Hey, I have a bunch of random speakers laying around the house and had an idea to create a makeshift suround sound by creating a circuit that connects the speakers together and includes a power source so that I don't loose as much quality and volume as I split it. I am planning on having a 3.5mm audio jack as the power source.

I have three sets of speakers so far, two of which inputs are just 3.5mm jacks.
the third one is an old set of TV speakers, I have included pictures below:





I am just looking for some advice on where to start really.

Thanks.

 

You could be on the wrong track to begin.

What is your definition of a speaker?

A loud speaker is usually an acoustic transducer with 8Ω impedance. You need an audio amplifier to drive such speakers. If you connect a power adapter to the speaker you will let the smoke out of it.

Computer speakers may or may not have an audio amplifier built in. This is best referred to as power amplified speakers. Know which kind of speaker you have.

Surround sound is another matter altogether. Let's begin with one step at a time.

 

I am just looking for some advice on where to start really.

If you keep your eyes open, you can find surround sound amps very inexpensively or even free on craigslist or e-bay. They won't be very good at the low end, but they'll be FAR closer than what you might build. That's where I'd start.

Are you sure you mean "surround" (more than 2 independent channels), or do you just want more pairs of stereo speakers? Or even more mono speakers?

 

From the way back days a cheap way to achieve surround sound is to connect one speaker between the L and R hot terminals, and put the speaker behind you.

Connected thus the speaker will sound out the difference between channels and is surprisingly good, though it depends on the source material.

 

You can get surround from two speakers as well, including headphones. It can work surprisingly well. I had an old Sony TV that could make you turn to look for the sound that seemed to be coming from the side of the room. Pretty amazing with two small speakers only 2 feet apart.

But of course that requires a signal processor, not just slapping in more speakers.

 

From the way back days a cheap way to achieve surround sound is to connect one speaker between the L and R hot terminals, and put the speaker behind you.

Connected thus the speaker will sound out the difference between channels and is surprisingly good, though it depends on the source material.

Did that a lot in autos. After installing a stereo ... that center front speaker became useful. I first heard that configuration from the Chief Engineer of the radio station .... he connected his home stereo in that manner.

 

You're wasting your time with surround sound.

The best sound quality to be had with both music and feel in movies is to have two speakers and a two channel amplifier, nothing more.

For me surround sound ruins the movie/music.

 

That advice may be relevant to this OP's thread but in general it's just not true. I have a good surround system and it's awesome. Eight channels of uncompressed music and effects, with directionality as the director intended. There's no way I feel I've even "seen" a movie until I've played it on my 7.1 system. The impact of a good sound track is huge.

 

8 channels of artificially made fake sound which would not exist if you were in a real life event of the scene depicted in the movie.

And with music surround doesent make sense at all, unless you were standing in the middle of a circular stage with musicians all around you, which doesent exist.

 

8 channels of artificially made fake sound which would not exist if you were in a real life event of the scene depicted in the movie.

And with music surround doesent make sense at all, unless you were standing in the middle of a circular stage with musicians all around you, which doesent exist.

Goes right along with all the computer generated screen shots that doesn't exist either. give it a rest!

 

We're way off track.

OP Ben hasn't responded yet. First I would like to know if he has speakers alone or amp/speakers. Then we can talk about mono vs stereo. Then I would add a L+R summing amp to a woofer or sub-wooker. Then we can talk about L-R and R-L channels and all combinations of L-αR and R-αL without even beginning to entertain surround sound.