Restore Your Old Home Theater

Hi guys! In this instructable i'm gonna share you how to reuse your old subwoofer or home theater system that may have stopped working or is kept idle! I'm having a 2.1 channel sound system which was not responding to any input devices or signals, so i thought to use it simultaneously with my new sound system directly. So here it goes... :)

Generally there are no such special materials to be used here. Just some basic tools like screwdriver set, pliers, insulating tapes and needles will work!

It usually depends on how your system is designed, some may have only back cover and others may have covers on both sides. I had both sided covers. I firstly unscrewed and opened the back cover which had power transformer, amplifier circuit and a woofer which is denoted as .1 channel in the system specification.
I then opened its front panel which had no screws, infact sealed. Damn daunting task to remove the panel without damaging it!! :( It had digital volume buttons, Equalizer controls, a seven segment display, USB port, IR remote control module and processor chip; means all the digital circuitry resided on the front panel.

In my case, i had a damaged digital circuitry and worse, the subwoofer would'nt work without the digital circuit. So i had to bypass the stereo signal cable directly from input sockets to the amplifier circuit!
So firstly i had to locate the stereo cables which would run through signal input to front panel and then from front panel to amplifier circuit. Its really easy, because in most cases this signal cable is 3-cored i.e, one white wire for left channel, one red wire for right channel and a common wire which is actually grounded and also shields the channel wires inside the case. You can see in the image that there are 2 such signal cables attached to a single set of female headers. It means 1st 3 wires are for output to the front panel and the remaining 3 are for controlled inputs from the front panel. You'll simply have to bypass these input and output pins using female headers which is elaborated in later steps..!

I would advise you to salvage the unusable components from it which you can use in later projects. So just disconnect the wire headers from both side i.e, from the front panel circuit and from the amplifier too. Hold the female header set from both sides and pull simultaneously. If its too stiff or tight, you can use pliers too. See, there are more things to salvage from it such as header wires connected in the circuit itself and in my case a single seven segment display too, which i'll be using later in my display and indicator projects! ;)

Now, we'll have to make 3 bypass wires to pass the input signals directly to power amplifier input. Follow the images!
Firstly, remove the female header pin with wires attached to it from the header wires you salvaged just now. Use a straightened paper clip or any other thin stiff wire. Fat needles may work but be careful, after all they're needles!! Now press the locking pin of the female header pin using the needle and pull it out from the header set as shown in the image. Now strip two those wires, join them and insulate it using tape. And follow these instructions for making two more wires identical to them and move on to next step!

You'll see that there are total 6 wire set of headers in the amplifier side. They are actually 3 wires outgoing to digital control circuit and other 3 wires incoming to the power amplifier circuit. Just bypass the 1st red wire male pin to another red wire male pin, then do the same for white wire and the common i.e, ground wire and you're finished. Now close the covers of the system and enjoy the music! :)
Guys, plz ask if you find anything confusing coz i don't think i'm perfect and can make you understand easily!

Soon uploading an instructable to make a patch cable for connecting two different amplifier or subwoofer system through one audio signal source!