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How to hook speakers to my receiver with an amp. Volume Low and auto shuts off.

2K views 15 replies 3 participants last post by  crewxp 
#1 · (Edited)
I have an issue.

Whenever I hook the speaker wiring from the receiver to my amp, the volume is extremely low when I play audio and the receiver constantly shuts off and says 'protection on'. I used a L/R RCA Cable and stripped the headphone part off to try to hook in the receiver. Is it my wiring or where I'm trying to plug into? Do I use Front L/R or High/ Bi-Amp Front L/R?

The Ceiling Speakers were installed without specs given to me after they were installed. So it's hard to figure out how to wire them. There's about 8 speakers in total in the room

But when I hook my amp's headphone jack to my amp directly (instead of using speaker wire), everything works fine. But I feel this is just ignoring the issue. I want to create a permanent solution and make it not have a random wire sticking out the front.

Can someone tell me what's probably happening? The ideal setup is to use all 8 speakers for maximum audio coverage, all in stereo.

Here is my setup (In Order):
Sony STR DN840 Receiver (Bluetooth/Pandora Audio Hosting)
XLS 1000 Amp (L/R RCA to Phono on Receiver)..(Want to utilize Receiver's speaker inputs)
Episode ESS-6-BLK Speaker Selector (Left,Right,Ground,Ground going to Amp. 4 Wires)
Unknown Speakers installed. (16 wires going to selector, 8 speakers)

My failed Attempt's Setup:
I tried hooking the amp's L/R RCA Jack input slot to my receiver. I did this by stripping a RCA to Headphone Cable and plugging the L/R stripped part in the 'Front L/R' slots on the receiver. I didn't use the High Front or Bi/Amp Front L/R. Then I attached a ground wire to the two ground terminals since the RCA cable only had a Red/White cable, no ground. This caused my audio to be really low and the receiver to shut off.

Images:
Receiver Back: http://i.i.cbsi.com/cnwk.1d/i/tim2/2013/07/12/Sony_STR-DN840_35734383_09.jpg
Amp Back: http://a248.e.akamai.net/pix.crutch...00/900/products/2014/22/859/x859XLS1000-B.jpg
Switch Back: http://www.snapav.com/images/Product/large/ESS-6-BLK-B.jpg
 
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#2 ·
I have an issue.
Sounds like you have more than one.

crewxp said:
Whenever I hook the speaker wiring from the receiver to my amp, the volume is extremely low when I play audio and the receiver constantly shuts off and says 'protection on'. I used a L/R RCA Cable and stripped the headphone part off to try to hook in the receiver. Is it my wiring or where I'm trying to plug into? Do I use Front L/R or High/ Bi-Amp Front L/R?
Issue 1: You don't want to take the speaker outputs and connect them to the amplifier inputs.
Issue 2: Amplifier shutting down would indicate a short or other overload on its outputs. I don't know if it might be complaining about overloaded inputs if you are connecting as you say.
Question 1: You could use any of the available RCA outputs on the back of the Receiver to connect to the inputs of the Amplifier, but it depends on what part of the signal you want to amplify

crewxp said:
The Ceiling Speakers were installed without specs given to me after they were installed. So it's hard to figure out how to wire them. There's about 8 speakers in total in the room
Speakers have two wires each. You should try to figure out how they are wired. You can place a small battery - 1.5 or 9v - across the speaker leads to hear a click from the speaker for basic identification

crewxp said:
But when I hook my amp's headphone jack to my amp directly (instead of using speaker wire), everything works fine. But I feel this is just ignoring the issue. I want to create a permanent solution and make it not have a random wire sticking out the front.
That connection is not inappropriate. Again, you don't connect speaker outputs to a line level input.

crewxp said:
Can someone tell me what's probably happening? The ideal setup is to use all 8 speakers for maximum audio coverage, all in stereo.
It works when you apply a reasonable signal, so you are close.

Looking at your Receiver it has only a Subwoofer Out, no other Audio out.

At the least, you could build a voltage divider to bring the voltage level of the Speaker outputs down to an acceptable level for the input to the amplifier.

https://docs.sony.com/release/STRDN840.pdf



crewxp said:
Here is my setup (In Order):
Sony STR DN840 Receiver (Bluetooth/Pandora Audio Hosting)
XLS 1000 Amp (L/R RCA to Phono on Receiver)..(Want to utilize Receiver's speaker inputs)
Episode ESS-6-BLK Speaker Selector (Left,Right,Ground,Ground going to Amp. 4 Wires)
Unknown Speakers installed. (16 wires going to selector, 8 speakers)
See your manual above - no RCA outputs

crewxp said:
My failed Attempt's Setup:
I tried hooking the amp's L/R RCA Jack input slot to my receiver. I did this by stripping a RCA to Headphone Cable and plugging the L/R stripped part in the 'Front L/R' slots on the receiver. I didn't use the High Front or Bi/Amp Front L/R. Then I attached a ground wire to the two ground terminals since the RCA cable only had a Red/White cable, no ground. This caused my audio to be really low and the receiver to shut off.
Stop now before you blow something up. Don't let the smoke out.

crewxp said:
[/quote]
 
#4 ·
Sounds like you have more than one.



Issue 1: You don't want to take the speaker outputs and connect them to the amplifier inputs.
Issue 2: Amplifier shutting down would indicate a short or other overload on its outputs. I don't know if it might be complaining about overloaded inputs if you are connecting as you say.
Question 1: You could use any of the available RCA outputs on the back of the Receiver to connect to the inputs of the Amplifier, but it depends on what part of the signal you want to amplify

Stop now before you blow something up. Don't let the smoke out.
[/QUOTE]

Just re-reading and researching everything after you posted. There's no way I can use my existing setup without going through the headphone jack? I think what I will have to do to hook it up correctly is buy a pre amp? Is this any better than just using the receiver? Won't that be power/quality loss?

I hoped I could have boughten some wiring alternative at Best Buy. Like a XLR to RCA cable or something.
 
#3 ·
Wow. Okay, I knew it was my wiring. The old contractors for my place hooked everything up, but it never worked. They had it wired exactly like I tried, so I tried doing the same thing because I assumed that was how it was supposed to be done.

I'm heading to bestbuy later to try and buy some alternative cabling. What would you suggest I buy? You said I could use the RCA output on the receiver, but the receiver doesn't have any on the back.

Is my only option (If I want to use the amp), to use the headphones out? Any XLR cable or product alternative? If the amp isn't needed, I wonder why they set it up that way if only the receiver is supposed to be used.

Oh and also. THANK YOU a lot for the reply. This issue has been lingering for about a year now since the place was built for us.
 
#5 ·
Looks like BestBuy has something you can use:

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/kicker-...lack/5681005.p?id=1219148661297&skuId=5681005

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/aamp-of-america-inc-011-peripheralpremium-output-converter/8014659.p?id=1156203597652&skuId=8014659&st=categoryid$pcmcat165900050035&cp=1&lp=5

Or maybe they have the equivalent for home use.

The problem is that the amplifier wants to see an input signal of about one volt maximum, and your speaker output can send tens of volts to the speakers.

So you are overloading the amplifier input.
 
#6 ·
Yes! Those are exactly the accessories I was looking for.

And the receiver was the one powering off, not the amplifier. The amp stayed fine during all my messy attempts. The receiver powered down saying 'protection' when I increased the volume on it.

But I see the problem now. The Receiver's speaker outputs are too powerful for the amp? But why is the volume so low then compared to the headphones? Amp auto lowering because its too high of a voltage? The way they wired it before must have been really wrong. I was just going based off of their previous attempt.

My solutions?:
-Wire directly to the receiver and gain power loss?
-Wire RCA to amp from headphone jack on receiver. Anything wrong with this besides looks?
-Buy something to strip power from the receivers speaker outputs before going to the amp?
 
#9 ·
Going to try ditching the amp that was provided tomorrow. Seems it's just providing us more confusion and is a waste of space? :O

Quick question, the receiver has a Bi-Amp/High Front L/R outputs as well as regular Front L/R.

Would there be any difference to hooking it to the 'high' Front L/R slots instead of the regular?

And I'm guessing I'll know if I need the amp or not if the receiver doesn't give loud enough audio once changed?
 
#10 ·
Going to try ditching the amp that was provided tomorrow. Seems it's just providing us more confusion and is a waste of space? :O
Bingo

Quick question, the receiver has a Bi-Amp/High Front L/R outputs as well as regular Front L/R.

Would there be any difference to hooking it to the 'high' Front L/R slots instead of the regular?

And I'm guessing I'll know if I need the amp or not if the receiver doesn't give loud enough audio once changed?
Use the regular outputs.
 
#13 ·
It looks like my Atlas amp has the transformer you are talking about. Perfect Fit! :)

So... Good update after reading yours.

I got setup1 working fine without the XLS amp. Straight from the receiver to speakers actually sounds a bit better in my opinion. I wonder why that is.

Setup2: Having issues with the outside speakers. They are 'popping'/'distorting' when the audio first starts playing. Then it seems like it levels itself out, then it 'pops' only on bass parts on songs/audio. Mostly during commercials or from digital bassy sources.
Wiring: I'm running the indoor speakers straight from the receiver to the switch, which then goes to the speakers. For OUTDOOR speakers, The switch goes to the amp, which is set to 70V Transformer 'Parallel' mode. Which then feeds directly to the 8 speakers outside.

I can't get the popping to stop on the outside speakers. The inside sound great.

-Also bought a line-out to RCA coverter. Would I need that for my second setup to decrease receiver voltage to the amp to the outside speakers?
 
#16 ·
Quite possibly. I'll take a look inside the speakers today.

It sounds fine, maybe a little low volume considering I had to turn the Atlas amp all the way up to hear decent volume. But the 'popping/distortion', only comes on when playing bass parts. Regular audio sounds fine (although low in volume).

I tried hooking the amp in 70v mode as well as 100v.

Edit: Also, the line out converter is hooked up. Only difference I saw once hooked up was lowering of the volume by a lot. I did a line out (speaker end running from receiver to converter), and the rca end stripped to red/black and white/black wires. Those wires are hooked to the amp.
 
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