New Posts  All Forums:Forum Nav:

Setting Up Speakers

post #1 of 3
3/11/10 at 12:50pm
Thread Starter 
Hi! I am new here and pretty much an infant in the electronics world.

I live in an apartment that has 5 ceiling speakers in the living room. Two in front, two in back, and the one over the tv. There are four cables, each with a red, black, white, and green wires coming out of them. My question is . . . now what?

I know I need a receiver, I'm just not sure which to get. (I'm going to try to find one on craigslist or something as I am a poor graduate student.) And then I've seen talk of amplifiers. Do I need one of those or is it not necessary? The primary use of these speakers will be to watch tv and movies on my HDTV. Every so often I'll put music on, but tv is my primary concern.

Any help on what to do would be greatly appreciated. I know there a difference in where to connect the front speakers vs the back ones and then there's the four different colored wires and where they connect.

Thanks for reading and hope you guys can provide me some guidance. :)
Reply
post #2 of 3
3/11/10 at 1:04pm
The wiring is strange, usually you would have a pair (1 pos, 1 neg) for each speaker.  You should probably try to contact the owner or the installer to find out how to wire.

As far as components are concerned, an A/V receiver is an all-in-one solution for audio and video processing, switching, input, outout and amplification.  It includes an amplifier, so you would not need one, unless you are looking at an advanced "separates" setup (which you probably aren't). 

So you would want a receiver.  The next question is, what kind of budget?  You can pay from ~$300 up to $5K+ on a receiver.  My personal suggestion for the best bang-for-the-buck in receivers today would be the Onkyo 607 - www.amazon.com/Onkyo-TX-SR607-7-2-Channel-Surround-Receiver/dp/B001VEI2KO/ref=sr_1_1 on sale for $388 at Amazon right now.  A great receiver at a great price.
Reply
post #3 of 3
3/11/10 at 9:04pm
Thread Starter 
Thanks so much for your reply! My budget is somewhere between cheap and cheap. Once I figure the wires out I'm going to buy a used receiver so as to save money.
Reply
New Posts  All Forums:Forum Nav:
  Return Home