Hi all.

Wifey wants speakers in several rooms fed off the same hi fi system with
independent room volume control

Problem is current Hi Fi can only support 6 ohm load speakers. The
current speakers in lounge is also 6 ohms.

There is no second set of speaker outputs. at the Hi Fi.

If I parallel up some passive speakers in the dining room and in the
kitchen, this will present a load of 2 ohms to the Hi Fi, overloading
its final output power transistors resulting in a costly repair to Hi Fi.

I've thought about series connection but as the speaker pairs will not
be identical from room to room, and it makes independent room volume
control impossible.....

There is no line output or headphone output for me to use with active
speakers....

How do people overcome this?

The best solution I have identified so far is a gadget that can provide
a line level output from the speaker outputs on the Hi Fi and feed that
into some suitable active speakers for both the dining room and the kitchen.

Regards,

Stephen.

On Jun 10, 10:37*pm, Stephen H wrote:
Hi all.

Wifey wants speakers in several rooms fed off the same hi fi system with
independent room volume control

Problem is current Hi Fi can only support 6 ohm load speakers. The
current speakers in lounge is also 6 ohms.

There is no second set of speaker outputs. at the Hi Fi.

If I parallel up some passive speakers in the dining room and in the
kitchen, this will present a load of 2 ohms to the Hi Fi, overloading
its final output power transistors resulting in a costly repair to Hi Fi.

I've thought about series connection but as the speaker pairs will *not
be identical from room to room, and it makes independent room volume
control impossible.....

There is no line output or headphone output for me to use with active
speakers....

How do people overcome this?

The best solution I have identified so far is a gadget that can provide
a line level output from the speaker outputs on the Hi Fi and feed that
into some suitable active speakers for both the dining room and the kitchen.

Regards,

Stephen.

There are various choices.

One is to wire them all up in series parallel, with each speaker on
its own volume control pad. Very simple, but last time I looked at the
volume controls they were pricey. You could make your own of course.

I prefer your suggestion of active speakers. Its a lot more flexible,
but every speaker needs power, either locally or with some care
central power can be used.


NT

On 10/06/2012 23:30, NT wrote:
On Jun 10, 10:37 pm, Stephen wrote:
Hi all.

Wifey wants speakers in several rooms fed off the same hi fi system with
independent room volume control

Problem is current Hi Fi can only support 6 ohm load speakers. The
current speakers in lounge is also 6 ohms.

There is no second set of speaker outputs. at the Hi Fi.

If I parallel up some passive speakers in the dining room and in the
kitchen, this will present a load of 2 ohms to the Hi Fi, overloading
its final output power transistors resulting in a costly repair to Hi Fi.

I've thought about series connection but as the speaker pairs will not
be identical from room to room, and it makes independent room volume
control impossible.....

There is no line output or headphone output for me to use with active
speakers....

How do people overcome this?

The best solution I have identified so far is a gadget that can provide
a line level output from the speaker outputs on the Hi Fi and feed that
into some suitable active speakers for both the dining room and the kitchen.

Regards,

Stephen.

There are various choices.

One is to wire them all up in series parallel, with each speaker on
its own volume control pad. Very simple, but last time I looked at the
volume controls they were pricey. You could make your own of course.

I prefer your suggestion of active speakers. Its a lot more flexible,
but every speaker needs power, either locally or with some care
central power can be used.


NT

I have no problem with providing 12v dc to the active speakers as the
dining room and kitchen is awaiting rewiring.

I was thinking o using really chunky 12 vol copmputer style active
speakers.

Another way would be a wall plate with 12 Vdc to it, and a stereo amp
with volume control and then feed two passive speakers from it.

Stephen.

On Jun 10, 11:38*pm, Stephen H wrote:
On 10/06/2012 23:30, NT wrote:



On Jun 10, 10:37 pm, Stephen *wrote:
Hi all.

Wifey wants speakers in several rooms fed off the same hi fi system with
independent room volume control

Problem is current Hi Fi can only support 6 ohm load speakers. The
current speakers in lounge is also 6 ohms.

There is no second set of speaker outputs. at the Hi Fi.

If I parallel up some passive speakers in the dining room and in the
kitchen, this will present a load of 2 ohms to the Hi Fi, overloading
its final output power transistors resulting in a costly repair to Hi Fi.

I've thought about series connection but as the speaker pairs will *not
be identical from room to room, and it makes independent room volume
control impossible.....

There is no line output or headphone output for me to use with active
speakers....

How do people overcome this?

The best solution I have identified so far is a gadget that can provide
a line level output from the speaker outputs on the Hi Fi and feed that
into some suitable active speakers for both the dining room and the kitchen.

Regards,

Stephen.

There are various choices.

One is to wire them all up in series parallel, with each speaker on
its own volume control pad. Very simple, but last time I looked at the
volume controls they were pricey. You could make your own of course.

I prefer your suggestion of active speakers. Its a lot more flexible,
but every speaker needs power, either locally or with some care
central power can be used.

NT

I have no problem with providing 12v dc to the active speakers as the
dining room and kitchen is awaiting rewiring.

I was thinking o using really chunky 12 vol copmputer style active
speakers.

Another way would be a wall plate with 12 Vdc to it, and a stereo amp
with volume control and then feed two passive speakers from it.

Stephen.

Central power feed is neater, and can be included on the same plug as
the audio connections. But... if you dont know how to make a passive
speaker system work, you could find getting central power working
right hard going. The issue is that Vdrop on the 0v power line mixes
power line noise into signal input, and creates instability. You need
the skills to resolve it. So I'd suggest locally powered active
speakers.


NT

On Sun, 10 Jun 2012 15:50:20 -0700 (PDT), NT wrote:

The issue is that Vdrop on the 0v power line mixes power line noise into
signal input, and creates instability.

One wouldn't share the power ground and signal ground. But volt drop
in the power wiring would be another issue if anything more than a
few watts was required at the speakers. 12W @ 12v is 1A, start to
need a bit more than bell wire to avoid sagging supply volts under
load.

So I'd suggest locally powered active speakers.

Agreed, I'd look around at what powered computer speakers are about,
preferable with built in amps and mains PSU. I know you can get some
quite beefy systems as used by gamers, I doubt they will be running
of a wall wart...

Audio wiring, you might get away with unbalanced but going balanced
should solve all problems. The biggest problem seems to be the lack
of a fixed line level output from the existing HiFi. You can
certainly take the speaker outputs and attenuate that but the HiFi's
volume control will then affect all speakers. It might be possible to
hack into the HiFi and extract a suitable signal from it but these
days with cheap mass production and "one chip solutions" I wouldn't
like to say that the volume control is a variable potentiometer
carrying audio, it could just be a control for a VCA in the chip or
just a rotary encoder.

--
Cheers
Dave.

On 11/06/2012 00:28, Dave Liquorice wrote:
On Sun, 10 Jun 2012 15:50:20 -0700 (PDT), NT wrote:

The issue is that Vdrop on the 0v power line mixes power line noise into
signal input, and creates instability.
One wouldn't share the power ground and signal ground. But volt drop
in the power wiring would be another issue if anything more than a
few watts was required at the speakers. 12W @ 12v is 1A, start to
need a bit more than bell wire to avoid sagging supply volts under
load.

So I'd suggest locally powered active speakers.
Agreed, I'd look around at what powered computer speakers are about,
preferable with built in amps and mains PSU. I know you can get some
quite beefy systems as used by gamers, I doubt they will be running
of a wall wart...

Audio wiring, you might get away with unbalanced but going balanced
should solve all problems. The biggest problem seems to be the lack
of a fixed line level output from the existing HiFi. You can
certainly take the speaker outputs and attenuate that but the HiFi's
volume control will then affect all speakers. It might be possible to
hack into the HiFi and extract a suitable signal from it but these
days with cheap mass production and "one chip solutions" I wouldn't
like to say that the volume control is a variable potentiometer
carrying audio, it could just be a control for a VCA in the chip or
just a rotary encoder.

A thought out of the box.

Feed a fm modulater with the signal. The sort tesco sell at around £14.
use boom box or other suitable radio receiver in the rooms to play the
output. Think of it as wireless passive speakers with the added bonus
of receiving normal FM as well if you want to.

Gary

On Jun 11, 12:28*am, "Dave Liquorice"
wrote:
On Sun, 10 Jun 2012 15:50:20 -0700 (PDT), NT wrote:
The issue is that Vdrop on the 0v power line mixes power line noise into
signal input, and creates instability.

One wouldn't share the power ground and signal ground.

of course. That isnt the cause of the trouble.

But volt drop
in the power wiring would be another issue if anything more than a
few watts was required at the speakers. 12W @ 12v is 1A, start to
need a bit more than bell wire to avoid sagging supply volts under
load.

1mm^2 cable drops 44mV per amp per metre, so a 10m run drops 0.44v at
1A. In practice the Vdrop is less, due to a reservoir cap plus the
fact that i is lower most of the time with music and speech. I wouldnt
worry about it unless the OP has a mansion.


So I'd suggest locally powered active speakers.

Agreed, I'd look around at what powered computer speakers are about,
preferable with built in amps and mains PSU. I know you can get some
quite beefy systems as used by gamers, I doubt they will be running
of a wall wart...

Audio wiring, you might get away with unbalanced

Low impedance driving the unbalanced line wipes out all trace of
interference

but going balanced
should solve all problems.

I can see it creating problems.
First there' a lack of balanced line output consumer equipment at
sensible prices (preferably free)
2nd any earthed active speaker, and there are some, is not compatible
with a balanced line.
3rd all 2 or 3 core consumer active speakers are incompatible with a
stereo balanced input

The biggest problem seems to be the lack
of a fixed line level output from the existing HiFi. You can

If its genuinely a hifi it will have line out connectors. But these
are too high impedance to distriute without running into problems. A
little 1w amp solves that.

For one piece stereos wth no line out, it would take some electronics
knowledge to find and use an internal line level audio feed. But its
far easier to just hang a couple of resistors on the speaker outputs,
and use active speakers throughout the system.


certainly take the speaker outputs and attenuate that but the HiFi's
volume control will then affect all speakers.

tone too. If you're using it for listening rather than recording, this
is if anything a bonus.

It might be possible to
hack into the HiFi and extract a suitable signal from it but these
days with cheap mass production and "one chip solutions" I wouldn't
like to say that the volume control is a variable potentiometer
carrying audio, it could just be a control for a VCA in the chip or
just a rotary encoder.


NT

On Jun 10, 10:37*pm, Stephen H wrote:
Hi all.

Wifey wants speakers in several rooms fed off the same hi fi system with
independent room volume control

Problem is current Hi Fi can only support 6 ohm load speakers. The
current speakers in lounge is also 6 ohms.

There is no second set of speaker outputs. at the Hi Fi.

If I parallel up some passive speakers in the dining room and in the
kitchen, this will present a load of 2 ohms to the Hi Fi, overloading
its final output power transistors resulting in a costly repair to Hi Fi.

I've thought about series connection but as the speaker pairs will *not
be identical from room to room, and it makes independent room volume
control impossible.....

There is no line output or headphone output for me to use with active
speakers....

How do people overcome this?

The best solution I have identified so far is a gadget that can provide
a line level output from the speaker outputs on the Hi Fi and feed that
into some suitable active speakers for both the dining room and the kitchen.

Regards,

Stephen.

http://wiki.diyfaq.org.uk/index.php?...o_distribution

NT

In article ,
Stephen H wrote:
There is no line output or headphone output for me to use with active
speakers....

How do people overcome this?

No record output either?

The best solution I have identified so far is a gadget that can provide
a line level output from the speaker outputs on the Hi Fi and feed that
into some suitable active speakers for both the dining room and the
kitchen.

Problem with that is the level would be dependant on the volume control -
you really want a fixed level. Be easy enough to provide a line level
output if it hasn't got one.

I have a system pretty well like you want. A feed from the main sound
system at line level and balanced is fed to every other room in the house
using telephone wiring.

--
*If a turtle doesn't have a shell, is he homeless or naked?

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

On Sun, 10 Jun 2012 22:37:47 +0100, Stephen H
wrote:

Hi all.

Wifey wants speakers in several rooms fed off the same hi fi system with
independent room volume control

Problem is current Hi Fi can only support 6 ohm load speakers. The
current speakers in lounge is also 6 ohms.

There is no second set of speaker outputs. at the Hi Fi.

If I parallel up some passive speakers in the dining room and in the
kitchen, this will present a load of 2 ohms to the Hi Fi, overloading
its final output power transistors resulting in a costly repair to Hi Fi.

I've thought about series connection but as the speaker pairs will not
be identical from room to room, and it makes independent room volume
control impossible.....

There is no line output or headphone output for me to use with active
speakers....

How do people overcome this?

The best solution I have identified so far is a gadget that can provide
a line level output from the speaker outputs on the Hi Fi and feed that
into some suitable active speakers for both the dining room and the kitchen.

Regards,

Stephen.

Why would the line level speakers have to be active? Why not
conventional passive speakers with line transformers and volume pots?

--
Graham.
%Profound_observation%

Graham. wrote:
On Sun, 10 Jun 2012 22:37:47 +0100, Stephen H
wrote:

Hi all.

Wifey wants speakers in several rooms fed off the same hi fi system with
independent room volume control

Problem is current Hi Fi can only support 6 ohm load speakers. The
current speakers in lounge is also 6 ohms.

There is no second set of speaker outputs. at the Hi Fi.

If I parallel up some passive speakers in the dining room and in the
kitchen, this will present a load of 2 ohms to the Hi Fi, overloading
its final output power transistors resulting in a costly repair to Hi Fi.

I've thought about series connection but as the speaker pairs will not
be identical from room to room, and it makes independent room volume
control impossible.....

There is no line output or headphone output for me to use with active
speakers....

How do people overcome this?

The best solution I have identified so far is a gadget that can provide
a line level output from the speaker outputs on the Hi Fi and feed that
into some suitable active speakers for both the dining room and the kitchen.

Regards,

Stephen.

Why would the line level speakers have to be active? Why not
conventional passive speakers with line transformers and volume pots?

Depends if you care about the Fi part of Hi Fi or not,....


--
To people who know nothing, anything is possible.
To people who know too much, it is a sad fact
that they know how little is really possible -
and how hard it is to achieve it.

On Mon, 11 Jun 2012 01:44:53 +0100, The Natural Philosopher
wrote:

Graham. wrote:
On Sun, 10 Jun 2012 22:37:47 +0100, Stephen H
wrote:

Hi all.

Wifey wants speakers in several rooms fed off the same hi fi system with
independent room volume control

Problem is current Hi Fi can only support 6 ohm load speakers. The
current speakers in lounge is also 6 ohms.

There is no second set of speaker outputs. at the Hi Fi.

If I parallel up some passive speakers in the dining room and in the
kitchen, this will present a load of 2 ohms to the Hi Fi, overloading
its final output power transistors resulting in a costly repair to Hi Fi.

I've thought about series connection but as the speaker pairs will not
be identical from room to room, and it makes independent room volume
control impossible.....

There is no line output or headphone output for me to use with active
speakers....

How do people overcome this?

The best solution I have identified so far is a gadget that can provide
a line level output from the speaker outputs on the Hi Fi and feed that
into some suitable active speakers for both the dining room and the kitchen.

Regards,

Stephen.

Why would the line level speakers have to be active? Why not
conventional passive speakers with line transformers and volume pots?

Depends if you care about the Fi part of Hi Fi or not,....

Well I agree 100v line does have it's "Tannoy" associations, but is
that quite fair? Valve amps always had an output transformer and those
could be hi-fi.

One thing that makes me smile is when an attempt is made to pipe
stereo to a pair of ceiling speakers, personally I wouldn't bother

"Good evening Sir, Madam. Would you like the Lennon or the McCartney
table tonight?"

--
Graham.
%Profound_observation%

Graham. wrote:
On Mon, 11 Jun 2012 01:44:53 +0100, The Natural Philosopher
wrote:

Graham. wrote:

Why would the line level speakers have to be active? Why not
conventional passive speakers with line transformers and volume pots?

Depends if you care about the Fi part of Hi Fi or not,....

Well I agree 100v line does have it's "Tannoy" associations, but is
that quite fair? Valve amps always had an output transformer and those
could be hi-fi.


no, its the potentiometer on the speaker that kills it, not the transformer.




--
To people who know nothing, anything is possible.
To people who know too much, it is a sad fact
that they know how little is really possible -
and how hard it is to achieve it.

On Jun 11, 9:23*am, The Natural Philosopher
wrote:
Graham. wrote:
On Mon, 11 Jun 2012 01:44:53 +0100, The Natural Philosopher
wrote:

Graham. wrote:
Why would the line level speakers have to be active? Why not
conventional passive speakers with line transformers and volume pots?

Depends if you care about the Fi part of Hi Fi or not,....

Well I agree 100v line does have it's "Tannoy" associations, but is
that quite fair? Valve amps always had an output transformer and those
could be hi-fi.

no, its the potentiometer on the speaker that kills it, not the transformer.

In such systems you get 2 transformers in the way, plus the resistance
pad. All cause reduction in fi.


NT

On Mon, 11 Jun 2012 09:03:02 +0100, Graham. wrote:

Well I agree 100v line does have it's "Tannoy" associations, but is
that quite fair? Valve amps always had an output transformer and those
could be hi-fi.

Quite, 100v line is a good way to distribute audio to multiple
passive speakers and is capable of good results. As Mr Plowman says
the required transformers aren't particulary cheap and the power
levels available are limited but the acoutsic quality is mainly down
to the flappy bit that couples the electrical signal to the air.
Metal horns are never going to sound very good even if fed with a
perfect signal.

--
Cheers
Dave.

In article ,
Graham. wrote:
Why would the line level speakers have to be active? Why not
conventional passive speakers with line transformers and volume pots?

You'd then need the correct amp to drive them - if you mean 100v line. And
decent transformers for 100v line ain't cheap. Nor is controlling the
volume. OK for a poor quality tannoy etc but not the best way for domestic.

--
*Why do overlook and oversee mean opposite things? *

Dave Plowman London SW
To e-mail, change noise into sound.

Stephen H wrote:
Hi all.

Wifey wants speakers in several rooms fed off the same hi fi system with
independent room volume control

Problem is current Hi Fi can only support 6 ohm load speakers. The
current speakers in lounge is also 6 ohms.

There is no second set of speaker outputs. at the Hi Fi.

If I parallel up some passive speakers in the dining room and in the
kitchen, this will present a load of 2 ohms to the Hi Fi, overloading
its final output power transistors resulting in a costly repair to Hi Fi.

I've thought about series connection but as the speaker pairs will not
be identical from room to room, and it makes independent room volume
control impossible.....

There is no line output or headphone output for me to use with active
speakers....

How do people overcome this?

The best solution I have identified so far is a gadget that can provide
a line level output from the speaker outputs on the Hi Fi and feed that
into some suitable active speakers for both the dining room and the
kitchen.

that's probably the method for any decent quality. I have seen passive
volume controls on 100volt systems: nasty.


Regards,

Stephen.


--
To people who know nothing, anything is possible.
To people who know too much, it is a sad fact
that they know how little is really possible -
and how hard it is to achieve it.

A trip to a second hand shop and get a bunch of old amps and speakers, then
you only need to get the stereo feed to each room?

Of course I think for some surround systems now the active speaker with
sophisticated over the mains remote control of the master etc is around but
then, most don't have deep enough pockets for all that and its a nightmare
for mains connections!

Brian

--
--
From the sofa of Brian Gaff -

Blind user, so no pictures please!
"Stephen H" wrote in message
...
Hi all.

Wifey wants speakers in several rooms fed off the same hi fi system with
independent room volume control

Problem is current Hi Fi can only support 6 ohm load speakers. The current
speakers in lounge is also 6 ohms.

There is no second set of speaker outputs. at the Hi Fi.

If I parallel up some passive speakers in the dining room and in the
kitchen, this will present a load of 2 ohms to the Hi Fi, overloading its
final output power transistors resulting in a costly repair to Hi Fi.

I've thought about series connection but as the speaker pairs will not be
identical from room to room, and it makes independent room volume control
impossible.....

There is no line output or headphone output for me to use with active
speakers....

How do people overcome this?

The best solution I have identified so far is a gadget that can provide a
line level output from the speaker outputs on the Hi Fi and feed that into
some suitable active speakers for both the dining room and the kitchen.

Regards,

Stephen.

Stephen H :
Hi all.

Wifey wants speakers in several rooms fed off the same hi fi system
with independent room volume control

Problem is current Hi Fi can only support 6 ohm load speakers. The
current speakers in lounge is also 6 ohms.

There is no second set of speaker outputs. at the Hi Fi.

If I parallel up some passive speakers in the dining room and in the
kitchen, this will present a load of 2 ohms to the Hi Fi, overloading
its final output power transistors resulting in a costly repair to Hi
Fi.

I've thought about series connection but as the speaker pairs will not
be identical from room to room, and it makes independent room volume
control impossible.....

There is no line output or headphone output for me to use with active
speakers....

Are you sure? Perhaps I'm out of date but a line-level output (after the
selector but before the volume control) would be an unthinkable omission
in any high quality amplifier I've come across. Normally it would be
labelled "TAPE OUT" or similar.

In the absence of such an output, and the skill to create one, I suggest
buying a new amplifier.

--
Mike Barnes

On 11/06/2012 09:10, Mike Barnes wrote:
Stephen :
Hi all.

Wifey wants speakers in several rooms fed off the same hi fi system
with independent room volume control

Problem is current Hi Fi can only support 6 ohm load speakers. The
current speakers in lounge is also 6 ohms.

There is no second set of speaker outputs. at the Hi Fi.

If I parallel up some passive speakers in the dining room and in the
kitchen, this will present a load of 2 ohms to the Hi Fi, overloading
its final output power transistors resulting in a costly repair to Hi
Fi.

I've thought about series connection but as the speaker pairs will not
be identical from room to room, and it makes independent room volume
control impossible.....

There is no line output or headphone output for me to use with active
speakers....

Are you sure? Perhaps I'm out of date but a line-level output (after the
selector but before the volume control) would be an unthinkable omission
in any high quality amplifier I've come across. Normally it would be
labelled "TAPE OUT" or similar.

I suspect the "high quality amplifier" might be an assumption too far.
Many off the shelf midi systems can lack any useful connectivity in or
out...

In the absence of such an output, and the skill to create one, I suggest
buying a new amplifier.

Yup, one option certainly.


--
Cheers,

John.

/================================================== ===============\
| Internode Ltd - http://www.internode.co.uk |
|-----------------------------------------------------------------|
| John Rumm - john(at)internode(dot)co(dot)uk |
\================================================= ================/

xxx

In the absence of such an output, and the skill to create one, I suggest
buying a new amplifier.

Yup, one option certainly.


Yes - but a new amp with a TAPE OUT
then use the old one in another room.

and a ehringer MINIMON MON800
Ultra-Compact Stereo Monitor Matrix Mixer with Talkback Mic
http://www.behringer.com/en/Products/MON800.aspx

? George

On 11 Jun 2012 10:23:53 GMT, Huge wrote:

I have an original Squeezebox for sale, if the OP is interested, having
upgraded to a Duo in the living room.

If the OP isn't I might be... but what do you mean by "orginal
Squeezebox", there are several devices that could fit that
description.

--
Cheers
Dave.

On 11 Jun 2012 11:47:56 GMT, Huge wrote:

If the OP isn't I might be... but what do you mean by "orginal
Squeezebox", there are several devices that could fit that
description.

One of these;

http://wiki.slimdevices.com/index.php/SB1

A real "orginal" then. B-)

YHM...

--
Cheers
Dave.

"Dave Liquorice" wrote:
On 11 Jun 2012 11:47:56 GMT, Huge wrote:

If the OP isn't I might be... but what do you mean by "orginal
Squeezebox", there are several devices that could fit that
description.

One of these;

http://wiki.slimdevices.com/index.php/SB1

A real "orginal" then. B-)

YHM...


Surely the tag "original" should be only apply to this?
http://www.cgidlers.com/?q=node/12#comment-7
;-)

Tim

On 11 Jun 2012 16:02:56 GMT, Huge wrote:

YHM...

Apparently not.

Ahh. It likely went to "usenet@..." which I don't think goes
anywhere. (I must fix that). Try "huge@..."

I think I've mailed you. Took out "notthisbit"?

Correct x 2

YHM...

--
Cheers
Dave.