beojeff
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I’m interested in this topic as well. I currently have BL6000s as my rears, BL1s as surrounds, and BL9s are fronts. After installing the Theatre, I might use the Theatre for the fronts as well as center channel. This would free up my 9s to be used as wides or possibly rears — or even surrounds.
I also have a pair of 8000s and 3s and 4000s that I could move into the room.
A discussion of how well various beolabs are suited as rear speakers would be great — especially in light of the new bass management system.
BL3s have the advantage of not being obstructed by a sofa. However, they lack bass.
BL9s would have the lower drivers blocked by a sofa, but they would add bass to the rear of the room.
BL1s were once recommended for rears due to their height. However, now that we can add Atmos height speakers, the height of the BL1s might actually be detrimental to the placement of speakers and get confused with the height channels.
The setup of the BLGW and BLI is practically the same. Much easier than the MLGW — which didn’t even have direct Hue support. The BLGW/BLI basically just imports all of the info from how you programmed your Hue lights and scenes on the Hue app.
The BLGW has a couple of benefits for you, in my opinion — in addition to the cheaper cost. With the BLGW you already have all of the control you get from updating a BLI to PRO mode. Also, the BLGW has a masterlink port. (both old style as well as the RJ45 — so actually 2 ML ports) So you can keep a traditional ML network as well as NL devices all being used with the BLGW. The BLI did away with ML completely and has no ML port. This does not replace an NL/ML Converter. If you add an NL/ML Converter to an ML device, you are essentially turning that ML device into an NL device, which gives you all of the benefits of borrowing sources between NL devices and joining from one NL device to another.
Following is a list that I made showing what the BLGW/BLI trigger commands are that correspond to what is listed on the Beoremote One. Note that some commands need for you to unhide other commands on the Beoremote One before they are accessible.
LIGHT FUNCTION 1 = MORNING
LIGHT FUNCTION 2 = LEAVING
LIGHT FIUNCTION 3 = COMING HOME
LIGHT FUNCTION 4 = TV VIEWING
LIGHT FUNCTION 5 = EVENING
LIGHT FUNCTION 6 = MUSIC
LIGHT FUNCTION 7 = RELAX
LIGHT FUNCTION 8 = SLEEP
LIGHT FUNCTION 9 = GENERAL
LIGHT FUNCTION 10 = OUTDOOR
LIGHT FUNCTION 11 = HOME
LIGHT FUNCTION 12 = DINNER
LIGHT FUNCTION 13 = CINEMA
LIGHT FUNCITON 14 = BEDTIME
LIGHT FUNCTION 15 = NIGHT
LIGHT FUNCTION 16 = WELCOME HOME
LIGHT FUNCTION 17 = GOODBYECONTROL FUNCTION 1 = WINDOW 1
CONTROL FUNCTION 2 = WINDOW 2
CONTROL FUNCTION 3 – WINDOW 3
CONTROL FUNCTION 4 = WINDOW 4
CONTROL FUNCTION 5 = WINDOW 5
CONTROL FUNCTION 11 = ON _OFF 1
CONTROL FUNCTION 12 = ON_OFF 2
CONTROL FUNCTION 13 = CURTAIN 3
CONTROL FUNTION 14 = CURTAIN 4
CONTROL FUNCTION 15 = CURTAIN 5
CONTROL FUNCTION 22 = ON_OFF2
CONTROL FUNCTION 23 = ON_OFF3
CONTROL FUNCTION 24 = ON_OFF4
CONTROL FUNCTION 25 = ON_OFF5
CONTROL FUNCTION 16 = SHADE 1
CONTROL FUNCTION 17 = SHADE 2
CONTROL FUNCTION 18 = SHADE 3
CONTROL FUNCTION 19= SHADE 4
CONTROL FUNCTION 20 = SHADE 5
CONTROL FUNCTION 21 = FAN
CONTROL FUNCTION 22 = DOORLOCK
CONTROL FUNCTION 23 = ALARM
CONTROL FUNCTION 24=CONTROL 1 ON
CONTROL FUNCTION 25=CONTROL 1 OFF
CONTROL FUNCTION 26= CONTROL 2 ON
CONTROL FUNCTION 27-CONTROL 2 OFFThere is also this training video:
You’re going to like the Hue bulbs and the BLI. You basically set up the bulbs in the Hue ios app, assign them to rooms, and create scenes of multiple bulbs. The BLI will import all of that information.
When you see in the Beoremote One Light list, e.g., “Morning,” “Away,” etc. Those are all just triggers that can be assigned to macros. For example, “Light Function 25” would be one trigger. I once made a list of what all of those Light Function commands were in the old forum and how they are assigned to names in the BR1 Light list. Of course, you can rename those entries that are in the Beoremote One Light list.
I’m like you in that I don’t like to use my phone to control the lights. There are quite a lot of options for control.
-You can use voice commands with Siri and Google. These do not require a BLI.
-Philips makes some options of wall buttons that can be assigned to the lights. In the U.S., there is even a plate that can go over your existing light control to provide what feels like a traditional toggle switch. Your wife might like that to get used to the new lights.
-The BLI provides many ways of integrating other system. For example, you can use Lutron keypads to control the lights/scenes. The Lutron Pico buttons are a simple and inexpensive controller.
-In addition to the Beoremote One, you can also put an Essence controller into “Light” mode to use the buttons to trigger BLI macros. If you have a Halo, in essential mode the BLI will automatically assign lights and scenes to the Halo. You need the Pro upgrade to be able to edit this in the BLI.
Knowing how passionate you are about B&O, I suspect that you will soon want the Pro mode to have more control and to get into the heart of the BLI. I’m here to help out if you have any questions!
Hi Skywalker, I see you have a Halo together with BR1. When testing the Halo at home 2years ago, I found it too limited for Video functions. Is it still true? I would like to buy a Halo for for daily A/V use with my Eclipse. Kind regards, Yann.
Yann-
I’ve been using a Halo with a Beosystem 4. I find myself using the Halo frequently to adjust the volume and to pause/start the video by pushing the center button on the screen. This is a pretty convenient feature. However, some apps on the Apple TV use the actual “play” and “pause” buttons instead of the center button. It would be nice if B&O added these two functions to the Halo main screen. I hope that the Theatre will at least allow volume control of video sources with the Halo. It would seem logical for B&O to eventually add the video control screen that the Beosystem 4 and Beovisions can use.
With a BLI, the Halo becomes even more useful in the living room. You can control the lights, thermostat, etc. I can even push a button to make the Roomba vacuum start cleaning.
Perhaps next we’ll be seeing B&O asking us to put money into a Kickstarter for them to develop a Beosound Moment MK2.
I feel a sense of being rather offended. It’s as if someone at B&O brainstormed and pitched the proposal, “Hey. Our customers have no common sense and like spending way too much money. They have cash to burn. So let’s get EVEN MORE of their money by having them spend it on something that doesn’t even exist!”
I was really surprised by how much better the BL3 pair sounded when adding a BL2 subwoofer. They sounded like a completely different speaker. Also, the Bl2 and BL3 look great together.
That’s a lot of wired speakers. I count 6 pairs and the Theatre only has 4 powerlink ports.
Each port accepts 2 channels. So you get 8 wired.
As I mentioned, I have Receiver 1 units to connect the non-wired speakers via Wisa. The Beosystem 4 has 12 wired channels — which is what I’m moving from with my current speaker setup.
For me, I’m using an LG C2 77″ screen wall-mounted with the Theatre also wall-mounted separately. I didn’t really like the G2 because of its box frame — which is truly meant to be flush with the wall. I’m using a wall-mount that will allow me to pull the screen away from the wall to have access to the sockets when I need that access.
In the past, I’ve had a dual screen/projector setup for when I want to use the CINEMA mode. However, I’ve found that with the large and bright TVs now available (I’ve currently been using a Samsung 75″ 4k) that I no longer ever use the CINEMA mode with a projector. I might move the projector to use with the jacuzzi bathtub with the now available Beosystem 4.
From what I remember hearing at my stand-alone Theatre demo is that it had plenty of bass for LFE. I would be surprised if the BL2 (aka not the quickest sub in the world) would really be a positive contributor to your eventual setup? Not sure if that frees up another speaker port or not…but something to experiment with.
This brings up an interesting issue with the new bass management of the Theatre. Prior to the Theatre, the bass management would have sent the LFE to the most capable speaker. However, my understanding of the new bass management of the Theatre is that the LFE would get dispersed among multiple speakers. Therefore, it might be beneficial to have a BL2 in the rear to balance the low bass of the Theatre speaker.
My current plan is to use the Theatre for the center and front L and R. Use Beolab 9s for front wides. Have a BL2 in the front area. Use Beolab 1s for the surrounds. Use Beolab 6000s for rears, and use a total of x4 Beolab 4000s for front hight and rear hight speakers.
That’s a lot of wired speakers. I count 6 pairs and the Theatre only has 4 powerlink ports. Are you planning to use some of them wirelessly with the wireless receiver? I’m sure this setup will sound absolutely amazing!
I sure am! I actually already have all of these speakers with my Beosystem 4. It has 6 PL sockets which provides 12 channels for speakers. With my Beosystem 4, I’m using a Transmitter 1 to send the BL10 (center) and BL2 via WISA using x2 Receiver 1 units. This is because the wired PL cannot isolate the center channel and the subwoofer channels from each other in one socket. However, the Receiver 1 units will isolate just one channel so that I can connect both the center and the sub to one of the 6 PL sockets of the Beosystem 4.
So far, I really don’t feel that I’ve been benefitting from the height speakers. I’ve been waiting for YEARS for something like the Theatre to be able to truly benefit from Dolby Atmos. I’ve had this infrastructure ready for years just waiting for the Theatre! I feel like I’m the ideal target customer for the Beosound Theatre. I have a huge variety of Beolabs ready to be upgraded to Dolby Atmos.
I do agree with you that the A1 and 15/17/20 would be great multi-room speakers.
Well, you’ll be out of luck with the standalone products. E.g., Beosound Century, Beosound 1 (the old one with the CD player), Beoplay A1, Beoplay A2, 12, 15, 17, 2o, etc. You need products intended to work with any B&O network to work with a gateway/bli.
P.S. I have EIGHT NL/ML converters in my NL network. It all works seamlessly.
On the now defunct “beointegration” site there was a document that went into detail as to which products with what firmware would work to what degree with the gateways. I agree with MM that just about any MCL, ML, or NL product can work with the gateway or BLI using an NL/ML Converter. If you have NL or mozart products, it just makes sense to bring everything else up to date with NL/ML Converters.
I’m really glad you raised this topic. I’ve been wondering myself about the best placement and roles of various beolabs.
My current plan is to use the Theatre for the center and front L and R. Use Beolab 9s for front wides. Have a BL2 in the front area. Use Beolab 1s for the surrounds. Use Beolab 6000s for rears, and use a total of x4 Beolab 4000s for front hight and rear hight speakers.
My condo is a New York-style loft with very high ceilings. Therefore, placing the height speakers on the actual ceiling is not possible. I’m attaching 4000s to a mezzanine in the front and 4000s near the top of a partial wall in the rear. Something nice about the 4000s is the flexibility of positioning the speakers to be directed toward the seating area.
I’ve wondered if the front wide position and role is the best use for my 9s.
I’ve also wondered if the BL2 should be moved to the back since the Theatre and 9s have such low bass.
I think that the surround position is good for the BL1 speakers. I recall some discussions suggesting that BL1s are nice for rear speakers due to their very height. However, now that we can have actual height speakers, I think that the height of the BL1s might make them unsuitable for rear speakers that would be so close to the seating area.
I’ve also wondered if replacing my Beolab 6000s as rear speakers with BL3s as the rears might be better — especially considering that the sofa blocks the lower half of the 6000s.
Finally, I’ve wondered if using certain speakers could downgrade the performance of the rest of the speakers if the Theatre somewhat adjusts other speakers’ performance down to accommodate the lower common denominator of weaker speakers. For example, I have an unused pair of BL4s, but I don’t know if I would want to use those for ANY role.
I hope this subject brings up some interesting discussion.
just got back from my dealer, and was playing with a Theatre setup – on the BR1, I could see the Control option under the list option. So I think you’re all good.
But did you see any functions listed in the CONTROL submenu?
I’m curious about this with the Stage, too.
Can anyone confirm from looking in the app if there is the option for the Theatre to forward LIGHT/CONTROL commands to the BLI?
I’ve been curious about this for the Stage as well.
