pc surround sound queries.

[tristaaan]

Hi there guys,

Just a couple of quick questions really. I'll start off with a little detail about my set-up, i have a Creative (not the best i know) 7.1 Surround Sound system attached to my pc, although i'm only using 5.1 at the moment due to a small room, i have it set up mainly for watching movies with the speakers set around my bed. Here is where the questions start to come in... My dad has recently given me some old bookshelf speakers he used to have, and i was thinking of using them for the stereo/main speakers, but they require banana plugs and all of the connections from the sub to speakers are RCA Phono to bare wire (red and black into back of speakers) so...

1) would it be possible to buy/create a phono to banana plug lead?

2) or would i need to get an AV amp/pre-amp or something similar?

3) would these new speakers improve the sound, or would it sound unbalanced (having good quality speakers backed up by poorer quality)

Thanks for sticking with such a long post, appreciate any advice given, and again thanks in advance

Tristaaan

 

[Ben123]

Answers to questions...

1. In short, No
2. Yes
3. Highly likely, Yes

The RCAs on the sound card will probably be line outs. So yes you will need an amplifier of some sort. A 2-channel amp will sound best.

 

[Petherick]

With due respect to Ben123, though his reply may be correct in some part, I would say;
1. Yes, you can buy banana plugs, so you could attach them to your existing cables. Try Maplin or ebay.
2. It depends how sensitive the speakers are, that is how loud they are for a certain power input. I have succesfully run small 'hi-fi' speakers from a Creative soundcard without any extra amplification.
3. Only you can say after trying

 

[tristaaan]

Thanks for the input guys, I'd read a few forums posts and things before where people said similiar things to Ben123, but they are only cheap little speakers, so I don't think they'll need much power, and for the price of a set of 4 banana plugs it'll be worth a try surely.

Will let you know the results thanks again for the info.

Tristaaan

 

[MajorFubar]

Before you go spending money on banana plugs, try one speaker with one cable by shoving the bare wires in the holes for the banana plugs. You might need to fold the end a bit to make a snug fit. IYou'll either get sound or you won't. And you probably will, unless the speaker's broken. If the leads from the Creative Surround System terminate in bare wire at the speaker-end, then they're amplified outputs, not line-level, and so they should work with any speaker, more or less and within reason. I think Ben's picked-up on the fact you said the outputs on the Creative are RCA and he thinks they're line-level outputs for powered speakers. But that won't be the case here.