Home Theater Forum - connecting 4.1 green/black wires to laptop and tv

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connecting 4.1 green/black wires to laptop and tv

sdac

2007-05-21, 3:25 am

Hi, i just bought a Creative Inspire M4500 which has 4.1 sound.

Anyway the system has 1 green and 1 black 3.5 plugs coming out of the
subwoofer.

Back of 4.1 speakers

[URL=http://imageshack.us][IMG]http://img441.imageshack.us/img441/5584/
picture002og5.jpg[/IMG][/URL]

I have the following 2 problems:

1) connect to laptop.
My laptop has a regular sound card with an earphone connection. If i
connect the green wire from my speakers to this... then only 2 front
speakers+woofer work while if i connect black cable then only rear
speakers work.

I want to connect both green and black cables so i will get sound from
all speakers (i don't care if it is 4.1 or just regular stereo as long
as 4 speakers have sound) ?

2) connect to TV
My tv does not have an earphone area... only the regular RCA input
How can i also connect the 2 green black cables to RCA. Can i treat
the green as "right" and black "left" and get some converter which
will connect the 3.5 male green and black to RCA ?
If so, will this give me stereo sound from the 4 speakers ?

Sorry if my questions are very simple but i don't know much about this
and i've been very confused with what i saw online.

Thanks in advance.

JoeT

2007-05-22, 8:25 pm

"sdac" <ameerov@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:1179726515.501156.155320@n15g2000prd.googlegroups.com...
>
>
> Hi, i just bought a Creative Inspire M4500 which has 4.1 sound.
>
> Anyway the system has 1 green and 1 black 3.5 plugs coming out of the
> subwoofer.
>
> Back of 4.1 speakers
>
> [URL=http://imageshack.us][IMG]http://img441.imageshack.us/img441/5584/
> picture002og5.jpg[/IMG][/URL]
>
> I have the following 2 problems:
>
>
> 1) connect to laptop.
> My laptop has a regular sound card with an earphone connection. If i
> connect the green wire from my speakers to this... then only 2 front
> speakers+woofer work while if i connect black cable then only rear
> speakers work.
>
> I want to connect both green and black cables so i will get sound from
> all speakers (i don't care if it is 4.1 or just regular stereo as long
> as 4 speakers have sound) ?
>
> 2) connect to TV
> My tv does not have an earphone area... only the regular RCA input
> How can i also connect the 2 green black cables to RCA. Can i treat
> the green as "right" and black "left" and get some converter which
> will connect the 3.5 male green and black to RCA ?
> If so, will this give me stereo sound from the 4 speakers ?
>
> Sorry if my questions are very simple but i don't know much about this
> and i've been very confused with what i saw online.
>
>
> Thanks in advance.
>

Surround setups aren't designed to make sound come from all four speakers
from a simple stereo input. I'm guessing because you haven't adequately
described the entire setup but yours likely should have the sub plugged into
the rear left/right outputs and it has it's rear left/right speakers
attached to it. The front/center speakers attach to corresponding outputs.
Your laptop have a pcmcia connector? Get a surround capable sound card to
plug into it. On TV you need to plug into a surround system to get sound
from all the speakers. Subs always plug into either a rear set of
connections or a dedicated sub output.

Gandalf

2007-05-22, 9:25 pm

sdac wrote:
>
> Hi, i just bought a Creative Inspire M4500 which has 4.1 sound.
>
> Anyway the system has 1 green and 1 black 3.5 plugs coming out of the
> subwoofer.
>
> Back of 4.1 speakers
>
> [URL=http://imageshack.us][IMG]http://img441.imageshack.us/img441/5584/
> picture002og5.jpg[/IMG][/URL]
>
> I have the following 2 problems:
>
>
> 1) connect to laptop.
> My laptop has a regular sound card with an earphone connection. If i
> connect the green wire from my speakers to this... then only 2 front
> speakers+woofer work while if i connect black cable then only rear
> speakers work.
>
> I want to connect both green and black cables so i will get sound from
> all speakers (i don't care if it is 4.1 or just regular stereo as long
> as 4 speakers have sound) ?

I can think of several ways to accomplish what you're asking.
Probably the simplest...

Go to partsexpress.com

Buy a Dual Headphone Adapter:
http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/show...tnumber=240-130 $1.90

That will connect both SW inputs to your laptop, giving you four [4]
speaker stereo.

> 2) connect to TV
> My tv does not have an earphone area... only the regular RCA input
> How can i also connect the 2 green black cables to RCA. Can i treat
> the green as "right" and black "left" and get some converter which
> will connect the 3.5 male green and black to RCA ?
> If so, will this give me stereo sound from the 4 speakers ?
>
> Sorry if my questions are very simple but i don't know much about this
> and i've been very confused with what i saw online.
>
>
> Thanks in advance.
>

Again, from partsexpress.com:

Get a 3.5mm Stereo Male To 2 RCA Male Cable 5 ft.
http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/show...tnumber=240-135 $1.95

If your laptop has a line in, you can plug this in there and plug the
other end into your TV audio outs.

This way you don't have to undo any cables and you can use your laptop
as an audio switch / mixer.

If your laptop only has a mic in, you could try it, but turn off any mic
boost in the Windows mixer and start with a low volume setting on both
the TV and the mic input of the laptop.

I really wouldn't expect any damage from this [although *technically*
possible], but the TV audio out will overdrive the laptop mic-in to the
point of distortion very quickly.

If you can't/don't want to try that,
pick up a 3.5mm Stereo To 3.5mm Stereo Coupler Metal
http://www.partsexpress.com/pe/show...tnumber=090-318 $1.45
and leave it on the end of the TV's 3.5mm/RCA adapter.

When you want to listen to the TV, swap the headphone adapter on the end
of the SW cables to the 3.5mm coupler on the TV's RCA adapter.

If you really don't feel like switching cables back and forth to go from
the TV to the laptop, you could pick up an inexpensive av switch from
eBay for under $10, but you'll need more [or certainly different]
adapters to accomodate the switch.

If you're still confused, or want to try the av switch route and need
cab;e/adapter info for that hookup, reply here.
But it's actually pretty simple and straightforward.

hth,

--
-Gandalf

Never meddle in the affairs of a dragon for you are crunchy and taste
good with ketchup!

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