As far as CD players from before the turn of the century go, there are few more iconic than the Beosound 9000, a freestanding CD player that allowed you to play tracks from multiple CDs one after the other like a vertical jukebox. It’s absolutely unique, even for its time. The Bang & Olufsen Beosound 9000c brings back that classic design.
No, they didn’t set up an entirely new production line to make these vertical multi-CD players. Instead, it’s a part of the outfit’s Recreated Classics program, where the company buys up any old examples of the model, brings it to their workshop, and rebuilds it, upgrading and updating wherever needed. Originally, the outfit did this with their Beogram 4000 turntables before turning their attention to the unique CD player.
The Bang & Olufsen Beosound 9000c retains the original functionality of the 90s device. That means, you get to load up to six CDs at a time in a vertical orientation, with the laser head physically moving up and down to play whichever track on whichever CD you choose to load next. Yes, that’s the visual component to the whole thing, as you watch the mechanism switch from one CD to the next. Even better, it retains the speedy movement of the original, which, at the time, was listed as going from 0 to 60 mph in 5.7 seconds, so you get the visual treat of seeing that reader head move up and down at a really brisk pace.
According to the outfit, they decided to invert the black and natural aluminum finishes in the original to match the Beolab 28 speakers, which is what they’re shipping the refurbished CD players with. It works, too, since the black background for the CDs make them stand out a lot more. All aluminum parts used here, by the way, are the original version that have been re-machined and re-anodized to get them in tip-top shape.
The Bang & Olufsen Beosound 9000c gets a new anodized floor stand that’s different from the one that came with the original. Truth be told, the original stand just doesn’t match more contemporary aesthetics, so going with an entirely new one definitely does the trick. We’re assuming it retains the original motorized glass case, though, which remains a nice touch even after more than two decades.
The device also gets the outfit’s Beoconnect Encore device bundled. To the unfamiliar, it’s the outfit’s Wi-Fi music player that lets you connect to the internet and stream tracks from various sources. Its addition here means the CD player is now a connected device, so you can control the CDs from either a companion app or the included Beoremote One BT. Even better, it gets all the Encore’s feature set, so you can play music from the thousands of free stations and even use their patented MOTS AI technology, which creates automatic playlists based on user settings. Yeah… this is, basically, a modernized version of a 90s classic and it really seems all the better for it.
Only 200 examples of the Bang & Olufsen Beosound 9000c have been remade. It’s bundled with two Beolab 28 speakers, priced at $55,000.