Lexicon BD-30 Blu-ray Player (Oppo BDP-83 Clone) Review

majorloser

majorloser

Moderator
Hey guys this is all fascinating stuff but you should probably ask permission before posting private emails. It's always a pet peeve of mine when someone posts a personal email response I gave to them on AVS or other forums especially if its used out of context. This is indeed a strange situation as we weren't even aware of their review prior to publishing ours.
Maybe so, but an e-mail can be considered a legal written document. If you want it confidential it needs to be stated.

If a company representative responds to a member of the "public" via e-mail, then I would consider it a public statement. Also, any e-mail sent from a "company" computer or from a "company" e-mail address could very well be supeonaed in court. In those instances you are speaking on behalf of the company or doing something behind their backs on company time. Either way, you lose.
 
jliedeka

jliedeka

Audioholic General
I agree that you can't change the mind of an audiophool. Just like religion and politics, I've learned that is a waste of time to try to argue with someone about audio quality. People have belief systems (appropriately abbreviated as BS) that filter any new information from getting in.

Jim
 
F

fatherom

Audiophyte
I asked Gene to delete my posts that contained Jerry's email. Even though I think he's a tool, I prob shouldn't have posted a private email.

If others who quoted my post (jinjuku, martmann, and others) could also delete the quoted email, it would be much appreciated.

Thanks! :)

Chris
 
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fitzcaraldo215

Enthusiast
Scandal

There is nothing like a good scandal, and this is certainly one. I do not feel bad for Harman, who allowed this, though I am sorry for the damage it might do to Lexicon owners, unless Lexicon somehow survives. But, Lexicon's management are unscrupulous idiots for thinking they could get away with this. They deserve whatever punishment they get. That's not true, I am sure of many Lexicon employees, if the company does not survive.

But, I love what this does to Home Theater Review, Jerry Del Colliano, and Ken Taraszka, M.D., their principal reviewer. Ken, M.D. is the guy who wrote the glowing review of the Lexicon, published a little over a week ago. I used to hang out over there years ago before I learned of better, more credible reviews and forums on the web, like this one. I quickly became aware that they were lightweights, but I was unaware of much better at the time. I PM'd Ken, M.D. many times with well-intended, constructive criticism of his reviews, but he was always highly defensive. Now, they do not have a leg to stand on. All their past and future reviews now come into question, as they should have long ago. I hope they enjoy their well deserved black eye.

I guess it makes one reflect on the high end in general. There are many dedicated, honest manufacturers, reviewers and even sales people out there, but there has always been a bunch of cynical bastards who inhabit it, as well. This incident confirms many audiophiles' worst fears about at least part of the high end: that it has no problems selling overpriced snake oil. (Hey, at least they chose a great player in the Oppo.) There is a lot more of it out there, as we all know, but seldom is it caught red handed like this. I love it. Will the baddies learn a lesson from this, though? I doubt it. They will just realize they have to be a little smarter about it next time.

Meanwhile, thanks to the good folks at Audioholics for your honesty in publishing this fascinating story and risking what you did. I am sure it will pay dividends.
 
M

martmann

Audiophyte
I asked Gene to delete my posts that contained Jerry's email. Even though I think he's a tool, I prob shouldn't have posted a private email.

If others who quoted my post (jinjuku, martmann, and others) could also delete the quoted email, it would be much appreciated.

Thanks! :)

Chris
I would be happy to edit or delete my posts, but I see no way to do so (I just registered here today maybe "noob restrictions" prevent it?).

Anyway it's ok with me if the site mod wants to clear out my posts that have chunks of the email in question.

Good catch Gene.


Edit: I can edit this post, but no "Edit" button is on my other posts.
 
F

fatherom

Audiophyte
Jerry reopened the comments on the Lexicon review and added a bunch of his own...I have no moral qualms posting THIS :D

hometheaterreview DOT com/lexicon-bd-30-universal-blu-ray-player-reviewed/
 
tbergman

tbergman

Full Audioholic
For those who don't want the upmarket chassis and for those connecting via HDMI - the Oppo is a KILLER solution for a LOT less money. For those who want a more fancy chassis and build quality - there is the Lexicon. Let the customers decide.
I read that as prettier and heavier? For 3k more...
 
Seth=L

Seth=L

Audioholic Overlord
Jerry De Tool said:
Harman claims that nearly 40 percent of the parts of the unit are American and assembled in their Elkhart, Indiana plant where Crown is made as well as some of the Mark Levinson line such as the No. 53 power amps.
I wonder if that 40% is a figure based on the overall mass of the player. An extra heavy unnecessary base, top, read and face plate would account for a significant increase in weight, certainly enough to claim 40% of the player has Lexicon parts. However, it's the electronics themselves that determine the performance, and they didn't change any of those.

What a tool.:rolleyes:
 
F

fatherom

Audiophyte
Jerry posted over on AVS forum in the Lexicon thread in the Blu-Ray Players forum...let the feeding frenzy begin! :)
 
Ares

Ares

Audioholic Samurai
* By Jerry Del Colliano

Lastly,

A lot of people are outraged at the idea that a company would buy and repackage a transport to be marketed under their brand and sold through their distribution. I think that its more common that many people think. Most AV companies don't have the R&D to build their own transport or AV preamp so they go to OEM companies to buy the parts. They might tweak something here and or there but for the most part it could be very similar to other products on the market.

A Mercedes C-class is built on the same platform as a Dodge Seibring. A Porsche Cayenne is built on the same chassis the VW Toureag. Smaller Lexus have a lot in common with Toyota Camrys. My Dad's new Maserati Granturissimo has many of the same key parts as they Ferrari F430.

For those who don't want the upmarket chassis and for those connecting via HDMI - the Oppo is a KILLER solution for a LOT less money. For those who want a more fancy chassis and build quality - there is the Lexicon. Let the customers decide.

PS: we have an Oppo BD-83SE review being fact checked now and we also have the NuForce mod of the unit in for review. Those should go live in the coming weeks and months.*




Does this make sense to anyone, does he realize that Toyota owns Lexus and that the Fiat Group owns both Maserati and Ferrari also that Porsche owns 50.76% of VW. But in this case Oppo and Lexicon are 2 different companies one does not own the other also the fact that the specs are identical in every way, with the cars some spec maybe the same but never identical.
P.S. Jerry should come here since he said Audioholics started this controversy.
 
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gene

gene

Audioholics Master Chief
Administrator
Does this make sense to anyone, does he realize that Toyota owns Lexus and that the Fiat Group owns both Maserati and Ferrari also that Porsche owns 50.76% of VW. But in this case Oppo and Lexicon are 2 different companies one does not own the other also the fact that the specs are identical in every way, with the cars some spec maybe the same but never identical.
P.S. Jerry should come here since he said Audioholics started this controversy.
This is really a bizarre situation. Not sure why Jerry is attacking us for posting facts about both players but if it empowers him then sobeit. I sent an email to Oppo and they claim to have worked directly with THX. I also asked permission from Oppo to make the following statement which they deem is correct.

"Oppo worked directly with THX to improve video performance during the testing of the Lexicon player and the benefits trickled down to the Oppo platform as well."

Thus I am adding this to the THX page of the article to ensure the most balanced perspective is realized.
 
M

martmann

Audiophyte
It's obvious that Jerry Del is all about damage control.

Now he posts a bunch of crap on AVS, and still no answers.

He keeps harping on "m" using a fake name, when all his answers to "m" (who made valid points, asked valid questions, and did it professionally) were childish insults and accusations, never EVER addressed anything that had anything to do with the real topic. Also, BEFORE any posts were deleted for this LAME excuse, "m" posted his real name and email address.
Jerry knows all this, and he knows he is lying about it.

The more I read from this Jerry Del, the more I'm insulted by it.

Ethics is not a word in Jerry's Lexicon, and I hope he is taken to task for the lack of decent character.
 
gene

gene

Audioholics Master Chief
Administrator
Here is what I added to the THX Response page. It may take 24hrs to show up due to our site caching over several servers.

I also emailed THX and Lexicon of this update.


Oppo Official Response

January 19th, 2010

We received an email from Oppo stating they did work directly with THX during the certification process for the Lexicon BD-30. They allowed us to publish the following statement.

"Oppo worked directly with THX to improve video performance during the testing of the Lexicon player and the benefits trickled down to the Oppo platform as well. We also worked directly with Lexicon engineers for various issues they discovered during their internal tests."

In light of this fact we are pleased to see there was direct involvement from all three parties to produce such a wonderfully performing platform. We do however hope the analog bass management issues we discovered on the Lexicon player will be addressed by Lexicon engineers to better support their customers using legacy analog THX equipment that doesn't have bass management facilities.
 
pzaur

pzaur

Audioholic Samurai
This is really a bizarre situation. Not sure why Jerry is attacking us for posting facts about both players but if it empowers him then sobeit...Thus I am adding this to the THX page of the article to ensure the most balanced perspective is realized.
It all comes down to this, Jerry doesn't want a "balanced" review of the product. He wants a glowing, positive, unquestioning review of the product and that is all.

-pat
 
mtrycrafts

mtrycrafts

Seriously, I have no life.
I would be happy to edit or delete my posts, but I see no way to do so (I just registered here today maybe "noob restrictions" prevent it?).

Anyway it's ok with me if the site mod wants to clear out my posts that have chunks of the email in question.

Good catch Gene.


Edit: I can edit this post, but no "Edit" button is on my other posts.
Welcome:D

Yes, here at AH we have a time limit, not long, to correct a post or delete it.
 
ricocetj

ricocetj

Junior Audioholic
This is really a bizarre situation. Not sure why Jerry is attacking us for posting facts about both players but if it empowers him then sobeit. I sent an email to Oppo and they claim to have worked directly with THX. I also asked permission from Oppo to make the following statement which they deem is correct.

"Oppo worked directly with THX to improve video performance during the testing of the Lexicon player and the benefits trickled down to the Oppo platform as well."

Thus I am adding this to the THX page of the article to ensure the most balanced perspective is realized.
So the official stance is essentially that Lexicon, THX, and Oppo worked together to improve the BD-83 platform, and that that improved version was then sold by the two manufacturers as "similar" (i.e., the same) products with different cosmetic appearance at drastically different prices? This is beyond bizarre and very confusing to me. Does this mean that the BD-83 currently being produced/sold is different than it was when originally released?

Strange series of events.
 
Johnny2Bad

Johnny2Bad

Audioholic Chief
Okay, call me crazy ... but I'm going to defend Lexicon here. Sort of.

First of all I want to state outright that, before a career change 20 years ago, I was a retailer of HiFi, including a number of brands that, for better or worse, would be labeled "High End". We were in a small market (to the point where some brands would not let us become dealers) and also had to pay the rent, so we sold some mass-market gear, although we started at a fairly high entry point.

We did very well, and led the nation in sales of a very few high end products, but that's just to show that we took it seriously and made our market, instead of expecting it to come to us.

I would like readers of my post to take that into consideration, keeping in mind that a lot has changed, (from a dealer perspective) and a lot has not.

Lexicon adds a more robust chassis. Regardless of the intrinsic value of those parts, it may help with certain aspects of audio performance (or it may not, but my experience is it often does).

Secondly, Lexicon provides and pays for warranty service for their players ... they don't ship them to oppo to get fixed. Again, the value is hard to quantify, but it none the less amounts to something, and broadly speaking backing your product is somewhat expensive.

Lexicon has a different distribution structure than oppo. There is a certain amount of value added in being able to go to a dealer rather than dealing online. Leaving aside, for the moment, that oppo does a very good job with their model, none the less it's more expensive the Lexicon way.

I'm just using seat-of-the-pants figures here, but they don't just come out of a hat; in my experience the above would probably result in perhaps doubling Lexicon's costs over oppo's. This would be true pretty much regardless of what product we're talking about.

Now, what about the rest?

Here's what I think happened. Lexicon will try to cultivate dealers that are system installers. In HiFi reselling, there isn't much in the way of difference between what it costs to buy a product wholesale, and what you have to sell it for to stay in business. Margins are fairly consistent from brand to brand; there's some room for discounting if you run lean and mean, but selling brand A and selling brand B, well, you know pretty much how much you have to mark them up from wholesale to keep the lights on and the heating/air conditioning running, and pay the staff and the bank their cut, regardless of your business model.

You also can be safe thinking if Brand A costs X and sells for Y, then you can be pretty sure that Brand B's MSRP of Y means the cost is probably around X too. (Don't read that to mean the value of Brand A is equal to Brand B, although if they directly compete it will be similar; it's just margins based on wholesale cost and MSRP I'm talking about).

However, those margins are consistent from like product to like product; they are not consistent in the sense that the difference between MSRP and the selling price is going to be always a 10% discount (for example) for every product in the storefront.

Some stuff has higher margins than others. Broadly speaking, this is to allow a "system" discount that is better than a "single box" discount. If you buy a single component, the discount is going to be fairly consistent. If you buy a system, they are going to want to add a financial incentive to go with one brand, or perhaps a certain combination of brands that the store prefers to sell.

(Some resellers use extended warranties, which, going by a tax court case I read about recently have 50% margins; ie 100% markup, as the fat part of the system price. Whatever).

Traditionally, loudspeakers have somewhat higher margins than the bread-and-butter devices; amps, preamps, receivers, integrated amps. Also, source components tend to fall somewhere in between, margin-wise.

Within those categories, stores sometimes sell house brand items, or if they're nationally advertised, some brand that has a marketing strategy based on attracting dealers with higher margins (difference between cost and MSRP).

You don't (or shouldn't) really pay more (or much more) for these higher margin products, but it's where a disproportionate amount of a system discount lies. In other words, if the store can only afford to cut 10% off the MSRP price of the amp, it may be able to afford to cut 30% off the MSRP of the speakers or the CD player. You get a quote that averages 20% discount. Looks good.

Now, I don't want everyone to read too much into the particular items I chose in this example. Some speakers are just as tight as everything else; these tend to be better quality units by manufacturers who are in it because they give a damn about the sound, and they want to offer the most value at a workable margin to the consumer, without charging any more than they have to.

But, it does happen that sometimes there is a product that is there to take up the "room" in the price.

It's my personal opinion that Lexicon never expected anyone to buy the disk player by itself, and if they did, it's a bonus to the dealer, not Lexicon, because the wholesale price on the unit was low but the MSRP was higher than normal.

I think the player was supposed to sit in a system, put together by an installer, and to be the source of a big part of any discount. A reputable and ethical dealer would know what he needs for a margin, take the wholesale price of everything, multiply that by his margin, and say ... there you go; that's the quote.

If the disk player is responsible for $2000 of perhaps a $3000 system discount, nobody's the wiser, the price looks good, the dealer makes his margin so he can meet payroll this month, and everybody's (supposed to be) happy.

I do think that, with the added costs Lexicon takes on supporting it's products through a dealer network versus oppo's model, with Lexicon's national advertising budget, and other intangibles that add to the cost of doing business in a certain way, believe it or not, the player probably should sell for about $1500. That still might sound like a lot to some, but if it's accurate, there's about $400 more at wholesale for Lexicon than oppo. The rest goes to others (not necessarily the dealer alone, either).

I think that's illustrative of the number the installer might use when making up his quote for a system & installation. It could be fairly different (I've somewhat deliberately not used margins and costs I had to deal with, because I'm not trying to let out secrets here ... but the numbers I've used are not out in left field either; I just want to illustrate how the process works) but I think the concept I've described would remain true.

The figure I used may sound like a lot in comparison to oppo's price, but you do get something in return that oppo doesn't offer, and like I said, I'm not using numbers that are meant to be completely accurate. Whether that something is of value to you, is up to you to decide. Some people, obviously, think it is and others don't. That's business.

The THX thing I don't have any explanation for; but one possibility is that THX allows manufacturers to self-certify. In other words, THX doesn't actually test anything, they set out specifications and the manufacturer certifies it's compliant by submitting test results to THX. It's quite possible Lexicon was told the machine met specs by the OEM, and that they were under the impression oppo did not certify to minimize cost and follow it's lean marketing model. Thus Lexicon's perceived advantage to differentiate the products, and if I were Lexicon, I might buy that explanation myself.

Finally, although some are "outraged", I'm somewhat more sanguine. I've seen enough of the business to know that it's not so far out of standard industry practice to make a big deal about. Some companies do have high R&D costs they need to recover from relatively few units; some just pretend they do.

There is a rule of thumb that says the actual parts costs of a mass-market electronics device is about 20% of the retail cost. Like all rules-of-thumb, it's broad and doesn't apply on a strict basis, but it's close enough that you can do back-of-the-napkin calculations with.

As a consumer, you need to do your own due diligence and not take any manufacturer's word (including someone who you admire) at face value.

Finally, I just want to point out that if you look at two products and the rear panel is laid out exactly the same, and the front panel is laid out exactly the same, you would be right to suspect they are the same, or wonder what, exactly, might be different.

Okay, that's it. I hope I don't get flamed too much, but I'm just trying to help. Give me some liberty with the numbers I used; I'm just trying to illustrate a process, and give some insight as to how the business works, how something like this "could have happened", with no particular axe to grind, rather than suggest anything I've used are the "real numbers".

I would never have bought the Lexicon even if I didn't know what we've all learned, because when I do audio and video, I do for myself what Lexicon dealers and installers do, and I choose my products carefully and on a strict budget. My "new career" is remarkably fulfilling (although I loved being in the audio business as well), but it doesn't pay enough for five figure home theaters, and I'm totally OK with that.
 
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