Simple speaker advice needed

[DaveMH]

My friends have a brand new SONY flat screen with all the bells and whistles and they watch TV/listen to the radio via their Humax satellite box. This all works very well with no problems however, the audience have some problems of their own.

They are an elderly couple one with poor eyesight/good ears and the other with poor hearing and good sight, so one sits near to see and the other sits at a 'normal' distance. The problem is they cannot get the sound right, it is too loud for the person close to the TV when it is ok for the person at distance, their previous system had a 5.1 system plugged into the TV but this new one does not have a myriad of phono connectors like the last did.

They do NOT want to spend hundreds on a home theatre system (more complication) and in fact a couple of speakers on cables to the rear of the room would be fine, I tried this but when in use the TV main speaker cuts out as you are using the headphone socket! Any ideas please, around 100 GB pound is ok to spend.

Dave

 

[makkem]

Hi
probably the cheapest method would be a Y cable and two sets of speakers one set at the rear and one set at the front each pair powered (like cheap PC speakers) and with their own volume control .

 

[DaveMH]

Hi and thanks for your reply.

This does sound like the ideal solution, when you say 'Y' cable are you talking about a single 3.5 jack with a Y to what, two 3.5 jacks?

I did try plugging in a couple of PC speakers, they were a cheap pair with USB power supply and individual tone/volume controls and they worked fine but of course the TV sound was disabled, so no sound at the front of the room.

So the headphone socket could power 4 speakers?

Many thanks

Dave

 

[makkem]

Yes you would need a splitter or Y cable that is one 3,5mm stereo jack to two 3.5mm stereo jacks.
Yes it will disable the sound from the TV which is why I suggested two sets of speakers with one set at the front to replace the sound from your Tv,the advantage of this setup is that each pair of speakers will have its own volume control for each person to adjust while the overall volume would be adjusted with the TV remote.
Im sure that you would be easily able to pickkup two sets of computer speakers for less than £100
Yes your headphone socket will easily drive four speakers as it is only outputting a very low level to the speaker amplifiers and is not attempting to drive the speakers directly.

 

[DaveMH]

Hi sorry for the delay, something I did not set up right to get notifications.

I will give it a shot.

Many thanks

Dave