[Gunk]

I am replacing the 3.5mm jack on a pair of TFZ Series 5 earbuds.

The wires are all the same color. They are twisted in pairs and I tested to determine which is left and which is right.

My question is about the polarity of each pair. I have not done this before and don't know much about these things.
For instance,on the pair of wires to the left channel, I can connect the wires to the ground or the left channel connection on the new 3.5mm jack. I get sound when the wires are hooked up both ways. I can't really tell a difference in quality at this point.

This is my concern, if the signal wire and ground wire are specific and designed to only go one way, I would expect my sound quality will be diminished.

If the polarity does matter, is there any way to test which wire should be signal and which is ground???

Or is it just making an electrical circuit and either way is fine?

Any help is greatly appreciated.

 

[alpha421]

You're nearly there. Good job determining the set of wires for each channel. It's too bad that all four wires are the same color as that makes identifying polarity very difficult. Unless you can open the shell and have the fortune to have which is positive or vice versa identified by some mark, trying to figure out the polarity is going to be a trial and error process. Soldering the wires to the connector and listen to a track that you know well. Compare the sound to another iem if you have one on hand and if they sound identical or very similar on both L/R sides, you're golden. If not unsolder the wires, reverse and resolder. Good luck.

 

[Gunk]

Thanks for reply. So you are confirming that the polarity definitely matters concerning the sound quality?

I was previously just testing by holding the bare wires against the new jack while it was plugged in my phone playing a track.

Maybe by soldering I will get a better representation of which way has better quality.

 

[technobear]

What is important here is that both sides are the same way round. If you get one side wrong it will sound very strange.