Hi Emmanuel, I'll provide my experiences. (I own an Essence MkII)

I think that the huge shortcoming of the Essence is not the Essence itself, but the BeoMusic App, which controls the Essence. I find that it is a relatively poorly designed app, and not very conducive to those of us who have large music libraries. One can opt for the Moment, but I think at this moment in time (pardon the pun), the Essence may be a more mature product all things considered.

The most glaring difference between MkI and II is that MkII allows for the multi-room features of B&O devices.

I can't confirm the DAC, nor can I confirm the HQ audio files. Here's my current setup: I've got a QNAP TS451+ NAS running TwonkyMedia. Twonky is the DLNA server of choice for the Essence. I have issues with this as well, because Twonky doesn't allow for granular searching of music via BeoMusic, and their support is terrible, but it works and it is fast. The NAS serves up music through BeoMusic to the Essence. Additionally, Twonky is looking at music stored on a Music folder on the NAS which is actually an iTunes Library of music which is controlled by a "ServerAdmin" profile on my MacBook Pro. So all my music tagging / management is done through iTunes, but iTunes doesn't have to be running, because the server handles the music storage and is always on.

Hope this helps.

bonbazar wrote:

I have had a demonstration of the Beosound Essence recently and I found it a pretty exciting product totally in phase with our time and what I was looking for. I have a question tough for the ones who own the product: which features are missing? What would you improve on the product?

Also, I have tried to find answers on the net but without success:

- Do you know what is the internal DAC used? Is it a very good one?

- What is the difference between MKI and MKII? Is there an upgrade option available from B&O?

- Can you confirm that it can play High Quality audio files (24 bit/192 Khz FLAC) straight from a hard drive as this format is still not supported by iTunes (...)? Should the hard drive be connected to the Essence?

- Any idea why there is an IR receptor 'for future use'?

Thanks,

Emmanuel

bonbazar wrote:

Also, I have tried to find answers on the net but without success:

😕

What about using the "Search this site" function of this forum now...

For me, the very B&O Essence asset is its Powerlink plugs. Appart from this, it's just expensive.

bonbazar wrote:

I have had a demonstration of the Beosound Essence recently and I found it a pretty exciting product totally in phase with our time and what I was looking for. I have a question tough for the ones who own the product: which features are missing? What would you improve on the product?

Also, I have tried to find answers on the net but without success:

- Do you know what is the internal DAC used? Is it a very good one?

usually hard to find out with B&O!

- What is the difference between MKI and MKII? Is there an upgrade option available from B&O?

buy mk II.

Same price for mk I as mk II when viewed as a package with the table top ("wheels") remote.

mk II has more options / more flexible

e.g. Recent internet update to add GoogleCast

- Can you confirm that it can play High Quality audio files (24 bit/192 Khz FLAC) straight from a hard drive as this format is still not supported by iTunes (...)?

its not like there is a USB drive access.

You need to access via a technique like twonky.

In my case I use Plex.

Should the hard drive be connected to the Essence?

as above: not an option

Thanks,

Emmanuel

the app is too slow at start. I use the essence essentially as dmr through masterlink. the essence is connected to the a.aux of an ouverture.

i've exactly the same setup as Stevegee. i had massive problems to pair the remote wheelie which is solved now with an IR-eye. i'm seriously disappointed with the app when i want to listen to my ios-library or the music from the NAS because you have to keep your device on sucking your accu empty otherwise the queue won't actualise itself and play will stop after one, sometimes two tracks. all the rest is fine of course

Hi,

The beosound Essence is a nice product if you have a fully B&O configuration. I had the MKI and now updated to MKII (thanks to B&O offer last year)

I must say that it works quite well but the B&O app was an issue if you compare it to SONOS app for exemple.

But the new App coming on Android is much more usable and user friendly and at some point should be launched, I think, also on IOS.

Now, to be honest if I didn't have B&O solution, I would definitely go for Sonos which has a far better control software for now. I hope B&O will improve a lot this part.

Christophe.