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Through a series of unfortunate events I ended up briefly owning seven brand new Beoplay Portal PC/PS headphones in the summer of 2022, and keeping the last one that was purchased in exasperation.

The products were all bought from three different authorized dealers across the EU, and despite the serial numbers and manufacturing dates being spread out, mostly all of the headphones had manufacturing deffects:

- The clamping force of the headbands had considerable variation, some of the headphones were very comfortable, one fell off from your head if you looked down, while two of them caused headaches after wearing them for 20 minutes

- The firmness of the foam inside the earpads and of the lambskin also had variations

- Some of the products made a popping sound if you slightly pressed the cushion on the headband

- The painted white L and R letters inside the earcups had various brown spots

- Three headphones made a squeaking sound when you adjusted the length of the arms, one of them was also squeaking during normal use

- The material of the storage bag was half as thick if the product had a later serial number

- One of the products had a broken BLE module and would not connect

I got some casual use out of the headphones I have kept for about 6 months, and despite treating the product like jewelry, the headband cushion material has started separating from a hidden seam. The product was quickly replaced by Bang & Olufsen.

An app is required to adjust the EQ and access other features that are advertised on the sales page, but the app forces you to sign up for a B&O account and share personal information such as your name and email address, then register the product. You couldn't find any information about the requirement for account setup and product registration anywhere, not on the sales page, and not in the user manual. I believe this is at least a GDPR violation.

The headphones sometimes forget the customized settings, and after a couple of months of use, the app now has a hard time connecting to the paired device.

The headphones all sounded great, but from what I've read and experienced, Bang & Olufsen seems to hide shoddy manufacturing tolerances behind bespokeness, even for their most expensive products, and I doubt this is the user experience the rich are craving.