Beocenter 2200 in the modern day

6 replies

Hello folks,

a few years ago I moved back to Germany and got to furnish my new flat with items my parents had stored in their basement, one of which was an old Beocenter 2200 with a pair of Beovox S2400 speakers that my dad had originally used when he was a student. 

 Now, there are a couple of issues and questions I have, bear with me if I'm a bit ignorant and all over the place, I have no clue about any of this. However, hopefully someone can help me to get what I want out of this thing. 

First of all, I like to keep the Beocenter for nostalgic reasons and obviously because it allows me to listen so records as well, which I still like to buy. 

Now, technically the center seems to work well, but I noticed that for both the output pairs (speaker 1 and 2), no matter which pair I use, one of the speakers will be very quiet. 
I therefore thought the issue might lie with the balance controller, and wouldn't you know, if I slide it up entirely (to R), both speakers will be equally loud. I mean quiet, they become very quiet, even on high volume, but at least equally so. 
I am not sure if the issue really lies in the balance control, maybe some of the internal wires are broken and that's why one signal always remains weak compared to the other, but these are my observations. 
So far I have circumvented all of this by plugging a modern speaker into the headphones output of the Beocenter, since this still allows me to listen to my records, but without using the old speaker system. 

So, would anyone have an idea on how I could approach fixing this? Don't get me wrong, using my modern speaker via the headphone jack is fine, but I would at least want to try and find a way to use the old ones my dad used before me. Unfortunately I don't have any experience in fixing electronic devices, but I'm reasonably good at picking things up. 
Follow-up question: is it possible to split the signal from the headphone output to two modern speakers instead of just one? Having some output is nice, having it in stereo would be much better though.

Again, sorry if I'm being ignorant here, but I thought I would start the new year with getting something which has been annoying me for quite a bit out of my system and done with. 
In this sense, happy new year to everyone!

Thank you in advance for any possible help you can contribute!

It might seem a silly question,but have you got the 'speakers connected correctly ?

The sockets are for two pairs of 'speakers,each pair having  left and right channels.

The SP2 connectors are for say,a pair of speakers in another room.SP2 is controlled by the switch under the front of the unit.

Make sure that you have your pair of 'speakers connected to the SP1 sockets.

If you are sure of the connections,a fuse may have failed.The speaker outputs have a fuse for each channel,and these are concealed inside a small hatch underneath the unit.

These are nice little units,that can sound good particularly when used with virtually any other B&O 'speaker than the X25!

You can connect a streamer via the tape/aux socket at the front of the unit.too

Nick

Hello there,thx for the reply.

Not a silly question at all, considering my experience with electrical devices it's not too much to assume.
I have the speakers connected to both outputs that say Speaker 1 though, so I think that's fine. I will look for the hatch and the fuses asap, though I'm not sure what exactly I will have to look for. But that's something I can definitely check out.

As I said, so far I have been using the aux socket, which is labelled as Headphones to connect the Center to a Bose Link. It works well enough, but I would like to put the speakers I have into to use as well, naturally. 

Many thanks again
Yannick

If one channel is missing only on FM, the problem is very likely to be with the MPX-filter in the affected channel.
They are known to break internally.

Martin

Hello Martin,

FM as in in  frequency modulation for radio? The issue of one speaker being much less audible persists when listening to records as well as the radio or even tapes. 

Just to add, I switched around the cables and even got a new set through ebay, because I first thought the cables might be faulty. Doesn't seem to be the case though:

Yannick

FM as in Frequency Modulation, yes.
In this case radio signals utilizing MPX encoding/decoding and the need for filtering the pilot tone away.
But if the problem is also present when playing records, you can rule out the MPX filter (at least as the common cause).

There are some capacitors in the signal path that will need replacing.
It's typically the small ("subminiature" green'ish or black) ones. They are found many places but particularly the ones near the circular cutout in the large board are of interest.
They leak their fluid and lose function. I suggest you replace the lot.

Martin

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