufactures. Lexicon is owned by Harman International which has a turnover in excess of 2 billion dollars, so its parent company is not small fry. Maybe they could fund their own engineering design team and manufacaturing in the USA if they wanted to.

 

[Anonymous]

JohnDuncan:knightout:Hi-end AV manufactures have R&D departments so they can make claims about improved performance and cutting edge design. No. That's what the marketing department are for. Strangely enough, the function of an R&D department tends to be actually improving performance and cutting edge design.

I judge an R&D deparments ability to improve performance and cutting edge design. How many first class honors degrees in engineering, and given the claims by some specialist manufactures cutting edge designs physics, do they employe, to be at the cutting edge of innovation usually requires the best brains. Documented proof of improved performance and innovative designs. How many white papers it has published in peer reviewed technical journals. How highly regarded it is by its peers as a leader in technical know how and inovation. How many patents has it filed. How many companys are paying it license fees for using those patents.

Replacing components with more expensive components or spreading out or tidying up the internal layout maybe upgrading a product, it might even improve performance. But it is not cutting edge or innovative. I would describe it as basic engineering.

I have worked for a engineering company with a world class R&D department, filled with Phds, multi-discipline experts from around the world with salaries to match. The level of R&D these hi-end av manufactures do would be the job of a technician, checked by or at a stretch done by a production line engineer.

 

[hammill]

professorhat:

It does make me laugh how people assume they know everything there is to know about how a company rip people off because all they do is "replace functionally identical components with more expensive components and claim improved performance". So, you admit you don't really know anything about this apart from what you've read in a review, but you're more than willing to state the "fact" they've done no R&D, (in fact claim they don't even have an R&D department), but all they've done is just ripped some bits out, put some new stuff in and blindly hope it's going to work?

It's like those who say this piece of wire only costs a few pounds to make yourself, and yet they'll charge you £50 for it - what a rip off! Because clearly, in any industry, it's always the raw materials which are the highest overhead. People and salaries are cheap as chips! When I'm budgeting for an IT project, I generally don't even worry about how much it'll cost to resource a project because the cost is so low. (I wonder why my budgets are always so vastly under estimated...

)

As a software engineer, I could not fail to agree with much of what you have written, but I think what has happened in this case is different. I work for a small part of a largeish company that produces what I think is a good product. The product is specialised and sells a few thousand copies. We charge considerably more per license than Microsoft do for E.G. Office, even though ours is far less sophisticated product because although our overall development costs are much lower than Office, our costs per product are much higher. The reason we sell is that no mass market product addresses our area of expertise and our prices are perfectly legitimate.

Now imagine if we persuaded Microsoft to let us sell Office rebranded with our company name. All we do is change all occurances of Microsoft to that of our company. We then sell this new Office at a similar price to our own product - ten times as much as normal Office. This would be blatently obvious, a rip off and commercial suicide. It seems to be the case that what Lexicon have done is the equivalent to this and they deserve all the abuse they are receiving.

 

[hammill]

knightout:

JohnDuncan:knightout:Hi-end AV manufactures have R&D departments so they can make claims about improved performance and cutting edge design. No. That's what the marketing department are for. Strangely enough, the function of an R&D department tends to be actually improving performance and cutting edge design.

I judge an R&D deparments ability to improve performance and cutting edge design. Documented proof of improved performance and innovative products. How many white papers it has published in peer reviewed technical journals. How highly regarded it is by its peers as a leader in technical know how and inovation. How many patents it has filed. How many companys are paying it license fees for using their patents.

Replacing components with more expensive components or spreading out or tidying up the internal layout maybe upgrading a product, it might even improve performance. But it is not cutting edge or innovative. I would describe it as basic engineering.
I don't know, they have cut some very nice edges on that aluminium case.......

 

[Tom Moreno]

I think generally most high-end hi-fi companies take OEM kits and make significant contributions to the design that differentiate it from the rest of the pack. Reading this particular review, it seems as though Lexicon got a little lazy this time round and got caught with their pants down. I am personally more interested in seeing what the follow up to this exposure ends up being. Will they throw their hands up in the air, own their guilt, and do something to remedy the situation or will they continue to scream their innocence in the face of pretty damning evidence without presenting conclusive evidence to back their own position? It doesn't exactly bode well that THX seems to have disowned the product by removing mention of it on their site.

 

[Anonymous]

professorhat:

It does make me laugh how people assume they know everything there is to know about how a company rip people off because all they do is "replace functionally identical components with more expensive components and claim improved performance".

The reason I say replacing functionally identical components and claimed improvement. When a blu-ray player upgrade involves more than changing the box it typically centers around the power supply and audio/video isolation. So you have two players both using the same disc drive, both using the same chipsets, and both using the same software. But one has a cleaner power supply and better isolation between video and audio, is the improvement measurable on the circuit board? I would expect yes. Is the improvement measureable at the screen and at the speaker? Is the improvement perceivable by humans? The manufacturer usually claims subtle but significant improvements that matter to those who really care about getting the best quality. Subjective reviewers may rave about night and day differences. But some manufactures also claim the improvements are not measurable but are perceiveable, but not by everyone. The manufactures are also generally opposed to double blind testing and disagree with current scientific understanding of what is a perceiveable difference. In the old days when a DVD player upgrade involved giving a player that previously only had a scart output, SDI output, the improvement was measureable at the screen and readily apparant to the viewer. Nowadays the improvements are often claimed but rarely proven.

It is not like they are upgrading a ultra-budget player with alot of room for improved performance, or changing components that should have an obvious effect on performance like the chipset. They are upgrading a already highly regarded player by changing components that if the original design was competent should have no effect on performance. You can be talking about possibly measurable maybe not perceivable improvements to the analogue audio outputs on a player virtually everyone uses the digital outputs on, and possibly measureable but irrelevent in the digital domain improvements on the digital video and digital audio outputs. Since hi-end manufactures do not usually provide measured results for their improvements and rely instead on subjective reviews, and it turns out at least one apears to have only changed the box, you are not even guaranteed these dubious improvements.

professorhat:

It's like those who say this piece of wire only costs a few pounds to make yourself, and yet they'll charge you £50 for it - what a rip off! Because clearly, in any industry, it's always the raw materials which are the highest overhead. People and salaries are cheap as chips! When I'm budgeting for an IT project, I generally don't even worry about how much it'll cost to resource a project because the cost is so low. (I wonder why my budgets are always so vastly under estimated...

)

Some specialist av cable manufactures appear to be little more than glorified wholesalers, they pick a cable and buy it in bulk giving them the ability to have the supplier brand the products however they want. Then package it and sell it at a huge markup. A company that actually does manufacturing has overheads in equipment costs, staff and energy bills. That is why it is mostly subcontracted out to the far-east.

Some companys like enthusiast satellite equipment shops get their own satellite receivers built in the far east to their desired specification, they know what they and their customers want in terms of performance, versatility and price. Nothing wrong with that. Same for small av companys catering for a demand in the market. Like seperate box video scalers/processors that you can use test discs in and see how they have effected the picture quality

Hi-end av strikes me like designer label fashion, it is fine if the person buying it, is doing so because they like the look, styling, brand, are buying into the lifestyle - image. They are usually also on safe grounds when they claim the designer label gear is better made from higher quality stuff, or has better warranty and customer support. It is the claims of improved performance for the discerning customer, defended against those who can not see or hear the difference as being because they lack the refined tastes of their betters, that I think is questionable. If they can back up these claims with proof great, if they can not beyond subjective opinion, I think they are mainly in the business of flattering the egos of their customers. When you are in the business of flattering the egos of your customers you damn well better not make your customers look or feel stupid which is what Lexicon appears to have done. Purchasers want pride in their purchase, or bragging rights, not to feel conned and look foolish. They should have changed something other than just the box to lend credence to the perceived improvement in picture and sound quality.

 

[Frank Harvey]

knightout:Lexicon production staff going by the photo in the dealer sheet is what 6 people. How big do you think their R&D department is? According to your previous post it is too small to fund a bottom up design solution so has to upgrade others designs, now it has an entire department, doing what?

Other stuff.

Yamaha has a turnover in excess of 10 billion dollars, I would not put it in the same category as small niche high-end av manufactures. Lexicon is owned by Harman International which has a turnover in excess of 2 billion dollars, so its parent company is not small fry. Maybe they could fund their own engineering design team and manufacaturing in the USA if they wanted to.

Even though these companies are owned by other companies, that doesn't mean they have that other company's resources at their disposal. These smaller companies are run in exactly the same way as they were before these other companies bought them, and have to suvive on their own merits. Lexicon is still a small company. Yamaha electronics had to merge with Yamah Music because it was so small - they never even used to keep any stock in the UK - it'd be distributed out once it hit customs in the UK. Yamaha as a global company pretty much make everything and anything you can think of, but the hi-fi/AV side is miniscule in comparison to all that, and again, has to survive on it's own. Lexicon are not different. After visiting Yamaha UK's HQ recently, I'd say Lexicon are a smaller company.

Lexicon do run their own R&D department and manufacture their own stuff in the US, hance part of the higher prices of their own equipment.

 

[Anonymous]

I have mellowed my opinion on this from original outrage at the gall, to perhaps a better comprehension of the how it might of come to happen.

I think Lexiconn were attempting to provide their end customers with what they wanted, a prestige product with a good level of performance and support. Even rebranding and repacking a product and supplying warranty and customer support is going to cost more than just saying buy an Oppo, and Lexicon customers may not have wanted a blu-ray player from a brand they have never heard off and that does not match the rest of their system, they want a complete solution.

With high-end custom installs part of that prestige comes from the list price. But since they sell through custom installers, who I would expect budget and price for a complete solution, how many end customers would have paid anywhere near full list price for the complete solution. The high markup on the player might benefit the dealer, but more often I expect the customer who thinks they have got a great deal on the complete solution, while the dealer is still making enough of a markup to make a living. The list price even at $3500 is significantly less than some of their compeditors offerings and the prestige market is price sensitive, but not in the I want the cheapest player I can get direction of the rest of the market, more in a I want the best and am happy to pay for quality, if it is cheap it must be rubbish direction

They should have upgraded the internals of the player or had a much lower list price. But I expect the not upgrading the internals was an issue of expediance in getting the product to market and their high regard for the Oppo`s performance not a deliberate attempt to maximum profits at the customers expense. Afterall how much extra would it have cost them to upgrade some of the internal components, which is afterall the only thing most of their compeditors are doing to the same player. Their compeditors will be later to market, but rushing to market with a prestige blu-ray player is what has got Lexicon in to this situation in the first place.

So naivety rather than skulldugery. Ofcourse if you believe that the hardware modifications of their compeditors versions of the Oppo are going to offer significant leaps in performance, and the price tag was about performance not prestige, then you will still be outraged.

 

[Anonymous]

Normally I find David from Frank Harvey Hi-Fi's opinions and advice helpful and sensible. But in this case I think his comments may be influence by the fact that he lists Lexicon amongst the product his company sells! Looking at the pics in the review there is little doubt that Lexicon have pulled a fast one. As an owner of an Oppo player I can confirm that it is a top notch Blu Ray player (I am using Classe amps and B&W 802D & HDM1D speakers) that is able to deliver really good picture and sound. But really, even if it costs a bit (or even a lot - $500 - $750) for a good quality aluminum case - how can that justify $3000 extra! David, lets get real about this and stop defending the indefensible - maybe you should mention that your company sells Lexicon products and declare that you have a conflict of interest. The high end could really get a bad name from this!!

 

[Andrew Everard]

All the brands stocked by Frank Harvey HiFi are listed in David's biography, in accordance with House Rules.

 

[hammill]

johnbutler:Normally I find David from Frank Harvey Hi-Fi's opinions and advice helpful and sensible. But in this case I think his comments may be influence by the fact that he lists Lexicon amongst the product his company sells! Looking at the pics in the review there is little doubt that Lexicon have pulled a fast one. As an owner of an Oppo player I can confirm that it is a top notch Blu Ray player (I am using Classe amps and B&W 802D & HDM1D speakers) that is able to deliver really good picture and sound. But really, even if it costs a bit (or even a lot - $500 - $750) for a good quality aluminum case - how can that justify $3000 extra! David, lets get real about this and stop defending the indefensible - maybe you should mention that your company sells Lexicon products and declare that you have a conflict of interest. The high end could really get a bad name from this!!
I agree on all points. I have an Oppo and am very pleased with it. The build quality is good - not quite up to my Kuro but that is hardly surprising and the picture and sound are top notch. The Lexicon thing is a disgrace and I don't trust anyone from the industry who tries to defend them - unless they provide evidence that the other forums story is untrue.