Allow me to state what's obvious to many BeoWorlders: BeoLab active speakers are an incredible shortcut for today's digitally savvy generation. You literally do not need an amplifier between your source and the speakers - the amplifier is built into the speakers.

You could actually just connect a pair of BeoLabs directly to your computer or an AirPort Express unit, or similar component. However, that's not advisable for several reasons.

1. BeoLab speakers are very good - they deliver excellent sound, and are capable of a very natural performance. You should give them the best possible signal.

2. AirPort Express and laptop computers have inexpensive, low-spec digital-to-analog conversion components (DACs). When you use the analog signal they provide, and connect that directly to your BeoLabs, you are not achieving what your speakers are capable of. 

3. There's also a safety issue. If you've already tried this direct analog connection, you will have noticed that your speakers make quite a lot of noise when you remove or insert the connecting minijack; and you may also occasionally have served yourself a blast of sound because the volume setting was too loud. To protect your speakers and hearing you should have a unit between the Airport Express or computer, and the speakers.

4. The Airport Express minijack-out can deliver both an analog and a digital signal. If you use the latter, you won't be using the low-spec DAC inside the Airport Express to transform the digital signal to a signal your speakers understand.

5. You should therefore get a Digital-to-Analog-Converter (DAC), and run a Toslink optical cable from the Airport Express to the DAC. These cables are inexpensive, and all you need to make certain is that the cable has minijack Toslink at one end, which is the one you'll be inserting into your Airport Express (or computer). You then connect the cable to the Toslink IN on the DAC.

6. If your BeoLabs have RCA-connectors, then you can just run RCA audio cables from the DAC to the speakers. But most BeoLab speakers have only Powerlink connectors. No problem, companies such as Sounds Heavenly (see link below) can supply you with an RCA-to-Powerlink cable that you can use to connect the DAC to the speakers.

Main benefits:

1. No scratching or sudden sound explosions due to changes in impedance as you remove or insert the analog minijack plug, while the speakers are switched on. And no need to switch the speakers on or off.

2. A good DAC sends no signal to the speakers when it isn't receiving a signal, which means the speakers will power-off after a while when not in use.

3. DACs with volume control can be used to set a maximum working volume, to protect them and your ears - BeoLabs are powerful.

4. You get very good conversion of the digital signal, ensuring your speakers are fed with CD-quality sound if your files are AIFF/WAV/or Apple Lossless (ALAC).

5. If you get a DAC with headphone amp's you can also use it to listen to headphones from the DAC, which is also better than just connecting them directly to the computer.

 

Volume control, remote control with iPhone/iPod Touch/iPad is easily achieved, using the free Remote app from Apple, or using other apps, including those developed for Squeezebox, Sonos, etc.

There are various threads here discussing different DACs and solutions - but all of them adhering to the basic principles above.

Thank you so much Soundproof ! Could you please advise me where I can buy a good DAC at a reasonable price ? Does this also mean i can connect another TV-brand to my Beolab-speakers and get 5:1 sound with a DAC that can deal surround sound of course ?

Best regards

Hans, Sweden

soundproof:

4. The Airport Express minijack-out can deliver both an analog and a digital signal. If you use the latter, you won't be using the low-spec DAC inside the Airport Express to transform the digital signal to a signal your speakers understand.

and

Volume control, remote control with iPhone/iPod Touch/iPad is easily achieved, using the free Remote app from Apple, or using other apps, including those developed for Squeezebox, Sonos, etc.

All true, but if you use the AE to control the volume, your wasting your money on an expensive DAC. Your digital signal is not bit-perfect anymore. The more digital attenuation you use, the worse it gets.

 

As the DAC of Airport Express is very poor, an as I didn't want to mix an AE with an external DAC, I've tried another way : Sonos. The DAC is really better, not perfect, but very good with some of the good old Beolabs such as 6000 or 8000.

Now that Airplay has arrived, I'm not so sure what to use for my next home, as Airport could be as flexible as Sonos, with a better integration, but I should use an external DAC for my "link room"... Have to try Spotify on iPad with Airtunes to see if it's as good as Spotify with Sonos...

DoubleU:

soundproof:

4. The Airport Express minijack-out can deliver both an analog and a digital signal. If you use the latter, you won't be using the low-spec DAC inside the Airport Express to transform the digital signal to a signal your speakers understand.

and

Volume control, remote control with iPhone/iPod Touch/iPad is easily achieved, using the free Remote app from Apple, or using other apps, including those developed for Squeezebox, Sonos, etc.

All true, but if you use the AE to control the volume, your wasting your money on an expensive DAC. Your digital signal is not bit-perfect anymore. The more digital attenuation you use, the worse it gets.

 

Actually, this is no longer the case - but the impression lingers. It used to be like that until QuickTime 8. Particularly QT6.x was very bad.

Over at the Benchmark Wiki dealing with getting the best out of OSX you'll see that they ascertained this when QT7/8 was released. Up until then, they counselled that people should output audio at full volume, and then regulate it with the DAC. After QT8 that's no longer necessary. With OSX it is not a problem at all.

The volume controls in iTunes versions 7.X and 8.X will not cause significant distortion. The user should not hesitate to use the volume control in iTunes v7.x and 8.X

(http://www.benchmarkmedia.com/wiki/index.php/ITunes-QuickTime_for_Mac_-_Setup_Guide)

Good set-up guides here:

http://www.benchmarkmedia.com/wiki/index.php/Category:Setup_Guides

 

As stated in my original post, the DAC in the Airport Express is not good enough, and one should look for a stand-alone unit. You can get these at different price-points, if you want one that is capable of surround decoding, then I think you should do some research into options.

I have a Grace m902 (now replaced by the m903) - and that does a wonderful job. I see Benchmark have just released a DAC1 HDR, which is high-resolution capable. These are not multichannel units.

There are also less expensive options on the market. There are threads here dealing with the Cambridge DAC Magic, which does not have an independent volume control, but which is a good option. But there are lots to choose from by now - a market has developed for such DACs.

Maybe someone else can recommend a multi-channel capable stand-alone DAC? Another option would be to get a surround processor, and then switch between two-channel and multi-channel, but then I feel one is departing the original topic, which is how to get the best possible signal to a pair of BeoLab speakers from a computer.

Other solutions, such as SONOS, Squeezebox, etc., are also very good options, particularly as they've all created nice apps for control of your source and playback settings, comparable to the options you get with Apple's Remote. Squeezebox is very nice because of its wide selection of internet radio options in addition to what sources you have on your harddisks.

Oke Soundproof, thanks for clearing that up.

I have the predecessor of this component connected to my BeoLab 5s. It gets its signal from a Mac mini. This is an inexpensive multi-purpose unit which is actually used for recording music, but it can easily be configured to act as a DAC. Has extremely good jitter suppression, and both Toslink Optical and coax s/pdif, as well as FireWire IN.

Costs about USD 400. You also get a headphone amp, and volume control.

http://www.tcelectronic.com/impacttwin.asp

Hi all

In reference to this question, although not quite the same. Can someone please tell me if the folowing setup is possible.

Macmini connected with HDMI to BV7 with BL5´s and BL3´connected with powerlink, works perfectly.

However, i would like to utilize the digital inputs on the BL5´s. What will happen if i connect the BL5´s with S/P-diff dirrectly to the optical out on the mini??

Is it possible at all, and what will take precedence?. Say i press V.mem for the mini to show up on BV7 (Sound set to HDMI on AV4), Speakers turn on througt powerlink. If i then choose to play some music on the mini, will this then be digital directly from mini to BL5´s OR through HDMI to BV7 and through powerlink as always?

Can someone help me on this? I would rather not have to by a seperate DAC.

Thanks in advance

 

Ehlerz

I don't know whether you can use a DAC anyway - I don't know whether the s/pdif precedence works in that set-up, as you're using V.mem -- maybe if you use PC for the Mini? But there are good DACs in the BV7, and the signal going from the Mini to the BV7 is digital through the HDMI.

Here I'd go for keeping things as simple as possible - I'm certain someone here has a similar setup and can advise you. I'd personally opt for using the HDMI here, as it would pass both stereo and multi-channel signals to the BV7, which would then process these properly, at the press of a button.

soundproof:

I don't know whether you can use a DAC anyway - I don't know whether the s/pdif precedence works in that set-up, as you're using V.mem -- maybe if you use PC for the Mini? But there are good DACs in the BV7, and the signal going from the Mini to the BV7 is digital through the HDMI.

Here I'd go for keeping things as simple as possible - I'm certain someone here has a similar setup and can advise you. I'd personally opt for using the HDMI here, as it would pass both stereo and multi-channel signals to the BV7, which would then process these properly, at the press of a button.

Hi soundproof

That is true, however, the BL5´s are connected to the BV7 only through powerlink, so the digital signal never reaches the speakers..

/Ehlerz

Yes, I am aware of that, Ehlerz. But your BV7 has good DACs, and are passing a converted signal to the BL5s, where it is being properly amplified. The advantages of the hdmi-signal being properly handled in its various configurations (two-channel, multichannel) are preferable to trying to set up a separate signal chain, in my opinion.

Is it possible that we could have a new section showing how to do certain setups?

Maybe with diagrams and a pretty specific list of what is needed (eg cabling, components, TVs, systems, etc.)

These could include setups such as using airport express; Beoport; link room setups; etc etc

This would be really handy for those that aren't so tech savvy..

That is a very very good idear... Some setups including apple gear are not all straight forward..

 

/Ehlerz

@ using a Beolab 5

The BL5 is very special and kind of dominating your whole system, because its' internal DAC is responsible for the sound of your system, because the ICE-Poweramps in the BL5 can only deal with analog signals. All signals are upsampled by the BL5 to 24bit/192khz before being converted to analog for the amps again. In addition to that there is a DSP with 32-bit floating-point processing in front of the internal DAC too. So it is pretty pointless of what high-tech source you are attaching to them ... the BL5 is the dominator.

Best regards

Tim