zimdogg

Well after stumbling around trying to figure this out, this is all I can come up with: I was wrong on where the wires came out, instead of in my basement there are 3 separate cat5 cables that are wired through the walls and emerge in my media cabinet in my main living room. No extra speaker wires though, just the cat5 cable. After googleing a lot, this is what I can make of it... Since I already have my receiver located in the same media cabinet that the wires are pulled to, I would use the zone 2 output on my receiver to connect to a unit similar to this: https://www.crutchfield.com/p_543AH2/Russound-A-H2.html From there, I'd plug the cat 5 cable in, and install wall plates like this where I have blanks with speaker wire and cat5 cable behind them: https://www.crutchfield.com/p_543AK4/Russound-AK-4.html I'm assuming that I'd then use my receiver as my source, and use those AK4 units as volume control in each separate zone. I don't think I plan to invest in any of this at the moment, but should that change I'll update on how things go.

Yep its helpful. I think it'll make more sense when you see it. I highly doubt I can run new wires, they're probably snaked all through the walls and most likely were put in with other electrical when the house was built in 2007.

Kansas City Missouri.

I have a Monster surge protector available but don't have it hooked up. The rotel unit is just hooked up to a power strip with surge protection built into.

That's correct. I punched a hole in the exterior wall into my basement and ran it all down there with fresh wire.

I have a few. I have an older Pioneer Elite VSX-42 hooked up to my 5 channel setup in the living room (its independent of all this other funky stuff) I have a Yamaha TSR-7850 hooked up to RP280FA mains, RP450C center, and using whatever in-walls I have in the basement as surrounds at the moment. I have a Rotel RA985bx integrated amplifier I use to power the deck speakers (AW650's) as well as a pair of KG5.5's in my workout area that I A/B select depending where I'm listening. I wired the deck speakers directly to the Rotel unit and am not using any of the previous owners "stuff" for that. I don't even know where the speaker wires would be out on the deck that might already be pre-wired, they're not exposed. None of these are hooked up to anything that might power the Office/Master bedroom/"pre-wired" deck edit - Almost forgot, I also have a little old technics receiver powering a pair of KT-LCR's out in my garage.

This unit is what it seems like would go on the walls in place of my wall plates, then I'd need some sort of amplifier set up in the basement providing the audio source to each of the locations where these volume knobs would be. Obviously Pyle sucks, but this is what I'm thinking the idea behind the setup is like. https://www.amazon.com/Wall-Mount-Control-Knob-Wall/dp/B000V52CP0/ref=sr_1_9?crid=L4H2WBQ6VIJM&keywords=audio+over+ethernet+volume+knob&qid=1668192904&sprefix=audio+over+ethernet+volume+kno%2Caps%2C169&sr=8-9

I used this: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B084H6F869/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

I do have an attic but our home is a 1.5 story so there's bedrooms over about half of the main level and no really good access. I'll poke around a bit more when I get home and come back with pictures and better explanations. Seems like they wanted to have some sort of central control with individual room control for volume based on what I can tell. Then separate from that they had the living room wired for 5 channel surround, and basement wired for 5 channel surround. All 5 speakers are in the ceiling in the basement, and I have them hooked up. I have 2 speakers in the wall in our living room, and they're the surrounds. Then 2 more are wired really high up in the room and there's a center that's wired. I have access to all of these wires and have speakers hooked up to them. It's the deck, master bedroom, and office that seem to have some sort of independent control but I don't know where they'd get their music source from.

I pulled the grills off some of the speakers and couldn't tell what they were. I was hoping they were Klipsch (I have a lot of Klipsch speakers) but they don't appear to be. Honestly, they don't sound all that great and I don't plan to use the ones in the basement for anything other than maybe atmos and rear surrounds. What I'd like to do if the expense is manageable is to use the office/bedroom speakers mainly. It seems like these are set up to get power over ethernet, or at least use some sort of knob with an internal amplifier unless for some reason the speakers have amplifiers built in (which I don't think they do). There weren't any speakers on the deck but I've since added the Klipsch AW650's there and control them through a separate receiver that I wired into the basement. If I could control those with some sort of volume knob outdoors that would be great, but using my phone is fine too.

I moved into a home that has lots of speakers in the ceilings. Here's what I've discovered so far: Basement - 5 ceiling speakers, all 5 sets of speaker wires comes to an entertainment center where I can hook up to receiver. - no help needed here Living room - 5 channels that all lead to a cabinet for my receiver - no help needed here This is where I get confused: Office - 2 speakers in ceiling Master bedroom - 2 speakers in ceiling In these two rooms the speaker wires are behind an outlet style plate on the wall that also has cat5 cable as well. Near the back deck there's a blank wall plate that has 2 speaker wires and a cat 5 cable again. In a hallway I have a blank wall plate with something behind it that I've yet to identify In the basement I have a "central point" that has a bunch of cat5 cable coming to it. Now I'm assuming the basement is where the central brain of some sort would be, but I have no equipment down there, and then that feeds my audio signal to these blank wall plates in different parts of my house where they might have separate volume control equipment attached to them which would also attach to speaker wires. Never really done anything like this. When we bought the house I assumed the master bedroom and office speaker wires were piped into our main living room area where the 5 channel surround wires pipe into, but that's not the case. There's also lots of coax cable that isn't for television cable/satellite in place. For example, there's a coax cable run from my receiver cabinet in my main living room to another cabinet. I'm assuming they used this to hook up a subwoofer and used the coax cable with RCA's screwed onto it to carry the signal. I don't really know. I realize pictures are worth a thousand words and I don't have any available at the moment, but can get more based on any specific criteria needed if it's helpful. Any thoughts?

They're the 5.5's. Technically KM6's.

Just a note, they're probably not going to be real warm after 2 hours of play time. Gotta break those bad boys in first.

I had a pair of KG4's that I stupidly sold (before I knew how great a vintage Klipsch speaker is) that I powered with a Rotel RA-985BX Integrated Amp. They sounded incredible. Now, 2 years later I found a pair of KG5.5's that I power with that same amp and those also sound amazing. I love the KG line from Klipsch, and prefer them when listening to 2 channel audio compared to my RP-280FAs. Glad you found a good fit.

I have those same towers for my front LR channels, but don't have the Atmos capabilities in my receiver yet. Curious as to what you decided on for your AVR?

I ended up picking up an RP450C. Seemed to be the most natural fit with the RP280FA's. Looking forward to it arriving on Friday.

I have a Rotel RA-985BX that I enjoy. Maybe someone here can tell me whether or not the volume control on that integrated amp is bypassed if I remove jumpers on the rear, and send the front pre-amp line out's from my Pioneer Elite VSX-42 to the Rotel unit? I'd like to use the Rotel for my front mains, and 2 channel stereo when I want (it sounds better than the pioneer) but not sure if this config works or not. My goals is to control volume and inputs on the Pioneer unit, but have my Rotel Integrated amp be the power source for the Front L&R channels. Thoughts?

So I recently upgraded my mains from an older pair of jbl e90s to the klipsch rp280fa in an effort to hopefully not need to replace them for many many years, and in doing so my center channel is just not going to cut it. The current center channel is just the same series jbl speaker as the front, and I'm having to adjust the levels so much to hear dialogue compared to what I get out of the mains. I'm running a 5.1 system now using the rp280fa mains, r15m bookshelves as surrounds, a ksw12 sub, on a pioneer elite vsx42. I plan to upgrade to an atmos and 4k level receiver soon, but haven't gotten there yet. Any suggestions on a good option for center channel that will mesh well with my mains? On another note, I have an older rotel ra985bx integrated amplifier, and would love to be able to use those two channels to my mains while using the pionneer elite to process the surround portion of movies. I also listen to lots of 2 channel music and like to A/B listen to the rp280s, and also listen to my older KG 5.5s. Is it possible to only use the rotel as an amp on the front 2 channels, and essentially bypass the volume control on the rotel unit and instead control everything from the pioneer. The rotel just puts out great clean power and is true to the power rating. Both sets of speakers sound much better when powered by the rotel. Thanks all for any help and suggestions! Mike

I think it would have worked if my wife had some smaller sized cups, but I guess she was blessed that way and I cant get a seal around the cap. Like I said, great wife. Hahaha

I tried that, my wifes breast pump, tape, and still no success. Those dust caps are really rigid.

Definitely a good wife. The new ones came a little early too. The 5.5's are big, and the 280s are even bigger.

Thanks John, been enjoying them a lot the last few days. Now if only Spotify would support lossless audio.

Ah, forgot to mention that the previous owner also replaced the tweeters with the Bob Crites Titanium tweeters, so already had that mod!

Hi All, thought I'd say hello since I recently just joined these forums. The help and opinions of many others from the past really helped me in a recent purchase decision of a pair of KG5.5 (Technically KM-6's), and sure do wish I found this community earlier. I had always known that Klipsch retained a good reputation in the business, but never actually listened to anything myself. 6 years or so ago, I came across a pair of KG-4's on craigslist that I purchased, and it changed my listening life for good. I stupidly sold those after I purchased a JBL home theater system, and immediately realized my mistake. In an attempt to hear the sound I loved again I bought some R-15 bookshelves, but they just weren't what I was used to, so the search for another older model began. Fast forward to last weekend, and I now have a pair of the KM-6's ready to put in my living room. They're overall in great shape, I'd call it 9/10. The main problem with them is one dented dust shield, but no matter, as I plan to keep the grills on in the living room anyway so my wife doesn't get mad at me for taking over the room with these big boys. My intention is to hook them up to my Rotel ra985bx, so hope they sound good on that amp. That's what I ran the KG-4's on, and it sounded excellent. At any rate, I'm excited to have some old school horns again. I'm also excited for Christmas, as my wife is getting me a pair of the RP-280FA's to start replacing that JBL system I found at a garage sale. Fun times!!