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newbie trying to set up a simple sound system for a frat

M

mike renna

New Member
My son's frat is looking to get a nice 'sound system' to play music in a house / outside when tailgating, etc.

The speakers they settled on are 2 of the EV ZLX 15P speakers. my son says there's a guy in the frat that has a dj box / mixer? that has 2 RCA plugs in it and they want to be able to play music from an iphone. The store was talking about being able to daisy chain the 2 speakers. Connect the audio to 1 speaker then feed with XLR cable to the other speaker.

I remember the home stereo systems - a left and right channel / 2 speakers, each with a home run to the receiver.

eqch of these ZLX speakers is mono, right? so do they only play 1 channel? or my son is saying he wants to get a cable / adapter that has 2 RCA males on 1 end and either 1/4 TRS or XLR on the other end. Effectively just merging the channels from each RCA connector?

Can you do that?! like taking the 2 center conductors, tieing them together and tying the grounds together. do you get a nerged signal of both channels? Is that OK for the mixer to 'short' the left and right channels together?

If you play something like this, would you hear both sides? Out of both speakers?


And similar thinking - when you plug an iphone with aux (3.5mm?) to 1/4 (or XLR) cable into the first speaker, is the speaker doing the merging of the 2 channels? or do you have to choose which channel to play?

any advice on how to do this without damaging anything and having it sound good, would be greatly appreciated
 
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What are they using for an amp? Connect the speakers to a stereo amp and use the mixer as a preamp if it has 2 channels. Those speakers are passive. They are not internally powered, so an amp is needed.
 
Needs 2 cables for stereo.

RCA to XLR or 1/4" TS plug. You can get a 1/8" TRS to RCA stereo cable from i to mixer. Then RCA to RCA cables to the amplifier. Then long speaker cables. Use an RCA to XLR or 1/4" adapter at the amp end if you have to. (This works with powered speakers too, just need long enough cables to reach the speakers directly. For crowded rooms XLR cables to the powered speakers with whatever adapter at the mixer end won't get unplugged when tripped on.)
 
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classic - sorry! The speakers are powered.

4343 - you say 'need 2 cables for stereo', let me step back - that's what I'm used to with old time stereo / 2 speakers. each speaker is 1 channel / fed by its own cable.

Lets say we only have 1 zlx powereed speaker - forget about daisy chain / a 2nd speaker.

if we take an iphone, use a stereo 'aux' cable and connect to the aux input to the back of speaker - we get both channels coming out of the 1 speaker. the speaker itself does the merge of left / right channel

I scrounged and found a 3.5mm to 1/4 TRS adapter. connected that to the speaker and still get both channels out of the speaker. Again, the speaker combines left and right.

The rca / TRS connectors are 'unbalanced'. XLR is 'balanced?'. does it carry left / right 'rather than' balanced'

Teal - I'm nervous now about anything combining /splitting audio coming out of iphone. don't want to break something.

So will this:

http://www.monoprice.com/product?c_id=115&cp_id=11509&cs_id=1150902&p_id=4775&seq=1&format=2

work to go into audio out of the pioneer DDJ-SB2 and with the pioneer set to mono, we'll get both channels with this? And use this:

http://www.monoprice.com/product?p_id=7147

to go to the iphone audio rather than the pioneer? (xlr to RCA male, rca female to aux). and we'd need to set the iphone to mono?
 
odd - that's my world : )

so the end result is that the source just has to be set to mono? Then can I use TR connectors if I have them rather than trs?
 
Easy way is connect the iPod to one speaker using a 1/8 aux cord to aux input and run a XLR cable from output to input on the other speaker. The speaker takes the stereo aux input and sums to mono.
 
For a Frat....

The new mixing board is good as a preamp for interjecting new technology into a system and for adjusting sound. But a Frat system is known for huge monster speakers that inspires its listeners. The fraternity with the most powerful amp and speakers rules the campus and always have because it's a once in a lifetime experience. JBL's, Polk Audio and Cerwin Vega are what memories are made of....
 
So now my son's talking to the guy that's a part time dj. the DJ is saying don't daisy chain the speakers. That'd be mono. Better to run a cable from source to each speaker so you have left / right.

Thoughts on that?

And then - thoughts on how to connect to the back of the speakers - the speakers can take the aux connection, XLR and 1/4" phono. Durability? reliability?

I'm thinking XLR to XLR then at the source have adapters XLR to RCA to go into mixer they already have, and 2 XLR to 3.5mm for iphone or 2xlr to 1/4" phono when they get a new mixer that has 1/4" connectors for output. But likely 2XLR to 3.5 mm will be several adapters, right? They don't make that adapter / cable sspecifically?

My son (who, like me, over thinks things too much) is worried that an adapter (or several in series) would degrade the signal. better to get XLR to RCA for now and get other cables as needed later?
 
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