Hi, 

For a compact unit, the beosound3000 (I have a 4000) is working perfectly fine. The sound is largely dependant on the quality of speakers and their build-in amps. I suggest a pair of Beolab 4000 as speakers with it. They are affordable, well designed, look great and give a real nice sound.

For a little bit more you can get some BL6000 which will be just fine. The beoloab 8000's have a very iconic design and frankly are one of the better all-round speakers imo. 

Beolab3 are very good speakers due to the alt system amazing clear sound and powerful in regards to their size. Personally I find they can render sometimes a bit too much detail and the sound is a little bit overworked when used in a smaller spaces imo. But that's solely based on my experiences with them.

They beomaster 6500/7000 is a very open and easily expandable system (though a little more conventional setup but understated looking) and will work with all passive or active speakers. You can start with the beomaster receiver/amp and add the cd player, turntable etc later if you like. It's advantage is that it allows more things connected to it than a beosound which only has the one aux.

From your reply I would suggest you get Beolab 3s - if these are what turn you on, then get some. You won't be disappointed. The reason I asked about the outputs on the Sony is that you can use this whilst waiting to save up for your music system. You can actually run Beolab 3s from an iPod if you really want!

Peter wrote:

You can actually run Beolab 3s from an iPod if you really want!

Do this mean that you can listen all active Labs by just plugging them directly on lets say Playstation 3?

soulboy wrote:

Peter wrote:

You can actually run Beolab 3s from an iPod if you really want!

Do this mean that you can listen all active Labs by just plugging them directly on lets say Playstation 3?

In principle, yes - but you will need a volume control in the source. The Beolabs don't have any, so they will play at full blast all the time if you feed them a fixed line level signal...

As Mika says, you need variable line level. The iPod dock has this and a remote. Beolab 5s actually have a remote facility themselves but they are about £10,000! 😂

What do you think about Iphone remote + Airport express + Active speakers . Will this setup work? Can there be any problems?

Since i already have iphone this sound like good solution for me.

PS: Is there a option in itunes to set max sound volume just in case that you dont blow at the speakers.

That will work - you may want a better DAC than the one in your Mac - I have just got a DAC Magic which seems rather good. But I would try your suggestion first and see if it is acceptable.

Peter wrote:

That will work - you may want a better DAC than the one in your Mac - I have just got a DAC Magic which seems rather good. But I would try your suggestion first and see if it is acceptable.

If i understand you need DAC for better sound quality. Is there a difference between playing audio files with B&O and Apple systems. Or is the difference made by file format and speakers?

It varies! Most computer sound cards are not the very best - which Mac do you have? Macs seem better than most PCs but it is something worth considering. DACs in B&O will be for the CD players and the BS5 and these are all rather good!

I use a mac mini for playing music and have started to experiment with adding a (on loan from a friend) dac ...boy does it ever make a difference. (Also makes clear that some of the non-lossless songs need to be upgraded....)

I do have an airport express/itouch combo in the bathroom right now and I confirm that the dac in the AE is really not up to par for a main audio system.