I am auditioning a pair of Beolab9 speakers with some excellent results.  I do not want a B&O source however as I have recently purchased a Benchmark DAC1 D/A converter which I run up to 24bit/96khz from a WinXP PC via USB.  The DAC1 is designed to give you a bit perfect source from a PC, its very good.  Partnering this to the Beolab9 has been through their standard Powerlink to RCA Cable and has provided a better sound than the B&O CD players.  The Benchmark DAC1 D/A converter also has a volume control and can be used as a simple preamp with fairly good results however, few issues remain with the sound quality.

 

1/ Preamp
Using the volume control on the DAC1 was OK, but bypassing it and using just the volume control on the media player on the PC (iTunes and Winamp) DID result in better sound quality.  It’s a scarey approach driving these speakers directly from a media player volume although theoretically no loss of quality should result, as the volume control is 24bit on the source media players and the Windows XP volume control is bypassed completely.

 

2/ Cables
Understood from reading other posts that the cable argument is not conclusive, but to me that standard B&O 'Powerlink' cable to me is making for a thin and quite shrill sound.  I am experimenting with having a custom replacement for standard B&O 'Powerlink' DIN to RCA cable being made up for me by http://www.flashbacksales.co.uk after seeing the following post;

 

http://forum.beoworld.org/forums/thread/27979.aspx

 

Flashback do not have a specific replacement for this cable, yet, but I am in a dialog with them to make up a prototype and I will hopefully be receiving a test set soon to try with this proposed setup.  I will be happy to feed back to the forum and hopefully as a result the people at Flashback will have a marketable upgrade product for the standard 'Powerlink' to RCA cable.  I’m hopeful the sound will be more detailed and less sibilant and shrill as a result.  You will never know until you try people :-).

 

Questions;

1/ Driving Beolab9’s directly via RCA, is this a good idea?  Anyone with a good solution for a preamplifier in this equation? The only one I’ve seen reference to was about 4 times the price of the Beolab9’s!

 

2/ Anyone got good cabling advice?  Lets assume the responses are cable upgrade friendly please :-).

 

3/ Are any other adaptors for 'Powerlink' to other input cables such as RCA or XLR available?

 

Congrats with your Benchmark, it's a very nice DAC - I had one for a while before replacing it with a Grace m902 because I found the sound of the latter a little less sharp. As you, I'm using speakers with acoustic lenses, and the fact that these radiate without the sound being "mellowed" by floor or room interactions (which you don't want) meant I didn't need/want added sharpness.

I'm a complete cable agnostic, as a result of having tried an endless number of various grade cables - up to and including cost that would have even my ex-wife get mad at me. The sharpness you're hearing is in the music, and I seriously doubt that cables will modify that, unless they are built explicitly to modify that electronically. (And no, I'm not trying to start another cable debate.)

Don't get put off by the thin cables from B&O. That company is so good at making money off peripherals and added boxes that if they saw there was integrity in claiming heavy gauge bespoke cables made a difference, we'd all be paying through our noses for them now. Their golden ears can't hear a difference, and whenever a cable manufacturer gets in touch to tell B&O that their cables are substandard, they're invited to come and pick out their cables against B&O's. 

I have bought cables from Flashbacksales, and can recommend both the cables with excellent terminations and connections, and the prompt service. I wanted to avoid having unnecessary intermediate connections as I went from DIN-to-RCA.

1. I've run RCA straight into the Line IN on both BL3s and BL5s, with no problem, from a Benchmark DAC and from other DACs, as well as receivers. Your Benchmark DAC is a preamplifier and can serve a signal to active speakers with no difficulty - you use the volume control on the DAC.

 

 

Catboy listen to Soundproof.  The cables shouldn't make a difference.  You're transmitting a digital signal.  This means the only way the cable would make a difference would be if it was so bad that you were actually losing data bits, which the B&O cable, or probably any cable you could buy out there isn't.  The cables can make a difference when transmitting an analog signal, such as for a traditional passive speaker, but even then it's really only the thickness of the wire that helps.  Anything beyond that like oxygen free, platinum platted, polarized pixie dust copper or whatever is all just marketing.

I was thinking of getting a DAC aswell. Currently I am planning to put the DAC between my Apple Airport Express and my BeoSystem 3 + BL9.

1. Can I do that ? and would that be a good idea?

I see soundproof and catboy both going directly into Line In on their speakers, but...

2. Would the BeoSystem 3 degrade the signal going to the BL9?

3. Which DAC would be a good entry level DAC and what price level should I expect to pay? 

Christian

Austin, as far as I know the lab9 do not have a digital in, only the lab5. So the Powerlink cable is analoge from the DAC to the LS.

Karsten 

1. Your BeoSystem 3 contains DACs.
You should be able to send your digital signal into one of its digital IN connectors, either from a CD-player, DVD-player or computer. The DACs inside BeoSystem 3 are very sophisticated, and can handle up to 32-bit/192kHz files (the sampling rate may be even higher, but I'm sure about the wordlength of 32-bit.) I don't have one, and don't know the specifics of controlling the audio signal through it - maybe someone here does?

2. The output from a DAC would be analog, and would be processed as analog by your BeoSystem 3 before being sent to the PL-OUT, but I don't think you'd experience any degrading of the signal.

The BL9s don't have digital IN, but they they don't require it if you have a DAC, as this will convert a digital signal to analog, and you can then use an RCA-to-PL cable to port the analog signal from the DAC to the BL9s. The speakers would act as amplifiers, while the DAC would let you control volume.

I've had no trouble connecting BL3s and BL5s to DACs (though in the latter instance just as an experiment, to see whether I could hear a difference between my stand-alone DAC and the units inside the BL5. Preferred the latter, for simplicity and because I wanted to use the DAC in another setup.)

The only caution is that the LINE OUT signal from your DAC's analog out to the speakers can't be higher than that specified in the manual for connection to a non-B&O system. For the BL5s this is 2V RMS. Begin with the volume set low on your DAC, as a safety measure.

 

 

 

Interesting and I am looking forward on seeing (hearing) your experiences. I had a pair of Beolab9 home for test yesterday and they sounded lovely. Tested against a system 3 times more expensive and it was almost a tie...! So why pay more than less....

 But I was (and sitill is) a little suspicious towards the ultrathin cables with the cheap connections. Even though I had nothing bad to say about sound quality, couldn´t they at least try a little bit to make them look and feel a little more expensive? I mean hey, we are talking of a pair of 8 grand speakers.....however, please share your thoughts about the new cables

Mr T.

 PS Benchmark direct into speakers is fantastic....  

The PowerLink cables aren't 'cheap' - they're good quality, but a good or bad cable will really offer no difference in sound quality at a line level (with the exception of the quality of the shielding used - which is good in PowerLink).

I didn´t say that the cables are cheap. I said that the connections are cheap, which they in fact are.

I think that weather or not a cable does make a difference or not is something that should be up to the user. In my opinion there are no right or wrong in this, only personal opinions.

MrT:

I didn´t say that the cables are cheap. I said that the connections are cheap, which they in fact are.

I think that weather or not a cable does make a difference or not is something that should be up to the user. In my opinion there are no right or wrong in this, only personal opinions.

It's not really an opinion though when it's scientifically provable that a certain cable will make no audible difference. 

 

Well, I do not want to start a cable debate. If you believe that science is 100% right then that´s the case for you. But there might be other people out there that thinks otherwise. So the secundary part of my post was only to say that everyone is entitled to their own opinion

MrT:

 

Well, I do not want to start a cable debate. If you believe that science is 100% right then that´s the case for you. But there might be other people out there that thinks otherwise. So the secundary part of my post was only to say that everyone is entitled to their own opinion

Of course, but you must also bear in mind that sound reproduction is a science. Without the input of scientific research, speakers would still sound similar to those of

If the OP wants to use 'upgraded' cables, then that's absolutely fine. I personally wouldn't though - no 'blind cable test' has ever produced results which amount to 'evidence' of audible difference, and scientific measurement has reinforced this.

MrT:

 

Well, I do not want to start a cable debate. If you believe that science is 100% right then that´s the case for you. But there might be other people out there that thinks otherwise. So the secundary part of my post was only to say that everyone is entitled to their own opinion

Alex is right.  Electronic sound reproduction is based solely on the principles of science, from the beginnings of the most basic radios, all the way to the most complicated sound systems today.  You'll find it quite difficult to construct even the most basic crystal radio without using the principles of science.  Sound reproduction only enjoys its position today because of many years of scientific research that it has been fortunate enough to benefit from.  To claim that you may have ears that can go above and beyond the principles of science is to belittle all the work that has gone into the history of electronic sound systems.  If you really did have hearing that was so sensitive that it could detect differences in electrical connections not otherwise measurable within the range of human hearing, then you'd be the subject of many new research journal publications.  There are many cases in electronics where the connections matter.  More often it's when dealing with signals in the MHz or Ghz range, to which the snail-slow frequencies of the audio range are insignificant.  Furthermore, the differences in the connections, especially at those speeds, are definitely measurable.  Even if the difference in a connection is measurable, the question is whether within the audio spectrum it will make any difference.  You mention the connections looking "cheap."  It's true that if the quality isn't as good, then you can run into contact issues down the road as the connections can't withstand as much physical stress or can't make as good of a contact.  But as long as the contact is actually working properly, you won't notice a difference in sound quality.

Science isn't something that can be right or wrong.  It's a means of analyzing and understanding the world.  I think opinion in this sense is being used very loosely.  It's like saying that people are entitled to the opinion that the world isn't round.  Sure you can find some people in the world who think that's the case, but that doesn't mean it's worth considering.

My cable confession.

I'm the kind of guy who likes gadgets, and who loves tweaking. I've moved around a lot, which means I've divested myself of quite a few acquisitions during the years - if not, I would have a "Smithsonian" of tech gadgets in the garage, loft and basement of whatever place I'd been living in.

Here it's not unusual, but most people would wonder why a person needs three complete sound systems, two with video, within ten meters of one another, in an apartment. My willingness to pay for a/v, and to have a/v is probably undisputed. My friends know me as a gadget freak.

I love stuff that works, and that works well. This is one reason why I've been a B&O fan for many years. Given that I've at times crossed over into non-B&O a/v you'd think that one result from that would be a completely different set of cables than those B&O provide. However, I've never been able to find a single person who is able to confidently distinguish "straight wire" from fancy cable, either as signal or loudspeaker cables. Unless there's a serious design flaw in the cable (or the manufacturer has hidden sound modifying components in the cable makeup) you can buy inexpensive cables and they'll do what they can do well: transfer an electronic signal suitable for the faithful reproduction of sound and image.

I happen to know that B&O frequently gets queries from manufacturers of fancier cables, who want B&O to upgrade their interconnects. On a few occasions B&O have asked persistent manufacturers to come and pick out their cable from a blind comparison to B&O's cable -- invariably without success.

One of the original component designers of McIntosh audio, Roger Russel, considers fancy wire to be an enormous scam, and actually congratulates the wire industry with having been able to perpetrate this scam on gullible customers.

http://www.roger-russell.com/wire/wire.htm#thetruth 

Being a scientist, and an electrical engineer of the highest order, Mr. Russel is incapable of accepting the wild claims of wire wizards - he knows they are ridiculous. And he has an amusing anecdote:

Despite the effectiveness of Gordon's cable demonstration and the truth about speaker wire, people visiting the McIntosh room at the shows, who had not experienced the cable demonstration, were disturbed that we were using ordinary heavy zip cord instead of one of the popular brands of speaker wire. Instead of listening to the McIntosh speakers and electronics, they recalled "bad" things they had been told about "common" speaker wire and this promoted questions about the "inferior" wire being used. When we changed the wire to a popular brand of wire, customers were happy with the setup, and directed their attention to the McIntosh equipment.

As a manufacturer of very high-end and very expensive audio equipment, why would Roger Russel handicap his equipment by using sub-standard wire? Only because he knew that more expensive wire would not improve upon the sound - but since that choice distracted customers from the purpose of the demonstration, they ended up using a popular brand, in order to be able to focus on the sound from the critical McIntosh components.

Do also remember that a direct comparison of B&O signal wire and other manufacturers' loudspeaker wires is invalid, as B&O uses active speakers, and their wire only carries the signal, and not the power required to drive the speakers.

And please do remember that when Mike Lavigne, who is in possession of what's considered the finest listening room in the US, compared Monster Cable against Transparent's Opus MM cable, he was unable to distinguish the USD 50 wire from the USD 48.000 wire in a valid double blind test. Audioholics who insist on spending silly amounts of money on cables, or who fear looking silly after having spent silly amounts of money on cables, are hoping against hope that Lavigne will declare that there was something wrong with the test. So far, no luck.

As you can see here, there's nothing wrong with Lavigne's listening room: http://www.aca.gr/pop_lavigne.htm

http://forum.beoworld.org/forums/post/67317.aspx 

Roger Russel strongly recommends that one spend the money on the speakers and components.

http://www.roger-russell.com/wire/audiocables.htm 

Alex:

MrT:

 

Well, I do not want to start a cable debate. If you believe that science is 100% right then that´s the case for you. But there might be other people out there that thinks otherwise. So the secundary part of my post was only to say that everyone is entitled to their own opinion

Of course, but you must also bear in mind that sound reproduction is a science. Without the input of scientific research, speakers would still sound similar to those of <1950.

If the OP wants to use 'upgraded' cables, then that's absolutely fine. I personally wouldn't though - no 'blind cable test' has ever produced results which amount to 'evidence' of audible difference, and scientific measurement has reinforced this.

Do you have information of all blind cable test ever made? Of course not, so you can´t say no 'blind cable test' has ever produced results which amount to 'evidence' of audible difference, and scientific measurement has reinforced this.

What you can say is no 'blind cable test' that I know of has ever produced results which amount to 'evidence' of audible difference, and scientific measurement has reinforced this.

There is no general absolute truth in music reproduction, there is only individual truth. And that is the point I am trying to make.

What interests me is reading about experiences from catboy420

Mr. T - this is an instance where one can use a very elegant tool of elimination.

I do not have knowledge of every valid blind test carried out as far as cables are concerned.

The cable industry has fought tooth and nail against blind tests as a format for judging cable performance.

If there was one - just one - statistically significant and procedurally valid cable blind test in the world that showed the advantages of expensive cable, then that test would be trumpeted across advertising in hifi-magazines everywhere.

 

MrT:

Do you have information of all blind cable test ever made? Of course not, so you can´t say no 'blind cable test' has ever produced results which amount to 'evidence' of audible difference, and scientific measurement has reinforced this.

What you can say is no 'blind cable test' that I know of has ever produced results which amount to 'evidence' of audible difference, and scientific measurement has reinforced this.

There is no general absolute truth in music reproduction, there is only individual truth. And that is the point I am trying to make.

What interests me is reading about experiences from catboy420

No, but I can comfortably say that if there had been a cable test with results which amounted to anything, then I would know about it.

Soundproof is right, if there had been ANY 'proven' advantages of 'good' cables in terms of sound - then it would be all over the 'hifi forums' and literature...

camshaft:

MrT:

 

Well, I do not want to start a cable debate. If you believe that science is 100% right then that´s the case for you. But there might be other people out there that thinks otherwise. So the secundary part of my post was only to say that everyone is entitled to their own opinion

Alex is right.  Electronic sound reproduction is based solely on the principles of science, from the beginnings of the most basic radios, all the way to the most complicated sound systems today.  You'll find it quite difficult to construct even the most basic crystal radio without using the principles of science.  Sound reproduction only enjoys its position today because of many years of scientific research that it has been fortunate enough to benefit from.  To claim that you may have ears that can go above and beyond the principles of science is to belittle all the work that has gone into the history of electronic sound systems.  If you really did have hearing that was so sensitive that it could detect differences in electrical connections not otherwise measurable within the range of human hearing, then you'd be the subject of many new research journal publications.  There are many cases in electronics where the connections matter.  More often it's when dealing with signals in the MHz or Ghz range, to which the snail-slow frequencies of the audio range are insignificant.  Furthermore, the differences in the connections, especially at those speeds, are definitely measurable.  Even if the difference in a connection is measurable, the question is whether within the audio spectrum it will make any difference.  You mention the connections looking "cheap."  It's true that if the quality isn't as good, then you can run into contact issues down the road as the connections can't withstand as much physical stress or can't make as good of a contact.  But as long as the contact is actually working properly, you won't notice a difference in sound quality.

Science isn't something that can be right or wrong.  It's a means of analyzing and understanding the world.  I think opinion in this sense is being used very loosely.  It's like saying that people are entitled to the opinion that the world isn't round.  Sure you can find some people in the world who think that's the case, but that doesn't mean it's worth considering.

Hahahaha, for your info; According to science the world isn´t round. All, but the flat-earth-society, (as far as I know ...) of the educated part of the population consider it round.

The science defines round as something that has exactely the same radius from the centre. That is not the case with earth.

The science defines earths shape as very close to an oblate spheroid—a rounded shape with a bulge around the equator—although the precise shape (the geoid) varies from this by up to 100 meters. The average diameter of the reference spheroid is about 12,742 km. More approximately the distance is 40,000 km/π because the meter was originally defined as 1/10,000,000 of the distance from the equator to the north pole through Paris, France.

So is the earth round according to science? No! Does it have a roundish shape? Yes! Is it more round than flat? Yes! But it is still not round according to science...I think it is ok that you believe that the earth is round...

Over and out

Is it something in the water?

soundproof:

Is it something in the water?

Either way - the men in white coats are on their way.

MrT:

camshaft:

MrT:

 

Well, I do not want to start a cable debate. If you believe that science is 100% right then that´s the case for you. But there might be other people out there that thinks otherwise. So the secundary part of my post was only to say that everyone is entitled to their own opinion

Alex is right.  Electronic sound reproduction is based solely on the principles of science, from the beginnings of the most basic radios, all the way to the most complicated sound systems today.  You'll find it quite difficult to construct even the most basic crystal radio without using the principles of science.  Sound reproduction only enjoys its position today because of many years of scientific research that it has been fortunate enough to benefit from.  To claim that you may have ears that can go above and beyond the principles of science is to belittle all the work that has gone into the history of electronic sound systems.  If you really did have hearing that was so sensitive that it could detect differences in electrical connections not otherwise measurable within the range of human hearing, then you'd be the subject of many new research journal publications.  There are many cases in electronics where the connections matter.  More often it's when dealing with signals in the MHz or Ghz range, to which the snail-slow frequencies of the audio range are insignificant.  Furthermore, the differences in the connections, especially at those speeds, are definitely measurable.  Even if the difference in a connection is measurable, the question is whether within the audio spectrum it will make any difference.  You mention the connections looking "cheap."  It's true that if the quality isn't as good, then you can run into contact issues down the road as the connections can't withstand as much physical stress or can't make as good of a contact.  But as long as the contact is actually working properly, you won't notice a difference in sound quality.

Science isn't something that can be right or wrong.  It's a means of analyzing and understanding the world.  I think opinion in this sense is being used very loosely.  It's like saying that people are entitled to the opinion that the world isn't round.  Sure you can find some people in the world who think that's the case, but that doesn't mean it's worth considering.

Hahahaha, for your info; According to science the world isn´t round. All, but the flat-earth-society, (as far as I know ...) of the educated part of the population consider it round.

The science defines round as something that has exactely the same radius from the centre. That is not the case with earth.

The science defines earths shape as very close to an oblate spheroid—a rounded shape with a bulge around the equator—although the precise shape (the geoid) varies from this by up to 100 meters. The average diameter of the reference spheroid is about 12,742 km. More approximately the distance is 40,000 km/π because the meter was originally defined as 1/10,000,000 of the distance from the equator to the north pole through Paris, France.

So is the earth round according to science? No! Does it have a roundish shape? Yes! Is it more round than flat? Yes! But it is still not round according to science...I think it is ok that you believe that the earth is round...

Over and out

I think my point was clearly missed here. 

MrT:

The science defines earths shape as very close to an oblate spheroid—a rounded shape with a bulge around the equator—although the precise shape (the geoid) varies from this by up to 100 meters. The average diameter of the reference spheroid is about 12,742 km. More approximately the distance is 40,000 km/π because the meter was originally defined as 1/10,000,000 of the distance from the equator to the north pole through Paris, France.

I think my point was clearly missed here. 

 

A nice eloquent scientific characterisation of the geometry of the earth. However, would it not also be true that if something a complicated as a 12,500-odd km diameter geoid (which in the earth's case has had extensive topological, mineralisation, magnetism, denisometric, and other eugenic measurements) has been characterised in some detail, that it is unlikely that science also has not made similar characterisations and measurements to that of a 3m length of copper wire?

You are I fear, confusing the religion and revelation of audio cables with that of the science of audio cables.

 

10% 

Mr10Percent:

MrT:

The science defines earths shape as very close to an oblate spheroid—a rounded shape with a bulge around the equator—although the precise shape (the geoid) varies from this by up to 100 meters. The average diameter of the reference spheroid is about 12,742 km. More approximately the distance is 40,000 km/π because the meter was originally defined as 1/10,000,000 of the distance from the equator to the north pole through Paris, France.

I think my point was clearly missed here. 

However, would it not also be true that if something a complicated as a 12,500-odd km diameter geoid (which in the earth's case has had extensive topological, mineralisation, magnetism, denisometric, and other eugenic measurements) has been characterised in some detail,.

10% 

Do y' know, I was just thinking the same thing!