ARCHIVED FORUM -- March 2012 to February 2022READ ONLY FORUM
This is the second Archived Forum which was active between 1st March 2012 and 23rd February 2022
Dear all,
I've been following this forum since a couple of years, but never participated or started my own thread, I had to fix that :)
In the last years, I bought a couple of B&O speakers, and as I bought an house recently, I'm now trying to make the best setup possible with what I already have.
Let's start with the available material :- 2x Beolab 8000- Beolab 11- 2x Beolab 14 speakers, but without the amplifier/sub- 1 Beoplay A8- B&O Cabinet (not really relevant, but I love it)- Yamaha A/V receiver with 5.1 pre outs- Synology NAS as music/videos repository
Currently, I have the two Labs 8000 plugged into my Yamaha surround receiver (RXV-773) and used as front speakers in my living room. The Lab 11 is plugged into the same receiver with a cable from Steve.
In the same living room, I have the A8, used as standalone (it was the main sound system before I bought the Beolabs 8000 some months ago).
The final plan is to move the A8 to another room, and have a full surround system in the living room, with the 8000s as front, the 11 as subwoofer (obviously...) and the 14s as rear, directly driven by the Yamaha receiver.
This would all be pretty easy to setup and would work fine for movies. But I also would like to have some easy to use sound setup for music, and that's where I was thinking to the Essence, that seems to do exactly what I want : easy music playing (mostly Internet radios, occasionally Apple Music / Deezer), physical remote to start/stop the music, nice design (remote).
Does anyone know if it is possible to integrate the Essence in my setup ?Additionally, for the Webradios, is the Essence "standalone" ? Once setup, can I just start listening to a radio by using the remote? Or does it need my iPhone / iPad ?
My first idea was to wire the 8000s and the 11 to the Essence, and then connect the Line In on the Essence to the front pre outs from the Yamaha receiver. But I wonder if there is a way to tell the Essence that the line in should work at fixed volume ? Because if it doesn't, there is no way to match the volume of the fronts with the surround speakers...
Another solution would be to buy a Beosystem 4, but the price is quite high and it wouldn't bring much added value, as it doesn't to anything more than the Yamaha receiver (maybe even less, room correction, ...). I would prefer to avoid to buy it, but if there is no other proper solution...
Sorry for the long text, and thanks a lot in advance for your help !
I can't answer much from your post, but I can tell you that the BeoSystem 4 alone will not work with your BeoLab 14 satellites. There are no amplifiers in the BeoSystem 4 so this would only work with active speakers. You would need the BeoLab 14 subwoofer for this solution. Did you buy the satellites separately?
Hi Mark,
Thanks for your input. This is true, but there is always a solution I guess (Beolink active or passive in this case I guess).
Anyway, the Beolabs 14 are not really the priority here, I could replace them by beolab 4000s or something similar for the surrounds if needed.
And yes, I bought the satellite separately, from someone who wanted the subwoofer alone. I always wanted the Beolab 11, as I really love the design of this thing, as I was planning to use a non B&O receiver anyway, it was perfect to not pay for the Lab 14 subwoofer :)
Regarding integrating the Essence into your setup... The only outputs of the Essence are the two PowerLink sockets. You should be able to get a PowerLink to stereo RCA cable and plug it in to one of the inputs of your receiver. I basically did something similar when I plugged in the Essence to my BeoSound 8. You can get the cable from Sounds Heavenly and possibly ask Steve if you have any questions regarding it.
I use Tunein radio on my Essence. You will need to configure the Essence with a web browser, enter your Tunein login info, set the order of sources, etc. Once you do you can control it all from the remote. You can change stations just by tapping the left or right button on the remote. The BeoMusic app adds what I believe is a critical part in that it's your display to see what is playing. I have several stations so sometimes I don't know which one is playing and I have to find my iPad to go to a particular station. Also if I hear a song that I like that I want to buy, I need the BeoMusic app to tell me the artist and song title. I love the remote as it is completely intuitive in the dark. You will have two volume controls, one on each remote (your Yamaha) so the volume on the Essence remote may not be all that useful.
The Essence could also add AirPlay and DLNA sources to your system if you do not already have them. I wish Deezer would come to the US for the general user... I would love to try it.
You won't be able to 'integrate' the Essence with a setup like you describe it.
You could - of course - 'use it as a source' the way Mark-N described it....which is not bad at all.
You could (the other way 'round) feed an output of your receiver into the Aux/line-in of the Essence.
You would have to use an output of the receiver, which allows for a fixed line level. But that wouldn't be an 'integration' either. You would have to deal with (at least) two control units - and you would have to have the sub in either of the systems.
Buying a BSys4 would bring you exactly the 'integration', you ask for - since the (not all) sources can be reached directly as natural/integrated sources (using a B&O remote) in the BSys4 setup. With the newest sw of the Essence you can set it up to use the speakers of the BSys4.
You could even (as Mark-N hinted in his post above) connect the Essence to the BeoPlay8 (in a remote room) using the line-in of the BP8. Just set the PL-output of the Essence to fixed line-out. You can control the Essence with the BeoMusic or the 'Wheely' - however, you would have to control the volume (of the 8) with the little remote, that comes with it.
The BSys4 and the Essence must - of course - be on the same network!
MM
There is a tv - and there is a BV
Thanks you both for your answers.
@Mark-N :
I have been thinking about using the Essence as a source for my receiver, but that wouldn't really fit the ease of use I'm targeting: I would have to turn the receiver on and switch it to the appropriate source to allow the Essence to play. Unless I found a way to trigger the Yamaha receiver with the Essence, but I doubt this would be easy to achieve...
Your integration of the BeoSound 8 with the Essence is quite interesting as well, can you tell me a bit more about that, especially how the sound level settings work ? Does the Beosound wake up alone when you push play on the Essence, or do you have to turn the Beosound on manually ?
For my Beoplay, I was thinking to use it in another room (bathroom probably), put an iPad or iPod touch on it and use internet radio through DS Audio. I still have some testing to do to ensure that it is working as expected, but once my favorite radios are saved in DS Audio, I think I could start listening by just pushing the middle button. But if the Essence works fine with the Beoplay 8, that would also be an option of course.
@Millemissen :
The solution of feeding an output of the receiver into the line in of the Essence would be my prefered one, but the double volume control is a dealbreaker, as it would compromise the use as a surround setup... I was hoping to be able to set the Essence so that it doesn't control the volume on its line in, but I doubt this is possible...
As you say, the BeoSystem 4 seems to be the solution, but I found the "value for money" of this system pretty bad... It doesn't support DTS-HD, 4K, HDMI 2.0, has no inbuilt amplifier... I can't even find a proper specification sheet for this system : is it compliant with the latest HDCP standards ? Does it provide a room correction, similar to the Audissey or YPAO system built in the standard A/V receiver ? Does it have an inbuilt tuner, if yes, is this tuner compatible with the TNT HD (not sure if this is a french standard...) ?The good thing with the BS4 would be that it would transform any TV/projector into something similar to a BeoVision if I'm right ? I could then control everything with the Beo One ? Many questions I'm sorry, but I would appreciate if you could give me more information about the BS4 :)
In the setup you describe with the Beosound 8, why would you set the PL-output to fixed line-out ? As you say, if you do so you can no more control the volume, which is kind of killing the interest of the wheely... Here I wouldn't see an issue in having two volume controls, I would just set the volume of the 8 to a defined level, then play around with the wheely only, no ?
Thanks again for your inputs.
Oh, I just thought to one more question : I can't find any used BeoSystem 4 anywhere at the moment, do you know what the approximate value of the BS4 is on the second hand market (an estimation is fine, just to have an idea)?
Thanks in advance !
Specs: this should give you some hints and the User Guide:
http://www.bang-olufsen.com/en/picture/televisions/Beosystem-4?cc=GB
But you are right - if you are looking for 4K, HDMI 2.0 etc, you won't find it.
As for this (french) tuner - I don't know?
Of course you won't find an amp, since it is built for active speakers/BeoLabs.
There is no need for inbuilt DTS-HD support since every Blu Ray player will decode the DTS-HD track to PCM.