Need help connecting pre-wiring to Bose system please! :) (1 Viewer)

The Facts: I have a Bose V20 system that uses bare speaker wire to connect to the speakers but the other end of the wire has a male RCA plugs that goes into the subwoofer for each of the 5 channels. My home is prewired with speaker wires for the 2 front and 2 rear speakers and they have bare speaker wires on both ends, these speaker wires all terminate at the central location where I have my components. The builder did not install any wall/speaker plates, these are literally speaker wires hanging our of a hole in the wall. The Questions: What is the best way to connect my subwoofer (which requires male RCA plugs) and the pre-wiring (which are bare wires)? Can I find an RCA plug adapter that I can just solder or attach the bare wires to? Should I just twist the Bose bare wire ends onto the pre-wire bare ends and cap them? What do I need to do the best job? Thanks!

You can get RCA connectors at Radio Shack, to solder on to the wires. They are pretty cheap.

Originally Posted by mrcp77
What do I need to do the best job?

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If you've browsed this forum much, you probably expected to hear this...


The "best" thing you could do would be sell the Bose and put that money towards real speakers and a real subwoofer. Even reselling the Bose for less than the ~$1500 you may have paid for it, you'll come out ahead in both $$ and performance.


Just adding another perspective...

Thanks! One more quick question please. I've been reading about RCA adapters/plugs for speaker wire that are LINE LEVEL as opposed to SPEAKER LEVEL. Is this something I have to look for on the label when I buy them? From what I've read if the sub is also your amp (which I believe is the case with BOSE systems as all the wires are plugged into it) then I the adapter/plug should be LINE LEVEL because SPEAKER LEVEL can damage my equipment? I'm lost...forgive my ignorance but I'm a newb that's eager to learn! Thanks!

I've always thought of speaker level signals as "amplified" and line level signals as "unamplified" (I believe there is about a 10x difference in voltage between the two).


When you use the speaker connections on a receiver (for fronts, center, surrounds), you are taking the amplified output from the receiver and sending it (via speaker wire) to an essentially unpowered speaker.


Passive subwoofers work the same way - they don't have built-in amplfiers, so they also take an already amplified signal via speaker wire.


Active subwoofers do the amplification themselves, so you feed them a line-level signal.


RCA jacks are generally used to carry line-level signals for subwoofers that include their own amplifier, or in cases where folks want to use separate amplifiers, they can be used to connect line-level outputs from the receiver (or processor) to the external amplifiers before the amplified signal is carried (via speaker wire) to the speakers.


Yes - running a speaker level signal into a line level input can cause catastrophic damage to your speakers since the resulting signal could be as much as 10 times the intended voltage.


You don't have to look for anything in particular with the RCA jacks - just be sure that you keep your line level and speaker level connections straight, and that there's only 1 step of "amplification" in the chain.

I'm in awe of the wealth of knowledge here, thanks for your thorough explanation. On to the soldering!

Looks like the fun/problems continue! I've bought the RCA connectors and have unscrewed the sheath. The main connector has a small tab for the hot and a long tab for the ground. Both of these tabs have holes to run the respective speaker wire through but the holes are too small to allow my pre wiring to pass through. So now i'm wondering what my best bet is....should I...


A)...just solder the bare wires to the inside of these tabs or am i risking a short circuit


B)...scrap these connectors and go buy the solderless ones


C)...go back to my first plan which was to take the cables that came with the BOSE system (one end is bare wire, other is RCA) and plug the RCA end into my sub as per usual and then twist the bare wires of the BOSE wire and my pre-wiring together with a wire nut - NOTE: The BOSE wires are slightly thinner wires than my pre-wiring, is it okay to connect them?


Suggestions...please?

Option C would be the easiest. Some may question a splice with two different gage wires but I am sure your Bose cubes won't know the difference. Just remember that when you make the splice that you connect + to + and - to - on all of your connections for each speaker.

Thanks, that's the way i'm leaning as easiest sounds best at this point...any other opinions before I run with a splice?

you can look for best answers of your questions on google seach.. hungonu

Originally Posted by jeleanchua

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