Wiring up Indoor/outdoor speakers

[derekhonda]

Ok, got a speaker wiring issue. Let me see if I can explain this.

1. I have a very good surround sound system in my living room (plus my comcast box, dvd, etc)

2. I just added a deck onto the rear of the house, which comes right off of the living room.

3. I want to add outdoor speakers to the deck.



Ok, so now here is where the problem lies. I want to run the speaker wires from the speakers outside, back into my existing set-up in the living room. I want to do this just because i actually listen to a lot of the music stations on my comcast box, and plus if i'm watching a movie and grilling out, I'm in and out alot.

Now, I want to be able to do three things.
1. Listen to it living room, only.
2. Listen to it on the deck, only.
3. Listen to it together.

Now...how do i do it!???!

[Guy400]

Different channels on your receiver. On mine I can toggle through and turn speaker pairs on and off. I also have outputs for Speaker A and Speaker B. I can turn all of Speaker A on and off, turn all of Speaker B on and off or turn them both on or off at the same time. You could wire your in-house speakers to A and your outdoor to Speaker B. Then you just have to turn those speaker sets on depending on what you're doing. Just remember to turn the outdoors off or your neighbors will get to listen to you watching your sleazy porn :D

[derekhonda]

Oh good point, I'll only make that mistake once! Haha

As far as I know, I do not have like an "A" and "B" setting, I am guessing that means it is time for a new receiver?

[Guy400]

Yes sir, not only will a new receiver give you more speaker options but you'll have more of the latest audio encoding formats as well.

[Scro]

This may help you. (http://www.crutchfield.com/p_190SS4/Niles-SS-4.html?tp=3340) But, I'm not sure how the sound quality would be.

[slightlybent47]

If you will give me a few days I think I have a high end speaker selector that has 6 channels and made by Addcom, I haven’t used it in years but it’s a very nice unit. You can have up to six zones with this unit.
You can have six pairs of 8 ohm speakers and it will still show no lower than a 4 ohm load on your amp. That way it will protect the amp form being overloaded.

I’ll have to look and see if I still have it. Let me know and I’ll dig it up for you.
If I have it, it will be in the original box with the manual.

http://i38.tinypic.com/96kvua.jpg
http://i35.tinypic.com/1zfr9te.jpg

[slightlybent47]

If you have a spar power amp laying around you could split your line out on your main output and run a separate amp for the outside speakers.

[derekhonda]

Hmm, so many options. I know on one of one of my subs it has a speaker out, no idea if it is only bass or not but it would be an accessory amp. I wonder if I put a toggle on it if that would be something that would work. I have a toggle and the wires so ill just have to try it out.

Overall, I'm really pretty done spending money on this system, but who knows, I'd like to do it as cheap as possible but we all know how that goes!

[slightlybent47]

If your going on the cheap then just run the speakers parallel off the mains and put a toggle switch on the outside speakers so you can turn them off when you want.

[Scro]

Originally posted by slightlybent47
If your going on the cheap then just run the speakers parallel off the mains and put a toggle switch on the outside speakers so you can turn them off when you want.

If you do it this way, be aware of your resistance. That's a good way to fry the receiver if it is too low.

[derekhonda]

But I guess with the toggle it would only allow me to listen to "living room only" or "living room and outside", not just outside.

Hmm damn technology...

[slightlybent47]

Well you could put a toggle on both the inside and outside speakers, in other words you would be making your own speaker switch box.
Check radio shack and see if they have a cheap speaker switch box.

If I still have that addcom unit I’ll let it go cheap, dose $75.00 + shipping sound good.
If so I’ll look for it and see if I still have it.

As for the receiver not handling two sets of speakers, it might be an issue but most will run a 4 ohm load with no problem, but some may not. It depends on the receiver.

you could get parts from R/S and make your own switch box.

[derekhonda]

I may be interested, but if I'm going to spend 75 bucks to just
"make it work" i might go on up to an A/B selector receiver if i can find one under $200 or so.

Also, If I did buy that selector, I'm just not really sure how that would work. I would have 5 speakers in the living room (FL center, FR, RL, RR) Plus three subs...plus the two outside speakers. Just not envisioning how I would route all of that through the "switch" and such.

[slightlybent47]

Two of those are front mains so that’s where you should split it for the outside speakers.
Your mains is where you have the stereo sound, but if there is not a full range signal going to it you wont have much base out side. That’s the draw back of an a/v receiver. With a sub set up you lose the base in the front the mains. All the base is coming from the sub and not the satellite speakers.
It might be time to upgrade to a new receiver.

What do you have now?

[derekhonda]

Yamaha HTR 5830

http://www.yamaha.com/yec/products/productdetail.html?CNTID=200022

What is going to piss me off, Is i just spent 150 bucks on a psyclone switcher for all my hdmi stuff, because currently that receiver only has 2 optical inputs and i had 3 to plug in! So now, if I spend another 75-100 bucks just making this work....I would have had a lot more simplistic and overall "better" sound system if I would have just spend money on a better receiver with a speaker switch and more hdmi inputs...

damn technology

[slightlybent47]

Haha! I think we’ve all been there!
How about going back to the idea of a separate amp for the outside, if the receiver has a tape out you can run a line level from there to the amp for the outside and that will give you a full range signal to the spare amp and give you full range outside. Or if it has an aug, output that will do it as well.

Or just try the speakers outside split off the front R/L and see how it sounds, it may be good enough for mow till you can upgrade later.

I feel your pain!

[slightlybent47]

Oh!! Wait a minuet, that receiver claims to have a A/B speaker selector.
Is the receiver in the link the one you have?

[Regular_Joe]

Looks like it will do A or B, but not both at the same time. The button to swap is right on the front ....

[Guy400]

Originally posted by Regular_Joe
Looks like it will do A or B, but not both at the same time. The button to swap is right on the front .... My old, old receiver has the same button for this function. It toggles; A, B, A/B or all off.

[slightlybent47]

Look on the back of the unit and you’ll see a speaker B output, that’s where you should connect the outside speakers. That will let you use the A/B selector to turn on the outside speakers.

You don’t need anything else, that unit should do what you want.


I see it only has one button for the A/B so it may just switch from one to the other. But some with one button work like this, push it once and you have speaker A, push it twice and you have speaker B, push it again and you have both A and B, push it yet again and your back to just the fronts.

[slightlybent47]

Originally posted by Guy400
My old, old receiver has the same button for this function. It toggles; A, B, A/B or all off.



That sounds right!!!

[derekhonda]

Well holy hell, my day just got brighter! Thanks guys!

[derekhonda]

Haha, like i said I've been building up this system on a budget, i had an old roomate that sold me basically 75% of the stuff for one low price and so I didn't really look over it or the paperwork or really know what I was buying, I just bought it, so this is great news!

[slightlybent47]

Glad to help.