setting up speakers to arcade

[trendyscotsman12]

hi
 I am wanting to wire up two 6x9 car speakers to my arcade machine.What would be the best way of wiring them to the pc with a amp ?. Or is useing 6x9 Just to far lol

[bkenobi]

The PC obviously can't push 6x9 speakers on it's own, so you will definitely need an amp.  You can either go the correct way or the cheap way. 

One option is to buy some PC speakers and gut them for the built in amp.  The problem is in impedance matching.  Most PC speakers are 4 ohm where good speakers are going to be 8 ohm.  You will eventually destroy the amp if you do this, but it will probably be quite a while.  The sound quality is OK depending on what you are listening to.  I have 2 4" Atari speakers pushed by a 2.1 system (including the sub for the system).  It sounds really good, but I only use it for MAME.

The other option is a car amp or a lower cost T-amp.  The car amp is going to cost ~$100USD whereas the T-amp should be closer to $30USD.  Either would work.

The choice really comes down to what you will be listening to though.  If it's just for MAME, you can get away with the PC speaker amp and you should be ok (those are much larger magnets on your 6x9 than most people use, but it should still work).  If you are going to do music/jukebox as well, I'd probably go for a dedicated amplifier.

[trendyscotsman12]

thanks

I have a car amp to use, is there any thing on the net etc that will help show how to set this up.I can wire up all the car sound system but am not to sure how to do it with pc sound card

[FrizzleFried]

See this thread: http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=95513.0

[mvsfan]

Dude, get a conversion cable at Radio shack. It will have one 3.5 MM stereo plug on one end, and two male Rca plugs on the other.

that will solve your sound card to amplifier woes with a plug in.

normally i dont like radio shack cables cause they tend to be real thin, but they will work fine for a source such as a sound card.

[trendyscotsman12]

mmm the conversion device sounds perfect,thanks for the help

[bradx]

nah, 6x9s arent too much at all!  i have a pair in my cab powered by an old radio shack amp and am considering throwing a 12" sub in there as well! 

[Finchbyrd]

I'm scared to use any type of sub, pc or not. I'm afraid it'll rattle the internals of the arcade apart over time. I was going to use a "broken" cabinet for mame, but ended up fixing it with very little effort, so I'm working on setting it up the way I intended, but now everything I do has to be reversable, so no external controls or holes for this cabinet! I am wiring up and putting the pc power and reset buttons behind the coin return doors. I'm very curious to see what I should do with the cab speakers. I'll probably buy some car speakers, not 6x9, but 5" or whatever and wire them to an amp from ebay. I can just unscrew the cab speakers and leave them somewhere inside the cabinet to sit until I want to put it back to factory specs, I'll have to get in there later today and see what's possible, but I'm interested in seeing what others have done without wrecking the interior.

[Finchbyrd]

I took my arcade speakers out to replace them, I had bought some 6 1/2" Sony's to install in it, but realized I kind of want to keep my mounting holes the same. Now that I have the speakers out, I see that they're 4 1/2" size, and 8ohms a piece, which is a strange size to begin with. Is there a place I can buy replacements to use? I don't want to blow the originals with the amp I bought to power the 6 1/2". I found one site, but it has one set http://www.mcmelectronics.com/product/PIONEER-A11EC80-02F-/51-075

[Avinitlarge]

Ive got a Logitech Z-340 setup. They sound really good. The bass is a bit OTT though. Im going to gut the satellite speakers and mount them under the marquee. They only cost £10.50 off of E-Blag.