[the Red Eft]

Hi! I just unpacked an SR-3/SRD-5 combo that I snagged on eBay last weekend, and I'm excited to try it out...But the speaker wires that are supposed to connect the SRD-5 to my amp seem to have been monkeyed with, and I don't know what to make of it. Let me explain:

The wires for the right channel are red and black, and the wires for the left channel are white and blue. But the end of the black wire has been soldered to the end of the blue wire, and the ends of the red and white wires have each been doubled up and taped with electrical tape.

The free ends of the red and white wires that stick out of the tape are thinner than the ends that go into the tape, and there's no exposed wire --- the coating goes right up to the end. You can kind of see them in the top right auction picture.

I've e-mailed the seller about it, and I guess if it comes to it I can just snip off the ends of the wires and proceed as I expected to, hooking up these wires like ordinary speaker cables...But why the solder? What exactly is going on here?

 

[the Red Eft]

Now the seller has written me back, but I'm not sure I understand him:

Quote:

to hook up to amp outputs just hook to leftand right speaker wires from amp to back screw terminalsL+L- R+R- on adaptor and put switch in es position that switch switches speaker output to earspeakers or speakerplug on front for permanent installation.if i remember correct those wires coming out were used with for a headphone plug and are just hooked to those back terminals on the adaptor.if you want to hook to aheadphone plug the two wires together are common and the other ttwo are for right or left. let me know how it goes

So he's saying I connect the screws on the adaptor to the speaker jacks on the amp? And that lets me listen through the headphones?

Forgive my clueless questions; I've never used adaptors more complicated than a 1/8 to 1/4 plug.

 

[smeggy]

Hmmm, it seems he was using them in a very unorthodox way, plugging them in via a headphone jack which is why the grounds are connected and the extension wires are thinner. Not good.

Snip off the extension wires he added and separate all four wires.

Those wires then go to the speaker outputs on your amp. Red and black are Right, white and blue are Left. Red and White are the + terminals.

The screw posts on the back are for connecting speakers and the switch on the front can be set to ES (ElectroStatic) or SP (Speakers) as a pass-through.

The phones will probably need to run with music for a small time to fully charge before sounding as they should.

 

[the Red Eft]

That's what I'd thought! Thanks a lot for the response.

 

[smeggy]

Enjoy them, by all accounts they sound great.