BeoSound 5c

A modern recreation of the Bang & Olufsen BeoSound 5 experience using web technologies and a Raspberry Pi 5.

Website: beosound5c.com

This project replaces the original BeoSound 5 software with a circular arc-based touch UI that integrates with Sonos, Bluesound, and Denon HEOS players, music services (Spotify, Apple Music, TIDAL, Plex), and Home Assistant. It works with the original BS5 hardware (rotary encoder, laser pointer, display) and supports BeoRemote One for wireless control.

Quick Start

Runs on a Raspberry Pi 5 4GB. See beosound5c.com for full installation instructions.

Fresh Install

1. Flash Raspberry Pi OS Bookworm Lite (64-bit) using Raspberry Pi Imager. Click the settings icon (gear) to enable SSH and set your username/password before writing.
2. Clone and run the installer:

git clone https://github.com/mkirsten/beosound5c.git ~/beosound5c
cd ~/beosound5c
sudo ./install/install.sh

The installer handles everything: packages, display config, service installation. No questions asked — it only prompts for a reboot when complete.

3. After rebooting, the device shows a QR code. Scan it with your phone (or open http://<device-ip>/config in any browser) to finish setup: device name, player, audio output, Home Assistant, and sources.

Updating

git pull && sudo ./install/install.sh update

Updates service files, sudoers, and Python packages. No reboot needed unless system packages changed.

Remote Support

If you need help troubleshooting, you can open a temporary remote support session. Nothing is installed for this up front: the first time you run bs5c-support, it asks before fetching Tailscale, and no daemon runs until you complete a session with an access key.

bs5c-support          # Start session — prompts for an access key
bs5c-support stop     # End session and disconnect
bs5c-support status   # Check if a session is active

Ask the developer for an access key, paste it when prompted, and share the displayed Tailscale IP. When you're done, bs5c-support stop disconnects and stops the Tailscale daemon.

Configuration

After install, open http://<device-ip>/config in a browser. The configuration UI lets you set the device name, player, volume adapter, Home Assistant connection, transport, and all sources. Changes are saved and services restart automatically.

Configuration lives in two files on the device:

• /etc/beosound5c/config.json — all settings (device name, player IP, menu, scenes, volume, transport)
• /etc/beosound5c/secrets.env — credentials only (HA token, MQTT password)

For the full list of fields and options, see the config schema.

To edit scenes (names, icons, HA scripts), edit /etc/beosound5c/config.json directly — the "scenes" array.

Security model

A BeoSound 5c expects to live on a home network you trust, like the speakers it talks to. Worth knowing before you install one:

• The local HTTP API has no authentication. Anything on your LAN can read device status and drive playback (/router/*, /player/*, the source services on ports 8766–8779). That's deliberate — it's how the kiosk, the phone setup page and Home Assistant all talk to it.
• Config changes and updates reject cross-site browsers. POST /config and POST /update/run accept requests from the device's own setup page, Home Assistant or curl, but refuse any web page served from somewhere else — so a site you happen to visit can't reconfigure your device or trigger an update behind your back.
• Secrets stay out of the API. /etc/beosound5c/secrets.env is 0600 and owned by the service user; the setup UI can write credentials but never reads them back.
• Don't port-forward it. None of these ports belong on the public internet. For access from outside, use a VPN or bs5c-support (below).

Telemetry

Honestly, I just find it delightful to see where BeoSound 5cs are showing up in the world. There are already installations in the US, across Europe, here in Stockholm, in Asia, and in Australia — and every time a new one appears on the map it makes my day.

To make that possible, each BS5c sends a small anonymous ping to beosound5c.com on startup. There's a toggle for it in the web config UI — turning it off is completely fine and changes nothing else. Nothing is sent before you've seen that toggle: the first ping waits until you save the setup screen, so a device you install and never configure never phones home. Your public IP is used to infer a country (via Cloudflare — never stored beyond the country name). Nothing that identifies you or your hardware is sent: no hostname, no device name, no MAC address, no account names, no credentials, and nothing about what you listen to. Feel free to read exactly what gets posted in services/lib/beacon.py.

Field	Value
device_id	A random ID the device makes up for itself on first ping and keeps in a device_id file. It isn't derived from your MAC address or any other hardware identifier, so it says nothing about your machine — it exists only so two pings can be recognised as the same dot on the map. Re-image the SD card and you simply get a new one
version	Software version string
sources	Names of enabled sources (e.g. spotify, cd) — no credentials or config values
player_type	Player backend: sonos, bluesound, heos, or local
volume_type	Volume adapter type: sonos, beolab5, powerlink, etc.

If you'd rather opt out, just create a NO_TELEMETRY file in the repo root:

touch ~/beosound5c/NO_TELEMETRY

Documentation

• Audio, players & sources — player types, source compatibility, Spotify setup, volume adapters
• Home Assistant integration — MQTT, webhooks, automation examples
• Remotes & IR — BeoRemote One pairing, IR source buttons, Beo6
• Development & contributing — local dev setup, repo layout, deploy script

Acknowledgments

services/masterlink.py is substantially a derivative work of libpc2 by Tore Sinding Bekkedal (GPL-3.0). Arc geometry in web/js/arcs.js is derived from Beolyd5 by Lars Baunwall (Apache 2.0). See THIRDPARTY.md for the full list.

This project is not affiliated with Bang & Olufsen. "Bang & Olufsen", "BeoSound", "BeoRemote", and "MasterLink" are trademarks of Bang & Olufsen A/S.