Stereo Update: Still a Work in Progress
After spending the last couple nights out because Youngest Sister and Youngest First Cousin have been in town (they both left this morning), I declared today a "do whatever" day. I didn't get out of bed (officially) until almost 9:30 and spent the rest of the morning drinking coffee and reading a book for the fun of it--meaning it wasn't for school or book club. O.K., it's probably chick lit, but there's nothing wrong with that.
It has been on my list to get the speakers hooked up to the receiver, a step which hopefully would be the last thing to get the music back on in my home. Music I actually can hear even if I'm not in the same room and actually sounds good.
The thing was, I was a little afraid of messing up the wiring or damaging. . . I don't know, something. And the whole thing with the laptop has been another thing to shake my confidence a bit. But after dinner I just decided to give it a try and just follow the instructions that the tech support guy gave me.
However, the cutting part was difficult, and the stripping part didn't really work, so after a good half hour of frustration, I called Mom and I asked if I was doing something wrong. I mean, I have stripped wires before, but it was a long time ago for a school project. So she encouraged me not to quit and just go down to the home improvement store (actually she said pick one, because there are two within practically the same driving distance of here) to see if someone had any suggestions.
So off I went with my paper bag that held one of the speaker wires and the wire cutters that allegedly also could strip wire. Once I got to the store, I headed to the electrical department, and when I walked by the one aisle where the tools are, there was an employee advising two men about installing an outdoor-type outlet. He sounded as if he really knew his stuff, so I waited quietly. After a few minutes, he noticed me and excused himself from the men to give them a chance to discuss their options. I explained the situation and showed him what I was dealing with. Basically he said the cutters I had were not going to get the job done. He had a wire stripper in his set of tools, and demonstrated exactly what I had been trying to accomplish. So I bought the same model, and $8 (plus tax) and by about 9:00 p.m., I had speakers connected.
I plugged everything into the surge protector and flipped it on. Powered everything up and tried out the CD player.
No sound.
I tried the cassette deck.
No sound from that, either.
O.K., let's try the tuner. Oh, and what's this "Speaker A" button? Maybe I'll push that, too.
Well, I've got static, so that's something. I think I was supposed to connect an antenna. Oops.
I did manage to coax sound out of the cassette deck, but it was in one speaker only.
Finally, I dug out my iPod and plugged that into the dock. I chose the playlist I made for the last time I took the train down to see Younger Sister. The first song is "Wanna Feel New" by Wanderlust, a band no longer in existence today but one I have seen play live, back in the '90s when I started going to concerts with my late friend J. There's also some weird family connection to one of the band members that I didn't know about until after I'd seen them and mentioned the concert to my parents.
The opening chords poured out of both speakers.
Success!
And the perfect song, too, because I had planned that the first song played in its entirety be one that had some connection to J.
So, while I still will have to place a call to tech support to figure out what happened with the other components, at the very least I've got some awesome sounds going from the limited library of the iPod.
And it sounds wonderful.
It has been on my list to get the speakers hooked up to the receiver, a step which hopefully would be the last thing to get the music back on in my home. Music I actually can hear even if I'm not in the same room and actually sounds good.
The thing was, I was a little afraid of messing up the wiring or damaging. . . I don't know, something. And the whole thing with the laptop has been another thing to shake my confidence a bit. But after dinner I just decided to give it a try and just follow the instructions that the tech support guy gave me.
However, the cutting part was difficult, and the stripping part didn't really work, so after a good half hour of frustration, I called Mom and I asked if I was doing something wrong. I mean, I have stripped wires before, but it was a long time ago for a school project. So she encouraged me not to quit and just go down to the home improvement store (actually she said pick one, because there are two within practically the same driving distance of here) to see if someone had any suggestions.
So off I went with my paper bag that held one of the speaker wires and the wire cutters that allegedly also could strip wire. Once I got to the store, I headed to the electrical department, and when I walked by the one aisle where the tools are, there was an employee advising two men about installing an outdoor-type outlet. He sounded as if he really knew his stuff, so I waited quietly. After a few minutes, he noticed me and excused himself from the men to give them a chance to discuss their options. I explained the situation and showed him what I was dealing with. Basically he said the cutters I had were not going to get the job done. He had a wire stripper in his set of tools, and demonstrated exactly what I had been trying to accomplish. So I bought the same model, and $8 (plus tax) and by about 9:00 p.m., I had speakers connected.
I plugged everything into the surge protector and flipped it on. Powered everything up and tried out the CD player.
No sound.
I tried the cassette deck.
No sound from that, either.
O.K., let's try the tuner. Oh, and what's this "Speaker A" button? Maybe I'll push that, too.
Well, I've got static, so that's something. I think I was supposed to connect an antenna. Oops.
I did manage to coax sound out of the cassette deck, but it was in one speaker only.
Finally, I dug out my iPod and plugged that into the dock. I chose the playlist I made for the last time I took the train down to see Younger Sister. The first song is "Wanna Feel New" by Wanderlust, a band no longer in existence today but one I have seen play live, back in the '90s when I started going to concerts with my late friend J. There's also some weird family connection to one of the band members that I didn't know about until after I'd seen them and mentioned the concert to my parents.
The opening chords poured out of both speakers.
Success!
And the perfect song, too, because I had planned that the first song played in its entirety be one that had some connection to J.
So, while I still will have to place a call to tech support to figure out what happened with the other components, at the very least I've got some awesome sounds going from the limited library of the iPod.
And it sounds wonderful.
Comments
And certainly there is nothing wrong with chick lit. That sounds good; I just added it to my library list.
Little Lady Agency was a pretty good read. Didn't quite get the American dialogue right, but it was passable and all the characters were fun. I have the sequel on request at the library, even though the premise seems a bit silly!