Thread: RCA Cables How To

Originally Posted by owenjh

Hey, I need a decent RCA cable to get from the front of my car to the back, will it make a difference what kind I use? Or will the wiring kit for cars from walmart be good? Guy at radio shack said I would need to amplify the signal if it was going a long distance, is this true??

Get some decent RCA cables. Just don't get cheap-*** thin wire ones. The ones sold at Radioshack will be fine. I doubt you are going the length needed to amplify the signal.

As a side note; It is rare to find a Radioshack employee with correct knowledge.

Originally Posted by ODYSSEY

Get some decent RCA cables. Just don't get cheap-*** thin wire ones. The ones sold at Radioshack will be fine. I doubt you are going the length needed to amplify the signal.

As a side note; It is rare to find a Radioshack employee with correct knowledge.

I USED to work for RadioSmack, and I at least knew what time it was out on the street. The problem I had was people coming in wanting adapters to plug their washing machine into their televisions and other various stupid nonsense. They would insist it was possible and would ask through the store until someone caved and sold them some stupid arbitrary thing that made them happy enough to leave.
As an electronics junkie, if you require good sound, get some good heavy shielded cables, preferably with gold connectors. That will keep your audio as pure and interference-free as possible. Don't bother with Monster cables though. Although quite good, they are overpriced for all the weird "features" they are purported to have. "Oxygen-free" my eye!

If you're going to run RCAs (or install any new car audio stuff) take a read of this:

http://www.epanorama.net/documents/g...oop/index.html

It's an intro page to ground loops.. You'll run into them sometime

Yea, I know about cables i have a $30 set of monstor cables for my CD player, I just don't know where to find long ones, I need to run quite a length from the trunk to the glove box. I would like to conceal them which means I would probably need about 15ft, I was thinking why not make it 20ft to have some slack which is always good when I was running network cables. What do you guys think? I want a decent sound but am not paying over $20 for cables maybe i could order online??

http://www.bonuscable.com/default.php?cPath=466
Found a decent amount of cables that radio shack doesn't have. I guess I will use a piece of string and work out the exact amount I need, thanks for your help guys. I figured I didn't need to amplify the signal for that amount of wire but its better to ask the people who actually know. Thanks again

cat 5 works well. get yourself a length of cat 5 network cable and some rca terminals from radio shack, strip the ends of the cat 5 and for now keep the twisted pairs together, one at time untwist a pair, you'll need maybe 2 inches of seperated wire. now really carefully strip about 1/2" off of each single wire from the pair. now all you have to do is use one for your + connection on the rca and the other as your -. crimp of solder the wires to your rcas and you're ready to roll. just match em up on the other end of the cable, thats why its important not to untwist more than one pair at a time. I used cat 6 and all of the light colors in each pair were identical. so basicly i had 4 white wires and 4 dark ones. just kep em in thier respective pairs and you wont have a problem

so with one network cable you can have 2 pair of rcas in one nice little shielded cable
i iwred my amps and head unit this way and I have no problems with noise or anything, works great and cost me all of $6 for the rca terminals.

Originally Posted by JaxPt

cat 5 works well. get yourself a length of cat 5 network cable and some rca terminals from radio shack, strip the ends of the cat 5 and for now keep the twisted pairs together, one at time untwist a pair, you'll need maybe 2 inches of seperated wire. now really carefully strip about 1/2" off of each single wire from the pair. now all you have to do is use one for your + connection on the rca and the other as your -. crimp of solder the wires to your rcas and you're ready to roll. just match em up on the other end of the cable, thats why its important not to untwist more than one pair at a time. I used cat 6 and all of the light colors in each pair were identical. so basicly i had 4 white wires and 4 dark ones. just kep em in thier respective pairs and you wont have a problem

so with one network cable you can have 2 pair of rcas in one nice little shielded cable
i iwred my amps and head unit this way and I have no problems with noise or anything, works great and cost me all of $6 for the rca terminals.

AAAAAAAHHHHHH!!!!! I don't know what else to say!

Just a light-hearted warning:

Please be aware that Cat 5 is not shielded and designed for running balanced lines.
Line level audio (eg. RCA) needs to be shielded and is *not* a balanced line.

There are specific devices (eg DI Boxes) which convert an unbalanced line into a balanced line. These are used in professional audio where noise is going to be a problem (long cable runs, noisy environment, etc).

You are likely run into problems with crosstalk and noise using Cat 5, but YMMV.... (as JaxPT said his is fine..)

Also be aware that there are a lot of Car Audio BS products floating around that advertise "Balanced line technologies!!" which are developed by people who have nfi of what they're doing.. please don't fall victim to them.

I've heard you can wire speakers with cat5 too, but I have never tried.

http://www.venhaus1.com/diycatfivecables.html