Surround sound - have I got it?

[MantaMike]

I have recently moved house and the new place has a lot of home entertainment systems wired in, unfortunately I have no idea how any of it works or how to connect it. Apologies if theses are stupid questions, but I have no experience in home entertainment.

In my lounge there is a small speaker in each corner of the room, I am assuming this is for surround sound TV. I also have the below connectors mounted on the wall behind the TV.



Can anyone identify what these connectors are, if they are for surround sound, is it just a case of making a connection to an output on the TV? If so what output do they connect to and what cables are required?

The TV is a five year old Sony Bravia

Or do I need any other pieces of equipment?

I'd be grateful for any help!

[MantaMike]

varsas said:

The connectors labelled 'B1' and 'B2' are RJ45 connectors, most commonly used to run data networking around the house. There is almost certainly a central patch panel they all (all the ones in the house) terminate to. You certainly could use this cabling to run speakers if you want to, but I doubt that's why they were put in. There are other, far more interesting, things you can do with them. Like build a DLNA network.

The other terminals look like straight Coax to me, so I assume they are arial/satellite hookups. I'm not 100%

For surround sound you'll need a surround sound processor, as well as speakers. Your TV does not have one, so you'd need something external, like an AV amp, like this:

http://www.richersounds.com/product/av-receivers/s...

you'd connect DVD/blu ray player to the amp via HDMI, then the amp to the TV, also via HDMI. You have the amp deal with the sound and the TV for picture only.

Thanks for that, I suppose it was a bit naïve to think I could plug some wires in and away we go!

interesting comment about a central patch panel, I have this lot in the loft which scares the hell out of me!







There are speakers in the ceiling of every room and the speaker wires appear to go through this junction, then re-appear in the corner of the lounge. it seems a shame to have all this infrastructure and not use it, but I'm thinking I need a professional to sort it all out!