Help!! Just bought house with 11 MCL speakers/transceivers

[BigLebowski]

Hi,

We just bought a new home that looks like it has about 11 MCL transceivers  (see pic) mounted in different rooms along with in-wall speakers. The house was built in 1988 and was majorly tricked out at the time but hasn’t really been updated since. We have no idea what anything is or how (or if) it works. There are no remotes or amps, just a central closet with R/L audio outputs.

The previous owner died and there is no one who can tell us about the system. Any advice would be greatly appreciated! Is the equipment worth keeping even though it may be 30+ years old, even though it was clearly state of the art at the time. Or, should just put in new speakers or cover with drywall. At our current house we have built-in speakers and use a Sonos amp and really like that set-up. Would that be possible with this set-up? Any other suggestions since we are moving in soon and trying to make sense of this really complex system?

Thanks!

[Madskp]

From the description with the built in (probably passive speakers) my guess without having seen the connections in the closet would be that in every room there is also a MCL relay box https://www.beoworld.org/prod_details.asp?pid=977 hidden somewhere, maybe over the ceiling. This will then have connection to the built in  speakers and the MCL trancivers. The realy boxes will then be connected on a string of MCL cable and end up in the closet, if thats so.

If you are moving your Sonos amp to the new location and the system is how I think it is you could connect the Sonos amp to the conncetors in the closet and feed power to the relay boxes from a separate power supply. This way you would be able to activate the speakers in the rooms you want to listen to the music by either pressing the mute button on the trancivers or by using an audio source button on a B&O remote.

However that solution might no be optimal as you would need both the Sonos app and the trancivers for control, and there is no individual volume control in the rooms.

But let us see some more about the closet connections

 

[trackbeo]

Whoever did the previous paint job didn’t even bother to pop them off the wall.  I *hate* little rectangular brush strokes in in the middle of a roller-matte-textured wall.  Which of course isn’t what you are asking?, sooo…

IMO trash them all since you don’t have any of the central equipment.  What you are looking at is the equivalent of Xantech remote-IR receiver/transmitters, only better-made (but still aged plastic switch parts) and at the B&O IR frequency, incompatible with other brands.  Maybe keep their wires (which hopefully also go to the central A/V room, you didn’t say?) and use them for DC (USB) power supply to wall-mount a bunch of iPad Mini’s — which you will use to control your Sonos Amp’s, all of which will also be back in that central A/V closet.  Home-run speaker wires is great, everybody seems to want all the smarts out in the room but it’s not necessary or even always the best quality.  Replace the in-wall speakers on your own pace, as you discover foam rot or place your own furniture in front of the supposed “perfect” locations the previous owner chose.  Or if wired iPad Minis are just too much (they will cover those paint marks completely!?!), then repaint and stick up Lutron Pico Audio’s either ganged up with the light switches (iff Decora) or separately just to cover the holes.  Then you will have the same button control for your new Sonos Amps, though not IR retransmission of course.  (Thus the reason for selecting iPads, source selection was part of the original B&O IR setup via handheld BeoLink remotes.)

It’s a B&O forum, so hopefully someone has a brilliant 20th-century idea for filling in your A/V closet instead of my wimp-out answer.  (If death was recent, search eBay listings for “ten great Bang & Olufsen SpeakerLink ‘passive’ kits plus a BeoCenter”.)  The stuff really does look cool, nicks and paint drops notwithstanding — but don’t mount B&O Halo’s in each room just because the previous owner left his old keypads there…  Nevertheless “audio right next to the light switch in every single room” is luxury, so I’d keep *something*.  As would most others here I’ll wager.  Good luck, and please post what you decide to do ultimately!  For that matter, a photo of the current state of your audio closet would not be amiss — might trigger great ideas from people less didactic and penurious than me!

[Guy]

trackbeo wrote:

For that matter, a photo of the current state of your audio closet would not be amiss — might trigger great ideas from people less didactic and penurious than me!

Having recently sold and moved from an MCL-equipped house (not yours, obv ?) I too would welcome a photo of the ‘audio closet’. I don’t think think that even I would persevere with MCL today, but there may indeed be novel ways to use the hardware that is already there, especially if you are happy with the sound quality of the in-wall speakers (perhaps just in some of the rooms).

[matador]

BigLebowski wrote:

that looks like it has about 11 MCL transceivers

Remove them carefully, sold them for a little or give them away to someone that will need them (I did tears ago…), and move on.

Those things are good things to anyone who like them. For anyone coming from the “non-B&O world”, what you have doesn’t worth the hassle to understand it…

… Unless there is something more in the closet!

[Millemissen]

@BigLebowski

This is how a MCL-based works……just to give you a sense of what you have there.

A (only one) MCL-compatiple central Beomaster (like the BM4500/6500) is needed to ‘power’ the units/speakers in the respective room….assuming that the installation is still good.

You could connect the output of any streaming device to e.g. the A.Tape input port of the Beomaster.
Activating this in the respective rooms – one, more or all – and sending sound to the streamer will give you sound/music there.  You can use either the unmute button on the small receiver panel or the B&O remote control, (which also gives volume control).
This was the second multiroom setup from Bang & Olufsen – from back in the 1980’s.

Only one source at the time possible – no possibility for different music in different rooms.

If you can live with this, it will still work.
If not……..better think of other options!

MM

[Cooldude]

@BigLebowski

I still have quite a bit of MCL and Masterlink in my setup.
As I will be moving soon, I will have to leave most of the wiring behind and I will need to replace them and a few faulty/broken ones anyways.
If you no longer need any of it, I will gladly take some and give them a good home.

CD

 

 

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