Beolab 28 bass “boomy” after theater integration

[Adrian D.]

I started my B&o journey in June with a pair of Beolab 28s. They sounded amazing. Bass was punchy, quick, and a higher volumes a bit much but still enjoyable.
Initially they were just setup as a pair hardwired into each other, and then directly into router.
All my music was played through AirPlay.

Fast forward to yesterday, I setup the Beosound Theater.
The 28s are daisy chained into the theater port 3 as DPL.
I have three listening positions configured, all from the same place and room configuration.

1. Beosound Theater alone
2. Beolab 28s alone
3. Theater as center and 28s as left and right.

The theater alone sounds good but thin compared to the wide stage of the 28s
The ensemble sounds great in movies.
The 28s sound great in stereo all the way to the bass where the issue now I’m experiencing.

Up to a middle listening volume the bass is audible and can be felt in the floors.
But as you move past the 60-70% volume, the bass just sounds boomy and flabby (if that makes sense) where before it was just solid.

Any ideas what could be causing this?
The room sense is now done with the microphone rather than my phone as was with beolab 28s alone.

Settings:
Loudness is off, level is 0
Sound is set to Neutral Music with bass management off, processing direct, compression off.
And I’ve run roomsense multiple times to make sure it wasn’t some issue.
I’ve also toggle temporarily disable room correction to see difference, and it makes it even worse.

im wondering if its cross over? or levels? but not sure where to begin with these settings.

My B&O Icons:

[Bill Lumbergh]

Hi Adrian. You wrote that you have connected the BL28s over DPL to socket 3 on the Theatre. I might have misunderstood you but are you saying that you have connected the BL28 daisy chained to the socket named PL3? The sockets named PL1-4 are used for analog PowerLink, not Digital PowerLink (DPL). To connect your speakers with DPL you need to use the sockets that are only named 1 and/or 2, not the ones starting with PL_.

I also started off with only BL28s and 6 months later got a Theatre. I initially connected the BL28s to the Theatre wired over PowerLink (analog). I had previously loved playing music on my BL28s, especially the pinpoint stereo imaging. However, after connecting them to the Theatre I noticed a clear downgrade in music quality, especially when it came to stereo imaging. The imaging became more “blurry”, not as detailed and accurate anymore. Even if I turned of bass management and played with Direct sound mode the imaging was clearly worse. Consequently I bypassed the Theatre and connected directly to the BL28s when I wanted to listen to music (when connected with analog PowerLink you can still see the BL28s as a speaker to connect to from the streaming apps). Though, a few months later I tried to wire my speakers over Digital PowerLink instead (each speaker directly to the sockets named 1 respectively 2, so not daisy chained). After that the detailed Imaging was back and the sound quality was identical to when I previously connected directly to the BL28. I tried the connections quite thoroughly and when I play a stereo signal with Direct sound mode the music sounds as great as before the Theatre. However, now I can choose to use bass management on or off, depending on what I prefer. I also have a set of BL8s as rear speakers and love playing music with a listening position that gives both the BL28s and BL8s the role as front L/R; gives a really room filling sound.

So please check if you have the speakers connected to the socket named 1 or 2. If they are connected to PL3, disconnected the speakers in the app and then move the cable (assuming it is CAT7 cable), and after that connect them in the app again. If they are connected with thinner PowerLink cable I would disconnect them in the same way but connect them with wireless Digital PowerLink. Thereafter you will need to rerun the Listening Positions.

In my case the bass gets a bit more controlled with bass mgmt ON, so could be worth trying that as well.

Btw, were the calibration run on the BL28s before connecting them to the Theatre? I think that is preferable.

• This reply was modified 1 hour, 39 minutes ago by Bill Lumbergh.

My B&O Icons:

[Author]

Posts