HEOS stands for Home Entertainment Operating System. It is a wireless multi-room audio platform from Denon that is integrated into wireless powered speakers, AV receivers, amplifiers, and soundbars. It is also found in Marantz home theatre product. HEOS works via your existing WiFi home network.
Essentially, it is a platform for multi-room wireless audio streaming. HEOS operates via the installation of a free-to-download app for Android & iOS devices. After the HEOS app is installed on a compatible device, click on "Setup Now". The App then proceeds to find & link to any HEOS-compatible devices you have.
How to streaming music with HEOS?
After the setup is complete, you can use your smartphone to stream music directly to compatible HEOS devices via Wi-Fi or Bluetooth, regardless of where they are located in the house. Additionally, the HEOS app can also be used stream music directly to the receiver. This means you can hear music via your home theatre system or stream music sources connected to the AV receiver to other HEOS wireless speakers. Currently, HEOS can be used to stream music from Amazon Music, Deezer, iHeartRadio, Pandora, Mood Mix, Napster, Sirius/XM, SoundCloud, Spotify, TIDAL, & Tune-In.
Apart from music streaming services, HEOS can be used to access and play music from locally stored content on media servers, NAS or PCs. Although you can use Bluetooth or Wi-Fi, streaming over the Wi-Fi network provides the ability to stream uncompressed music files delivering a far superior quality than music streamed via Bluetooth. HEOS supports playback of digital music file formats such as MP3, AAC, Apple Lossless, DSD, Flac, Wav, and WMA. HEOS-enabled home theatre AV receivers can also be used to access and stream audio from physically-connected connected sources such as CD players, turntables, audio cassette deck, and iPods etc. to any HEOS wireless speakers in your setup.
HEOS Stereo & Surround Sound
Although HEOS supports streaming music to any single or assigned group of HEOS wireless speakers, it can be configured to use any two compatible speakers as a stereo pair. For the best sound quality match, both speakers in the pair should be of the same brand and model. HEOS can be used to send surround sound wirelessly if you have a compatible soundbar or home theatre AV receiver. You can add any two HEOS-enabled wireless speakers to your setup and then send DTS and Dolby digital surround channel signals to those speakers.
The HEOS Link
Another easy way to access and use HEOS is via the HEOS Link. The HEOS Link is a specially designed preamplifier that is compatible with the HEOS system that can connect to any existing stereo/home theatre receiver or soundbar with analogue or digital audio inputs that do not have HEOS capability built-in. You can use the HEOS app to stream music through HEOS Link so it can be heard on your stereo/home theatre system, as well as use the HEOS link to stream music from your smartphone or any analogue/digital audio devices connected to the HEOS Link to other HEOS-enabled wireless speakers.
HEOS and Alexa
A select number of HEOS devices can be controlled by the Alexa voice assistant directly after linking Alexa App on your smartphone with compatible HEOS devices by activating the HEOS Home Entertainment Skill. After the link is established you can use either your smartphone or dedicated Amazon Echo device to control many of the functions on any HEOS enabled wireless speaker or Alexa-enabled home theatre receiver or soundbar.
