Speakers and Subwoofer from computer (repair)

[MuleShack]

I have an older pair of harmon Karden speakers from a PC that I bought from Dell a bunch of years ago.

It is a nice 4 speaker set that has proprietary plugs that go into the back of the subwoofer/bass station. It worked good until recently and then its like the booster lost its power. You can turn the volume all the way up on the computer and on the speakers and all you get is a very light sound barely audible.

It has to be something inside of the base station/sub. If it was as simple as a fuse, there wouldn't be any sound at all coming out not?

Anybody have any ideas if this could be a simple repair?

if I can get them working, I was going to put it out in the garage plugged into a small boom box or Ipod. Shame to throw away good speakers.

I suppose i could strip the ends off the speaker plugs and try to set something else up but it would be nice to get the subwoofer going too.

I may dig into it Tuesday and see what is inside.

[Whoaru99]

Didn't inadvertently mute the output somewhere in the chain?

[MuleShack]

There is a volume dial on the sub and a volume dial on one of the speakers.

Both were turned all the way up, along with the PC volume control.

The fuse looks to be in good shape.

I pulled the system out and set up on the floor. All 4 speakers and the sub are playing very lightly. When I plug in my ear phones to the same input jack, the volume is outrageous. Has to be something messed up inside sub.

All volumes are all the way up on the computer and not muted.

[Surface Tension]

You do have the power cord plugged in, right.

Next would be the speaker connections to the sub.

Then I'd suspect the amp inside the sub.

[MuleShack]

Found the problem.

Must be broken or cracked wires right at the point where the speaker wire goes into the plastic connector. It is the main speaker wire from the speaker with the volume control attached. I wiggle it and it plays loud, then take my hand off and then nothing.

It probably isn't good, because this connector resembles an S Video on the inside where the other 3 are just the single pin. So trying to fix the wires doesn't seem possible. I suppose I could hard wire them to the inside of the sub for just that one speaker.

[MuleShack]

The connection on the sub side is wired directly onto a circuit board...so unless I can find a connector similiar to the one thats on here and rewire it, i'm SOL.

[MuleShack]

I guess all is good now. I found a speaker/wire combination on E bay for $7 so should be back in business.

It was an Altec Lansing ADA 745 system.