I have got my hands on a pair of brand new BSS m-250 loudspeaker studio monitors and i was wondering if anyone could tell me anything about them (i.e. their value, and where i could sell such items)

Any help would be much appreciated

Let me guess. From a guy in a transit van - both claiming to be delivery men for a audio company, and they say...had 2 on the order, but 6 got put in by accident...and wanted to sell them to you to get some beer money.

Sad to tell you man - its a scam. There is no such thing. Brendle Sound Systems doesn't exist, all the glossy brochures, recommended retail price, and everything the guys had - faked. The invoice is fake, their sound company doesn't exist.

I got caught out by the same scam. Afterwards it seems stupid - but at the time, for some reason, you agree to it.

Now - the speakers are worth varying amounts. The 2 I got duped into buying - a mate of mine into expensive audio equipment tells me they're worth £250 absolute max.
They go up loud and don't distort too bad, but they won't be worth what you paid for them I doubt. There may well be varying speakers with that same model number as well... so just because mine sound ok, yours may well sound crap.

Good luck on them, and if you want more info on the scam - here you go ->
http://groups.google.co.uk/groups?q=BSS+sp...fncis.de&rnum=4

It's also listed here -> http://www.metafilter.com/mefi/12424, and here -> http://newpaper.asia1.com.sg/top/story/0,4...0099140,00.html
and here http://pub42.ezboard.com/faudioforum83468f...picID=179.topic

Different fake make/model number, but same scam worldwide.

Unbelievable !

A friend of me just (5 min ago) called me and asked me to lookup "bss 250 speakers".

He was standing in a gas-station and 2 man, who came out of a mini-van came up to him trying to sell speakers.

Exactly the same story ! They told him they had ordered 4 speakers and by accident they got 4 boxen with 4 pairs of speakers....

So I started looking for any info.
At first I didn't find anything (except for cofee machines with that model-nr) but I told him not to buy it anyway...

Right after I hung up the phone, I found this forum. With exactly (ok, almost exactly) the same story.

I called him back. He was allready driving home and he followed my first advice, so he didn't buy them

After hearing about this forum he called the police...
Let's hope they catch the assholes....

place where it happened: Gas-station at "Linker Oever", Antwerp

Just bought a pair, BSS M-250 Loudspeakers about 20 minutes ago for £300

I just came on the net to see how much they were worth and going to try and sell them on, hopefully make abit of money as I'm a poor student, when i stumbled across this forum.

Same story, some guy in a White Van, seemed abit dodgy but i still went ahead with it. Gutted.

He approched me on my street just as i was walkin home from university,
Ladywell Street,
Preston,
England.

If Anybody ever finds out if they get caught it would be great if u could let me know - [EDIT LPM removed email at member's request]

Could you post a decent pic of them so people can see and be aware. Please name the pic by the "proper" speaker name (BSS 250) so that it comes up in picture search too.

Maybe build in China and worth not a lot.

Easy to buy some by the truck load and start swindling people.

If anyone can make a pic, I can put it on the MM server so you don't have to bother about when it won't be available etc. on a personal FTP.

Contact me thru my member info page (click on my name) and don't put mail addresses in the forum.

Swindllers I hate that!

I managed to get swindled with these damn speakers too....although they sound good, i didnt really want them!
But hey, never mind...at least we have something for our money (on the bright side!)

Just wondering if anyone can help me tho... is it possible to test the speakers for a power output rating etc? I want to know the real stats on them because, as they are kinda dodgy, i reckon the stats given to us are incorrect too! Thinking of hooking up an amp to them, but dont know what power of amp to buy to make them sound good-ish!?
Any ideas anyone?
Cheers.

It has happened to me as well... 3 days ago...
I forked out 200 quids. They sound really good, I can't compain but I just feel now very strange with this fact that I had been tricked.
But I carried out a small investigation on the whole web and I found some information in Germany. It seems that a lot of people are also confused about them in there, but actually U can buy them there. I don't know German language well enough but I managed to translate a few bits. Below I put some links so if U know German U can easily find out what they wrote about.

http://cgi.ebay.de/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewIt...&category=11276

http://www.pbportal.de/forum/showthread/t-37159.html

http://www.preiswen.de/sound1.htm

http://www.hifi-forum.de/viewthread-30-886-1.html


The price is 179 euro per pair. But I don't know if this is true.
Then, U can find they are writing that this speakers comes from Latvia or Russia. Other information I am not sure about, U have to investigate about it on your own.

£250 quid! aaghggghhh!,

Two men, white van, left overs from an order, what was wrong with me?

Worcester Park, Surrey, England.

The same scam has been pulled in the States for quite some time. At least one friend of mine was taken, so heads up, New Yorkers.

The only decent warehouse deal I've ever found was through a reputable engineer at a shady studio that depended on my client's business too much to steal from me. I've often wondered whether the Mac I bought under those circumstances was actually hot.

In any case, the message is clear: Don't ever buy high end audio from the back of a stranger's truck.

Propper gutted!
I'm a (now extremely skint) student in Salford, who also payed £230 for a pair of BSS-M250s, suposedly worth £1500. That was yesterday, Jan 21st 2004. I tried to find out a little about them, and this is what I found.
Exactly the same happened to me as the others of you. Just nice to know I'm not the only one...
I note that they've also been around Preston, which isn't far away - but acording to "Alex" (as he called himself) he's been all over the contry, so who knows how many people might have fallen for it. These people must be stoped!

I should point out that on doing research on these from when I was scammed, I did find out that in America, certain individuals had been getting their own back.

Two people claimed to use their girlfriend as a decoy who pretended to be interested in the speakers, then stole the scammers' van.
There was also a report of one person who was actually stabbed by someone they had previously conned.

I think it needs to get some press coverage - just a mention on a national radio station or something would probably be enough. Currently, the only way you hear of it is if you, or someone you know, has already been scammed by it.

And who wants to report it to a newspaper themselves? "Mr <whoever> of <wherever> was tricked into buying 2 speakers he believed to be worth something, from the back of an unmarked transit van".. you just look an even bigger gimp than you were already.

Has anyone managed to sell on these speakers? How much did you get back? Where did you sell them? I've just been scammed and want rid of them as I didn't really want them in the first place.

Man I've seen those clowns all the time @ places.. (car washes,covenient stores ) and I alway's thought the stuff these guy's sold was on FIRE! Who in their right mind would buy a speaker without listening to it first? Now, Levis, shirts and such I could see someone buying... but TRANSDUCERS??? Remember the saying... "Caveat Emptor" beware!

These guys were just in Bristol this afternoon (March 11 2004). Just got swindled out of 200 quid by these men. Given accurate discriptions to Avon Police. Glad i had the forethought to take their descriptions and registration number down. I am a poor poor student and now I'm even poorer.
Still glad to know i'm not the only one. So are these speakers any good???

Sorry to be a killjoy (maybe that's not quite what you are) but I can't quite see where the swindle is. These guys say they're selling speakers - and that's what you get. They say they're worth more than the price they're offering - well, they may believe that ('worth' being a very elastic concept).

The worst they may be doing is fiddling tax, it seems to me.

The point is that they trick you. THey dont just 'say' that they're worth more, they have printed up false papers, invoices, articles brochures, even fake ads that show other people selling them on for £1500 or so. They have put a lot of effort into making you believe these speakers are what they say they are, that's the most annoying thing.

I bought a pair myself some years ago, 250£
Ultimately, u can almost name ur own price, but because of the fact that they have gone to so much trouble of making all the paperwork seem so authentic, 2 the naked eye, it seems like the deal you`ve been waiting for...
They actually sound somewhat ok, but it has to be at the price not much over 80-100£, at least i think.

They`re also operating here in Denmark, just 2day i was stoppet by 2 guy in a blue van, i was just about to lock my bike outside a netcafe, when a blue van pulled over by my side, some swedish guy stuck his head out and said, "erhm, xcuse me freind" i cut him off and said " so u got got some speakers for me" i didnt know if he was about to drive off or spin around around twice on his seat , never the less i took my time and said "yearh i bought a some a couple of years ago" i talked him down to selling them off 3pairs for a decent price, they would even come a set up a pair in my apartment for me and others to test the sound quality, he even gave me his phone number for me to call him later (how stupid is that ) - i mean hey! - if i knew anyone who needed a pair of speakers then i could help out some of my freinds, and thats would be it...or on the other hand, i could turn them in, but dont see the harm in what theyre doin, i should have know better the last time i bought`em and i can get`em cheap now, no matter what, as somebody said earlier in this forum, dont think u can buy high-end gear for that price out of a freakin van by 2 guys that dont know shit about anything, least of all music-gear...

Just a thought from D-:

speaker scam now in wale's u.k mate of mine nearly brought 4 but thank's for the internet got back to him in time thank's to your web site

So.... These guys seem to appear in Sweden nowadays and one of them speaks swedish in a acceptable manner ( claiming that he is from sweden though, what a joke!!! ). They show their ID's and we get their names too ( both fore and sir names ). As I didn't want to deal with them anyway I just took a quick look at ther ID's and figured out that the "swedish" guy was Peter. They started to pull out the same story as they always do with having a pair of speekers over and blah blah. Me and my friend ( students ) got really intressed as we realized our chance to earn some money here. The guys wanted 8000 kr = 550 pounds for the pair of speekers. My oppinion was 4000 kr = 275 punds for a complete 4.1 system ( 2 main monitors, 2 satelites and one sub bas ). I also started researching these speakers more closely as one of them got really nervous... I started to feel that something was wrong ( it isn't every day you buy something from the back of a van ). All the speakers seemed ok and we agreed to give a final offer for the 4.1 system. They finally agreed 275 pounds for all of them and we took the stuff and got home.

So then we started to figure out the real price of them as we from the beginning realized that they'd been overdoing it a little bit. So then we stumbled upon this site and realized we had been tricked. But hey!!! Why don't we see how they sound...

We plugged these speekers into our amplifier and found out that they actually sound really good. Ok. It isn't worth the price the two guys claimed it to be but I can tell you that I'm satisfied having a 4.1 surround system for 275 pounds or 450 euro. I think I've paid what they are worth, which means that I havn't got tricked in that way but our ideas of selling it further is now another subject to discuss...

.....
The components in these speakers are probably from china but who cares... Your components in your computer are probably from taiwan...

Hi!
Sadly enough i found this forum to late... I also got swindled... or how you might express it... 2 guys rentvan from germany.... Well be aware that they are widening their terretory... I was foold today i sweden...
But i guess I shouldent complain... 200 euro is´t that bad for that kind of eqipment, its mostley the thought that I got swindled that bothers me...

Be AWARE! These guy are proos.. They even helped me install them in my appartment and let me listen to them... They let me look on the internet for information about Bss without getting coold feet. They even asked me if i could speak german (which i said "yes, alittle but not much") and then they diskussed the prise (200euro) in german, so that i would think that they didnt want me to understand. And offcourse they made me think a was making hell of a deal.

By the way: In Sweden they call the subsystem for: bss, AC-001
Two packages one whit the sub and one with the satalites.

Have anyone else been foold in sweden?

Hoppfully the people that is doing this is being cought soon!

/scritz (sweden)

Hi,
I hope I had read this forum earlier, I got caugh by these guys today in Bristol (they're back in the uk apparently), it sounded like a good idea at the moment (and I should't have drunk so much yesterday).
Are they of any good at least? Do you know their real charactiristics ? I bet the 250 watts is a scamm

250 watts IS a scam... I've read numerous accounts of people opening those speakers to find that they could barely handle 15 watts RMS.

I just noticed one of these scams running on ebay... If the current price holds out, the buyer will pay about all they're worth.

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vie...5703799033&rd=1

Notice another indicator of fake statistics. 4-8 ohms... Either they're 4 or they're 8... The scam artist obviously doesn't understand how resistance and impedence work, as we all know, it is the amplifier '4-8 ohms' appears on, meaning it can handle that resistance... OF course,, they probably are 4-8 ohms... Somewhere in that range but it can't be guaranteed where!

IT should also be noted that the bass-enhancing feature some of these sepakers are sold with consists of a small cermaic capacitor... That's it. IMO it probably makes it worse.

I have a policy... Always research before purchase.

These guys give will appear all open and will let you investigate further because they know if they don't, you'll think there's something nonkosher about it. Whereas if they say 'see for yourself', then there's still a chance of you buying it even if you do, and you're more likely to just take their word for it once they offer this amount of glastnost.

I might consider advising you to contact Ebay whenever you see a speaker that is known to be a scam.

As satisfying as those stories from America sound, I've never met anyone from my burg who'd have the moxie to leap into the front seat of someone else's van and drive off whistling. I'm not doubting your honesty or integrity in any way, but I do wonder about the source of the particulars.

Street scams are far more common in New York than men in vans with strangely unfamiliar speakers. Just the other day, two Jamaican men approached me, supposedly to sell a G4 titanium laptop for $400. They claimed to be willing to show me said laptop before taking my money and seemed extremely eager to accompany me to the bank. When one of them told me a story about "famous hackers" meeting once a week to devise schemes of massive G4 larceny, I had to excuse myself to go somewhere to chortle.

Other friends have bought, variously, blank DVDs packaged as bootlegs of LoTR and packaged telephones that turned out to be bricks in boxes. The real deals are to be had in places like Chinatown electronics stores, where consistent addresses guarantee that any transaction which takes place won't involve your salesperson skipping town. When it's time to beat h/e/i/r/m with a car antenna (to continue the stereotype of the violent American), you'll know where to find h/e/i/r/m.

just want to inform anyone that gets scammed that these speakers are now officially famous...

if you've ever played max payne 2, have a look around his apartment and you should see some familiar black towers

i'd include a screenshot if i could...


£200, leicester, day of student loan arrival...

The bastards appeared in Farnborough Hants yesterday and swindelled my son out of his hard earned summer savings. Same old story, guy in a white van etc. I hope that someone catches up with them one day and gives them what they deserve.

Likewise - just got done today in Norwich in the UK. Luckily i only offered £50 and they took it. Either way though i still got scamed and it hurts.

I think they are doing the University runs and preying on students.

eyes open everyone!!

I am also in Salford Uni, He stopped me on Seaford road (…from a white van…) but I only agreed to hand over the cash after I heard them hooked up to my stereo in my room. I paid £200 but up until I read this page I was very happy with them, now I can’t help not to feel conned. What really hurts is that I trusted this guy and he was tricking me all alone.

I’ve found a guy selling a set of BSS M-250 speakers at www.findit.co.uk
He said he bought an extra pair by accident when ordering from Audio Direct, he said he has a 2 Year Warranty Card as well, although I checked Audio Direct and I can’t find BSS M-250 for sale…

He also says that the speakers are recommended for use with a BSS Omnidrive loudspeaker management system or similar. I checked the link he included:

http://www.hhb.co.uk/hhb/uk/products/detail.asp?ID=314

I found 11 items system made by BSS, including a BSS Omnidrive loudspeaker management system, but no M-250.

I guess this guy has also been tricked by the white van and is trying to cover his losses but he said he bought them for £1300 (from Audio Direct) but will accept £900


Since there has been this idea of being conned I can’t get it out of my head that there is something wrong with the speakers.
Is there anyone out there that is actually happy with the quality of the speakers?

Hello everybody.
Im from Sweden, and i have a story to tell.
Last monday 4/10-2004, i was showing my car to a guy he wanted too buy it. And suddenly a car drove up to us, AND it was a White TRANSIT VAN, whit two people in it. The one who was driving spoke swedish pretty good, and he started to talk too us and explaining that they had loudspeakers to sell. he said that they brought them up from germany, too deliver to a company in Stockholm.Thay had a order for picking upp 6 pair of speakers, but when they had left, they saw that they had loaded the car whit 10 Pairs. Htey had all the pappers and i stamp from some german company. It semed to be correct .
It sounded very good and i thought that this was a very good deal, he said that 5 minutes before he had sold 2 pairs, for 8000 swedish kr. And i said that i couldent get so much money, He said what could i give then, half give me a offer he said. MMMMMMMM, i was getting suppisches, he was very keen too sell very fast. And hes friend was not saying anything, so i started to talk to his friend , he couldnt talk english, but german.Apperently he was from the company they had picked them up from.
The guy who was looking at my car wasn't so imprest by the way he was acting, so he said no and walkt away.
So thay was focused on me, get some monye and you can buy the last 2 pairs for 2500 swedish kr. It was a good deal i thought, and i called om my car phone, too check my account.
When i was checking , i said to the guy that i didn't have the monye. And i wanted to call a friend , if he could come and look at the speakers and bring some money, beucouse he is very good at this stuff.
Then i saw that he didn't liked that, so i said that i did'nt wont to buy.
He jumped in to the car and said it was my loos.
Yeh Yeh!! i glad today.
I talked to my friend, and we started to look for the speakers, and my friend did find this forum.
I can say that they have comed to Sweden to. The guys in the White Transit.

This whole thing is very weird. The same thing happened to me in Ottawa Ontario about 6 years ago. I don't remember the brand, but 2 guys in a van were going to sell me some speakers that the original purchaser had backed out of buying. I didn't like the looks of the guy who was trying to sell me the stuff so I declined. Good thing too apparently. I still believe in the motto
"if it's too good to be true, it isn't"

" fictionmusic"
Did the speakers name were ,LinerPhase , a friend of mine were offered to buy some speakers severly eyrs ago, and those was called Linerphase. those speakers were covered whit something looking like black felt.
This was in Sweden , stockholm.
Is it some body else who reccognise the namn LINERPHASE Speakers.

It's just INSANE this swindle is still up and running!

FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF...!!!!!!!
... i can't believe it... 200 quids... u're right, and i thought about it... but i don't know, one of the speakers they sold me is still in its box!!!! ... and the guy showed me his driving license, i wrote down the number on his driving license... i haven't checked yet, but i guess it's a fake one, what do u guys think? ... well, now, the best I can do is to get someone to tell how much they're worth... i imagine there is no way to belive what's writting on the back of the speakers, is there?
what's written is the following:

bss - studio monitor m-250
sensitivity 90dB
Normal impedance 4 Ohms
Frequency response 30-20 000Hz
Music power 250 W
Crossover frequences 500/5000Hz

is this the same as all of u guys??? ... so, do we have a definite idea of the value of those speakers?? ...

thanks, i guess i won't be able to sleep tonight... i can't belive i've been that stupid... after 8h of lectures at university, for sure ur brain doesn't work well anymore...

guess the best is to keep them, isn't it? or should they be trashed cuz they have absolutelly no value?

...
i can't belive i got accepted into bristol university and be able to be that stupid...

Well I didn't see the name but they were coverd with what looked like black felt. The area I lived was were most of the Ottawa University students lived (much like the experience of other posters) so I imagine it is the same outfit (an international conspiracy of speaker con-men!)

OK. This was in Canada, you been offered these speakers.
I can say its seems to be world wide spreed. Beucouse my friend ,were offered these in Sweden, stockholm, some years
ago. Like my friend, i was offered to buy on the street,like everybody, but not neer any University or were students live.
They just came up whit a car, leaning out of the window, at a shoppingmall on the parkinglot.

On the question of what they are worth:

I just managed to get rid of mine for £350 which is far more than i would have imagined. However other people i have spoken to or seen on e-bay seem to be about £50 at the most.

shame!

Hey, there is a lot of upset people out their over this BSS 250 problem... but has anyone sat down and realised that 1) they do work and 2) just because we have all been 'conned' it doesn't mean the speakers are of a rubbish quality...


After the annoyance of being tricked wears off and the speakers have worn in, I am now quite pleased with my pair (for £200), is anyone else also pleased with there's......?

.....or am I alone on this one?

to tell the truth, I haven't tried them yet... cuz i don't have the material to...
i thought about selling them on ebay.. but i'd feel bad to do excatly what happened to me to someone else
However, one of my box is still closed (means COMPLETELY NEW!!!!!). I live in Bristol, if anyone is interested, i'll give them for the price I paid them... 200 quids... if they're worth it, i'd love to do so (I'm in a SMALL university hall... they take about 1/2 of the space in my room... which is really getting on my nerves)

IF ANYONE IS INTERESTED I HAVEN'T TRIED THEM, AND I'LL SELL THEM FOR 200 POUNDS (ok, it's not cuz it's in caps more people will read it, but it sounds like i'm telling everyone... )

so if u hear anyone looking for those kind, these are 100 percent NEW!!!! (WHAT A DEAL!!! ... it'll go for the one proposing the largest amount of money) It starts at 200 and goes up by 50!!!

... Hope never killed anyone, did it?

Uh oh… it's for the classifieds this post

please do

HAHA!... My dad bought thesame speakers, mini-van,leftover-speaker,bear needing persons.......

He got the speakers for 250£.

Most of you guys speak english, but this happend in sweden!

Thanx for the scam revieling anyway.

same happened to my friend 3 days ago in nottingham

heres the ones he bought.

they sound pretty sweet, worth 300 quid even (maybe)

i aint gona tell him he got scammed thoughhe would be so pissed.

Well peps, is 1:30pm and about hour ago same thing nearly happened to me and my friend in Sheffield. He was walking home from Uni, same story, guy, white van, speakers etc. Came back to halls to ask me about them, seemed a good deal, we were going to get them for £200. But, just as we were about to draw cash, had big second thought. Firstly, these are not £750 speakers, have you ever seen a pair of speakers for £750, I promise you they look ...nice, good speakers rely on good wood, and the wood on these BSS was obviously crap, (plus £700 speakers sound amazing). The sticker on the top showing frequency levels gave it away aswell.
For £200 you can get a good pair of speakers from a good hifi retailer (e.g Richer Sounds) and I promise you they will be better than these bss ones, plus if they break them you can always take them back.
Feel relieved that we stopped at the last minute, .....but what a scam.......good effort to the guy for trying........but what a load of crap.

http://www.scamshield.com

This scam really is amazing. I got hit in college at least 3-4 years ago. Paid $200 cash and actually still have them in my living room today. They sound decent enough, good for large parties when no one's really paying attention. The pseudo-company for me was Dynalab.

Is there a White Van Scam headquarters, you think? These people are definitely trained somewhere, because it's exactly the same spiel everywhere, right down to asking for extra beer money after the deal. Didn't get me on that one though. java script:emoticon(':)')

Two of my friends have just bought these speakers for £400!

They got scammed in the Sainsbury's car park in castle marina, Nottingham 2 days ago. I've just showed one of the guys this site. They're obviously not worth anywhere near that so he's pretty pissed off.

theres obviously alot of them running this operation.

quite unbelievable really when you think they must have aheadquarters and a boss/manager etc.

I imagine this secret warehouse full of crappy speakers, white vans, and guys with maps of all the university towns world-wide.

I do wonder how these guys do operate though. This scam has been pulled from Boston to Sweden and a lot of points in-between. (and even though there are those who say it all seems fair...you bought speakers, and they work...it is a scam nonetheless)

Maybe it's space invaders working on the earth invasion?

(for the innocents here, it's a joke!)

it seems to me the two guys are just doing a bit of creative marketing, it's not that different from when you see these amazing discounts being advertised from most music shops, where they show original prices that never exissted in real life (might have been the original inflated suggested retail price, from six years before), and the amazing new low price you get (save £££ !!!).

so these two guys are free to attribute the price they want to these speakers.

so they bought these speakers from their supplier (who knows, maybe they even paid vat) and then they pretend to have received them by accident and instead of doing the right thing - return them - they're willing to sell them to you.
so ok, that's a lie, but you got what you paid for: a pair of working speakers and a nice story.

so that's true.

so I do seem to start every sentence of mine with "so".

so I must go now.

so.

on my honour im not an easily angered man but i sure as hell will stress test their speakers with a fist if i ever see them near derby unicversity again.

i feel such an ass spending £300 for em, they sure sound nice and i ordered a good samson amp to go with em, but i fear such a powerful piece of equipment will blow the speakers.

i dont know if i will call the police or punch them out if i see them again. the second sure as hell is far more tempting.

i am a person that goes for all out quality, and i feel so stupid for not listenin to gut reaction and leaving, but i had an exam and was in a rush, so they played the hurry and decide game. ack! well so long as no-one i know finds out i suppose

Yep, they're in cardiff today, just got done, £270 and in middle of exams... SHIT! A conselation is within 45min, the cops was onto them.. Fake registration WH 02 DLK . BEWARE..... 1 american tanned guy with the gift of the gob, no tools in the van ...hoew could i be so stupid.!