Fitting Hi-Fi speakers into a 5.1 creative surround ?

[Katatton]

Hi there, new to the forums and will be the first one to tell you I'm an audio newbie,

so bare with me !

 

I have a standard Creative 5.1 surround sound system for my PC

( http://img508.imageshack.us/img508/1731/inspirep580car9.jpg )

They are great for gaming, but I find they are no good for making music,

headphones are good but I just dont like using them.

 

And recently acquired a pair of Philips Hi Fi speakers and was wondering how I

could use them with my PC ..

Is it possible to replace the front left and right (5.1 speakers) with the Hi Fi speakers, or mount the speakers on to a headphone jack ?

 

I've done a bit of reading and most suggest an amplifier but at the moment thats a tad expensive for me, and advice, info or suggestions welcome.

 

Thanks for reading!

[souptin]

No to using the headphone jack to drive your new speakers. You could try it if you like but I would confidently bet that it would be powerful enough to give you decent volume.

 

Replacing the front left and right creative speakers sounds like a better idea - but again you would need to find out if the amplifier(s) for the creatives is inside each speaker (in which case you will again not get decent volume).

[Katatton]

Hmm, I mean in theory its no harm to test if I cut and use choc blocks to test the Hi Fi's through the old creatives then I can just re connect if fail ?

 

Thanks for the input!

[souptin]

Yeah, exactly. As long as you don't mind cutting a few interconnects I don't see why not. Good luck!

 

ps - I see a mistake in my post above: I should have said that I don't think the headphone output will give enough volume when used to directly drive your speakers.

[Katatton]

Yeah I gathered you meant 'would not' )

 

I'll give it a go tomorrow, and update if it works or not,

 

many thanks!

[spdif-usb]

Exactly which Philips HiFi speakers are they?

[Katatton]

The only info on the back is Philips FB 768 PH, I have 2 speakers left and right and one center speaker.

[Katatton]

http://img6.imageshack.us/img6/2368/p1010312ry.jpg

[spdif-usb]

They are from an old Philips FW768P or FW798W mini system. They are rated at 6 Ohms speaker impedance, and the power amp used to drive them is rated at 40 Watts RMS (80 Watts MPO) per speaker. (Frequency response is specified as 40 Hz - 20 kHz, +/- 3 dB.) Undoubtedly, you will be needing a small power amp for them. Like for example, this one.

[phofman]

IIUC, your 5.1 set has a 6-channel amp in the subwoofer box and speakers are hooked to the box via regular speaker wire, not signal level. Just cut the wires, hook your Philips speakers instead and give it a try.

 

It is possible the 5.1 set has a high-pass filter for the front channels to relieve the small satellites from LF played by the subwoofer which would require a bit different setup.

[Katatton]

Well, as you guys suggested I just snipped the cables, hooked the Hi Fi's to the old creative speaker jacks and bang, works beautifully! Might need to tweak a few things like bass management and audio positioning but so far its been great!

 

Thanks for the input