speakers and cables
this is about me being a loser and problem creator.
I finally got a 2nd subwoofer and I was excited to hook it up. Well, not too excited. I knew it would be a pain to hook it up. I was excited to hear it. I spent over 90 minutes connecting the speaker wires to my power amp. When I turned it on, the left channel was gone. It blew the fuse. I disconnected everything, replaced the fuse, hooked it up again. It worked for 10 seconds, blew the fuse again.
The way I hooked them up was I went from the sub speaker out from both subwoofers, rolled the left and right side wires together so I had 4 wires that I connected to the left and right plus and minus channels - speaker binders on the power amp. What are my options? My preamp has no sub out. Nor my amp.
Stupid question: should I just go from left to left on one sub and right to right on the other sub?
I will not argue the impressions of audiophiles but I don’t believe there is any electrical difference between preamps with two rca outputs and what is accomplished by the splitter. If it feels more audiophile-ish, order the fancier AudioQuest splitters I linked in my first post here. 😎 Consider that you might be over-thinking this. |
I didn’t read every post but if not already recommended, why not use rca splitters from your single rca output then let the internal amplifiers in your powered subs do the work? Parden please, if I am somehow missing the issue. |
You need a splitter for each channel, so two in your case. I linked AudioQuest splitters but if you check lower down the linked Amazon page, you will find no-name brands for about half the AQ version. The splitter plugs into your rca output and then you run one rca cable per channel to the amplifier powering your main speakers and one rca cable to the low level input of each powered sub. This approach would give you stereo imaging for your subs, i.e., one sub for each channel, which is a common approach when running two subs. In that case I would position one sub somewhat near each main speaker. Summing the sub signal is a typical approach used when running only one sub, and sometimes when running a swarm of subs (more that two) throughout the room. |
@immatthewj Your Klipsch link is the most applicable to what the OP is doing. The person on that link who suggested running the line level connectors to the subs first and then a second line level connection from the subs to the amps, was using the sub’s crossover as a high-pass filter. That does have its benefits but the trade-off is essentially adding additional crossover parts in the signal path. I have a fairly high-end, balanced Marchand passive high-pass filter here and, with my speakers, I like running them without the filter better than with it, so it sits in a box. The level of benefit from using a high-pass filter will depend on the bass capabilities and roll-off characteristics of the specific main speakers being used as well as the behavior of the amplifier powering the main speakers. However, since the main speakers are intended to be run full out normally, the benefits of a high-pass filter can be subtle or perhaps not audible or, in some cases, may even make things sound worse. |
