Is it possible to make it wireless?

kram2803 · 4 Jul 2014 at 20:14

Hi so I have Sony dav-dz330 5.1 installed in the living room but its quite annoying that wires are everywhere and running on the walls which is quite visible and I can't run it in the wall. So I'm trying to find a solution to deal with these cables, was wondering if there's a way to make it wireless or something?

Orange: speakers
Green: sofas
Blue: tv unit
Dark Grey: wall
Black: door

Current speakers layout:

Planned setup:

smogsy · 4 Jul 2014 at 21:02

i would say run conduit & paint it

worked for me

cant see it now

kram2803 · 4 Jul 2014 at 21:19

smogsy said:
i would say run conduit & paint it

worked for me cant see it now

Yeah, but what about the corners though? The cable runs where the floor skirting then all the way up to the corner of the wall.

Marsman · 5 Jul 2014 at 11:52

You can't make the rear speakers totally wireless, as they will require mains power. The receiver will need an amplifier to power the speakers, which would increase the size of such a device; then you'd need to connect the speakers to that, and plug the receiver into the mains. You're going to have wires whatever you do.

Panasonic do such a device for their own 5.1 systems, but it's only compatible with certain models. I don't think there is anything that will connect to the speaker output on any 5.1 system, then transmit to a wireless receiver; any such product is likely to be brand specific, and cost more than it's worth.

lucid · 5 Jul 2014 at 13:50

Marsman has it sussed. KEF did a wireless rear speaker kit. It was £450 for the transmitter and receiver/amp module. That's on top of the cost of the main surround system and speakers.

There's a product called Rocketfish which is a low cost version. These are somewhere in the £70-£100 range from Ebay. One highlighted issue is the audio delay that these things introduce because of the extra encode/decode process for transmission. http://www.cnet.com/uk/products/rocketfish-universal-wireless-rear-speaker-kit/

In the end your home system is a budget Sony surround kit (circa £170~£250 retail) so it seems pointless spending any more than £100 on hardware to do away with the front-to-back cables. You still have the rear speaker cables from the Rocketfish to deal with though. Personally I'd take the long view. Get the walls chased and cable hidden properly. Install some decent wire so that when you can afford a system upgrade then the wires in-wall are up to the job. No trunking; no boxes, no trailing wires, no additional power supplies.... simple, clean, elegant.

kram2803 · 5 Jul 2014 at 14:08

lucid said:
Marsman has it sussed. KEF did a wireless rear speaker kit. It was £450 for the transmitter and receiver/amp module. That's on top of the cost of the main surround system and speakers.

There's a product called Rocketfish which is a low cost version. These are somewhere in the £70-£100 range from Ebay. One highlighted issue is the audio delay that these things introduce because of the extra encode/decode process for transmission. http://www.cnet.com/uk/products/rocketfish-universal-wireless-rear-speaker-kit/

In the end your home system is a budget Sony surround kit (circa £170~£250 retail) so it seems pointless spending any more than £100 on hardware to do away with the front-to-back cables. You still have the rear speaker cables from the Rocketfish to deal with though. Personally I'd take the long view. Get the walls chased and cable hidden properly. Install some decent wire so that when you can afford a system upgrade then the wires in-wall are up to the job. No trunking; no boxes, no trailing wires, no additional power supplies.... simple, clean, elegant.

Yeah I'm planning to run long cable instead and hide it properly, however the cable connector is quite different and I don't think maplin has it.

Connector

So I'm wondering if I could just connect the two end splints to a newer cable but I don't if that'd affect the sound or the speaker itself.

lucid · 5 Jul 2014 at 15:57

kram2803 said:
So I'm wondering if I could just connect the two end splints to a newer cable but I don't if that'd affect the sound or the speaker itself.

TBH, with the quality of the little satellites that come with all-in-one systems worrying about the difference some solder joint will make to sound quality is a bit futile.

The more significant element will be power loss over the cable length. This is where the Impedance rating of the speakers (Ohms) and the distances involved start to become significant.

Hi-Fi and decent AV speakers run at 8 Ohm impedance. Home Cinema kits such as the Sony run on a lower impedance; 3 Ohms each in the case of the DAV-DZ330. That's significant because the power loss increases significantly as impedance falls. Dropping from 8 Ohm to 4 Ohm nearly doubles the power loss. Dropping to 2 Ohm almost doubles it again.

The specs for these all-in-one kits are notoriously over-inflated. For example, the claim of 1000W total power output is something of a red herring when the maximum power consumption at the wall socket is just under 170W. In reality you'll be lucky to see about 15W per satellite and 30W at the sub. That's not such a big problem though because it doesn't take a lot of Watts to make some noise. However, losing 20~40% of that power because the signal has to travel some distance over thin and crappy bell wire is a big problem. Suddenly 15W becomes 9W for no more complicated reason than the cable is too thin.

This may seem a little overkill, but much thicker cable will do a far better job of preserving the power. Have a look at specing some 2mm CSA cable all round, or at the very least for the rear speakers.