Some Speakers Not Found When Connecting Receiver

[bethany.silva]

We bought a house with 2 sets of speaker wires come up from the floor in the family room with a hub down in the basement that the previous owner told us brings the outdoor speakers and rear family room speakers in. We hook everything up with an Onkyo 7.1 receiver and connect a passive soundbar, one set from the floor to one rear and one to zone 2.. The soundbar is seen by the receiver during calibration but not the rears or the outside. The strange this is that the existing wires only had 2 sets of positive and negative wires for 2 sets of speakers? How would that work? Don't each set need a Left & Right? Any help is greatly appreciated on how to troubleshoot and get all speakers working.

 

[jsmithepa]

Well the owner may have tie 2 sets of speakers into one, making the assumption you wanto play both sets of speakers always.

U need to call geeky cousin Vinnie to come over and figure what's what. Exceedingly difficult to remotely try to figure these things out with simple forum postings. Somethings need to be SEEN, and run a few tests with say an ohmmeter.

 

[americanaudiophile]

Each pair of speakers would need two separate positive conductors (left and right). You can get a way with one minus or ground conductor for a pair of speakers if needed but it's not common practice.
You can check the wires by using a AA or AAA battery. Connect the minus terminal to one conductor and tap the other one to the positive battery terminal. This will make the woofer move in and out so someone standing nearby will hear that sound. If you don't hear a sound then there may be a bad speaker cable or a bad speaker.