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Old Sub

4K views 4 replies 3 participants last post by  JRace 
#1 ·
I have an older Klipsch SWV 8" powered subwoofer. I just bought a Dennon AVR 1604 receiver. The connection for the Sub from the Dennon is an RCA type connection, yet my subwoofer has bare wire type connectors for both the left and right channel.


How do I hook my subwoofer up?
 
#2 ·
Hi Joe - I have an older Yamaha Sub, that also uses speaker wire type connectors, but it does accept banana plugs. My guess is your sub is the spring loaded wire type. Either way, when I upgraded my receiver to the HK530, all I did was use a Y connector from the sub output. Keep in mind though the speaker wire for the old Yammy was bannana plugged at both ends (receiver and sub). I would assume you could use bananna plugs for the input to the Y at your Denon's end, and leave the wires bare at the sub end (if it won't take Bananna plugs).


That should work, and it shouldn't damage the sub at all, it didn't bother the Yammy at all when I did that.
 
#3 ·
Your receiever has a low level output, designed to be fed into a amplifer, which then poweres the subwoofer. It sounds like you sub only has speaker level inputs.


It may be possible that your sub is powered, but sounds like it is passive (not powered) given that it only has speaker level inputs.


How did you hook it up before?


If it is indeed powered, but without low level (RCA) inputs, then you need a line-level converter (LOC) which converts rca conections to speaker conections. This is necessary becuase of the volatge difference's between the tow connection types.
 
#4 ·
It is a powered sub-woofer. I do have to plug in the sub to the wall to get power. But, I think you are right about needing an LOC. I called Magnolia Hi-Fi, where I bought the Denon Receiver, and at first they were saying to get the LOC, but then backed off, because they were thinking it would add distortion to the line. They told me to hook it up the "old fashioned way", which I did. That is, take the Front Left and Right hookups to the sub, and then from the sub, wire the Front and Left tower speakers, and tell the receiver that I do not have a sub. In this way, the full bandwith is transferred to the Front Left and Right. As it goes through the sub, the sub will handle the crossover (at 85 hz), and send the rest of the signal to the towers (Boston CR95 floor standing speakers).


It works, but It would have been nice to be able to let the receiver do the crossover work, rather than the sub. Oh, well. Maybe someday I'll spring for a new sub. My wife, on the other hand, doesn't like the "sub sound" at all!!! Even though I have it turned down, she still doesn't like that "low level feeling" that subs give you. I want to tell her "that's the feature, not the problem!" :)
 
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