Connecting Laptop to to my in-ceiling speakers speakers.

[Pho King]

Hi gurus,

I moved in to a place that has in-ceiling speakers and I've had the hardest time trying to find a straight answer on how to hook them up. I called magnolia to come by and take a look but they just tried pushing a 10k home theater system on me!

I took some pictures of the inputs / source / destination
http://www.flickr.com/photos/9...ets/72157622131417149/

Any help would be appreciated!

Thanks

 

[Baked]

Don't know if your macbook has optical out, but for laptop with optical out, you can get a DAC with optical input and RCA output and hook that up to the wall RCA jack and you're good to go.

 

[Pho King]

Thanks Baked! It sounds like you're speaking a foreign language, but after a bit of a search - I think I found what you're talking about!

http://digitalprosound.digital...ewarticle.jsp?id=56671

is this it?

 

[Baked]

DAC. Depends on what DAC you get, you may or may not need a mini-toslink to toslink adapter shown in the article you linked. The mini DAC I have has a mini-toslink input and RCA output. For your setup, you can order a cable that has RCA connector on one end for the DAC and spade connector or banana plug on the other for the speaker wall jack.

 

[Tiamat]

At first glance, Im not so sure those are RCA inputs. Do the metal sleeves unscrew? My first guess is that you need to hook speaker cables to the in-wall inputs. Looks like stereo L/R with the red/black for each channel. You will need some sort of amplifier (like a receiver). Then once you have a receiver, you can hook up your laptop with the receiver using a 1/8" analog stereo mini jack to Stereo L/R RCA cables, the receiver to the wall with copper speaker cables.

 

[Pho King]

the metal sleeves do unscrew, but it still doesn't look like my RCA cable fits. So now i need a receiver to go in-between my laptop and the wall? Anyone have any suggestions on a cheap good receiver? I occasionally see an onkyo model on slickdeals....

 

[Apex]

Those are standard banana plug connectors. You just hook your receiver into them, and hook your laptop into your receiver. That's it.

 

[Pho King]

Hmm, I'm still confused. Can I just use what Baked suggested? A DAC with a banana plug output or do I need a receiver?

 

[newnameman]

No, a DAC alone is not enough, you need an amplifier along with it (i.e. a receiver).

 

[Apex]

It depends on if your speakers are powered or unpowered. I'm guessing unpowered, since line level connections are rarely banana plug (it's possible, but relatively unlikely).

If they're unpowered, you need an amplifier of some sort, whether you use an amp or receiver.

 

[Pho King]

thanks for all the information guys! I'm gonna run off to Fry's to see what I can find!