Am I harming my equipment ???

[shaggyb]

The speaker wire I ran for my rear surround speakers did not have any sort of markings on the sheathing to help me determine a positive vs negative wire. The wire was run above the ceiling drywall in my basement, so it would be almost impossible to trace it back to keep one marked as a positive lead.

I want to hook up my new surround speakers, but am concerned that I may cause damage to them not konwing if the signal is crossed (negative feed from receiver to positive input on speaker, etc.)

AM I AT RISK OF DOING PHYSICAL DAMAGE TO MY EQUIPMENT, OR AM I SIMPLY LOSING SOUND QUALITY ???

I know the easy answer is to get new/better wire, that would have a marking or color coding of the wires to determine polarity. I was on a tight budget when I made my wiring decision (No excuse...I know) and admittedly tried to cut corners....(Now I pay for that choice)

Any information owuld be greatly appreciated

[RuSsMaN]

No, you will not harm anything.

Pick up a Fox and Hound, find a used one, borrow one from work / a friend and you can get it squared away in no time.

http://www.mcminone.com/product.asp?product_id=74-335&catalog_name=MCMProducts

Cheers,
Russ

[jakelm]

No damage, just polarity. If you had a multi meter that would reach, you could check that way.

Hook your surround wires to you reciever's left and right front speakers. Switch reciever to stereo. Turn on music, check polarity.

Or if you had DVE or AVIA disk. Real easy to check.

When you get it right... MARK IT!!!!

[shaggyb]

I guess I am not to sure what I am supposed to do ???

Am I checking for current ?? What exactly will the multimeter show me ?? What am I looking for ??

Please help !!!!

[bigaudiofanatic]

use a volt meter and on one end hook up a 9v battery than go to the other end use the volt meter which ever one is + mark it than go back to the battery and mark the wire that was hooked up to +. there ya go I do it all the time.

[shaggyb]

I found a different trick online using a 9v battery, and hooking it up to the ends of my wire runs (at the receiver). If the woofer jumped out when connected, thw wires were hooked up correctly, but if if jumped in, then it was reversed. i used this to mark my positive and negative leads and should be fine until I decide to upgrade the wires

Thanks to all for the help