How do I connect my subwoofer to my A/V receiver?

Question

My home is prewired for a subwoofer with four bare wire leads on each end. My subwoofer has push terminals to accomodate the four wires (and numerous other inputs), but my A/V receiver just has a powered subwoofer jack (fem RCA?).

Can I adapt my speaker wire to an RCA male connector and plug that into the subwoofer port?

I went to radio shack, but the salesman was told me that the adapters he had did not have the correct ground. (?)

There has got to be any easy fix for this.

I would rather not rewire.

Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

'Can I adapt my speaker wire to an RCA male connector and plug that into the subwoofer port?'

Yes - Radio Shack has the correct plugs in either male or female -

For the wires in your walls, you'll need to use male RCA's -

I make em' up all the time, and they work fine -

You'll need to be able to solder though - one wire goes to the pin (or socket on female), and the other wire goes to the outer contact, the ground -

Answer 2

You need a subwoofer amplifier or something like that. The "RCA" connector of your av reciever can only connect to a powered sub (effectively a sub with built-in amplifier) or a seperate amplifier for your sub.