Hello All,

Have admired Bang & Olufsen design for quite some time, and just received a vintage Beomaster 1900-2 as a gift. The unit is in good cosmetic shape, just a few scratches on the aluminum that I will try to clean up.

I was hoping that someone on the boards could help me out with the unit. It came with 2 sets of speaker connectors which are 2 plug weird connection. They are spliced to some regular speaker wire. It also came with a 5 pin DIN to RCA I think, very corroded RCA connectors. It is odd that the DIN has 2 sets of RCA inputs leading out of the 1 DIN... Is this normal?

I connected 2 speakers I have that are 8 ohm rated. I plugged in a stereo headphone to RCA to hook up my iPod. Plugged power on the unit. standby light lit up. selected Tape input, the "T" lit up, and I heard a buzzing sound on the left speakerand could turn the volume down to get it to stop, but I could not hear my ipod. I then hit the FM1 button (no FM antenna came with unit) and could hear the noise sound on both speakers very clearly, with no buzz / hum sound.

The FM1 light did not light up, nor the bass, treble or balance. What problem is that?

What type of FM antenna do I need? Should I get a DIN to RCA to listen to my iPod?

Could the Buzz sound on the left channel while in Tape mode, come from a bad connection of the corroded RCA inputs on the DIN to RCA connector I have?

Any help is appreciated, I am a novice, and dont have much knowledge of vintage electronics, but love this 1900 and would like to get it working properly, I am a collector of great design and specifically mid century modern.

Thanks,

Adam

Welcome to Beoworld !

The Beomaster 1900 (1900-2) is a wonderful unit but, being 30+ years old, most now
suffer from dried out capacitors.
Depending on which cap(s) have failed and how, the symptoms vary a lot.
There could of course be another fault on your machine but it will be very
hard to tell, let alone diagnose, with the old capacitors still in there.
A capacitor kit is available, containing more than 60 components.
A lamp kit is also available, containing a full set of fresh lamps of correct
type and wattage (plus a spare).

Both kits come with instructions and require basic electronic soldering skills and tools.
PM me for details.

Martin

Welcome from me as well!

The DIN-RCA adapter you have has four RCA connectors, as the DIN connection is able to carry signals both in & out (for connecting a tape recorder, for example). Colours vary, so it is impossible to say which two might be the correct L+R inputs for your iPod, but it doesn't hurt anything to just try them all until you find the correct ones.

To test the radio, take just about any length of loose wire and stick the other end of it in the antenna connector (I can't remember if the BM1900 has a male or female 75 ohm socket, but the 300 ohm connector should be easy to rig up, try either one of the sockets). B&O radios are typically very good, but still usually need at least some kind of an antenna to pick up anything but static.

In regards to antenna choice.

I have used Rabbit ear,"Y" shaped dipole,and roof mounted antennas.All work well with my BM2400,which is very similar to your BM1900.The roof mounted VHF/UHF/FM obviously giving the best performance.If you decide on something that uses the very common 75 ohm coax input on your receiver you will need an adapter available from Radio shack.Radio Shack catalog numbers for either Male or Female(I forgot which is which)are 278-265 and 278-261.I purchased mine at a local Radio Shack,they also can be found on their website.

Hi Dillen.

Thanks for your comments.  I have a Beomaster 1900 which turns off almost immediately after switching it on. Could this be the result of the old capacitors which you mention or is it something else? Your thoughts would be appreciated.

Regards,

Edwin

Another common issue is cracked solder joints to the large output stage transistors.
This can easily cause the Beomaster to go into standby immediately after switching off
but as stated above, there can be many other reasons.

Martin