buzz in home speakers

[duckloads]

About a year ago, my stereo speakers developed a buzz or hum after a thunderstorm. I have a Yamaha A/V reciever, Phillips DVD, HD cable box, and Klipsch speakers. I can disconnect everything from the reciever (except speakers) and still get the noise. the noise is not coming from the cable for the TV or the DVD player. I can disconnect the speakers in turn and the noise cuts out on that particular speaker. I have two Klipsch subwoofers, but I can't hear the buzz out of them.

My house was built in 1959, so the electrical system grounding was through the galvanized water pipes. Last Saturday, I drove an 8', copper clad ground rod into the ground and connected it to my breaker box via 4ga solid copper wire. I'm going to re-plumb my house someday, so this needed to be done anyway.

This new ground gave no relief to the buzz. I have enough noises in my head to have to listen to the buzz from my home entertainment.

Any help would be appreciated.

 

[elcruisr]

Any chance it's an induction issue and not a grounding issue?

 

[duckloads]

Any chance it's an induction issue and not a grounding issue?

Induction issue? I really don't know what that means.

 

[JcMack]

Any chance it's an induction issue and not a grounding issue?

Means: Outside electrical source induces (bleeds into) your speaker wire. A.C. is by description alternating current, a sine wave looking thing at 60 cycles which is similar to music output signal going to speakers. Any electrical cords near your speaker wires? That's where I was going. Can you try shielded wire to the speakers and ground the shield to the receiver only? Does the receiver have a ground lug on the a.c. plug or just two prongs? What is resistance reading between ground and neutral where receiver is plugged in?

 

[canoesota]

I agree with JcMack. Never run speaker wires in the same holes as AC wiring. You must be at least a stud away, including wall mounted volume controls. Also do you have any fluorescent lighting in the house?

 

[rcnixon]

1. How does the unit sound through headphones? If it crackles, it may be a bad amp.
2. Do you have another set of speakers to test with? If it crackles, it may be a bad amp.
3. Do you have another receiver to test the speakers with? If it crackles, it may be a bad speaker.
4. Can you run temporary speaker wires as a test?

Number 1 will test the amp output.
Number 2 will test the amp output in case the headphoses are driven from a separate amp.
Number 3 will test the speakers themselves.
Number 4 will test the wiring that may be in the walls and subject to inductive problems.

Russ

 

[Joni_Lynn]

A few years ago I had that issue, I got it fixed but don't remember the problem, only that it was in the pre amp/amp.
My speakers have a very soft hum all the time but that's the transformers on each of them, I use electrostatic speakers now. The old stereo is long gone, sorry I can't remember the problem it had. I was something minor like a capacitor or something.
Good luck.

 

[mwtdvm]

Speaker Hum

The little units on my desk hum and it's because of the snake pit of A/C wires running around them. I tolerate it because when they are playing , I don't hear it, and it is too much hassle to try and reroute all the other wires. Good luck!

 

[AreB]

Shielding from induction noise is much more of a problem with signal-level cables (component-to-receiver) than speaker cables. Since the noise is present in both speakers independent of source-and followed an electrical event- that pretty much isolates things to the reciever, not connections. Joni Lynn is on target and has very good taste in speakers. My electrostatics drowned several years back (a long and sad story) and I miss them terribly.

 

[duckloads]

Thanks all for the education. I tried headphones. All I can hear is the ringing in my own ears with the headphones on. I can disconnect / unplug every other component (except the reciever and speakers) and the buzz is still present in all 5 speakers. Again, I can't hear anything out of either sub.

I use the compact flouescents (sp?) lights and I turned all those off buzz still there.
the oly thing that helps is time. When I turn the reciever on at night or first thing in the morning, the buzz is the loudest. Give it 2-3 hours and the buzz is noticably quieter.

The Yamaha is a really good reciever that I bought just for the Klipsch speakers. I guess I'll need to find somebody to look at it. I certainly can't replace it right now.

Thanks again.

 

[Landpimp]

I had the same happen to my old Denon, we had a power outage/surge or something and as it turns out it blew the nutral off the main power box....and it fried the Dennon, lived with the hum for a year, got a new Marantz

 

[Landpimp]

oh BTW, I LOVE my old Klipsch Forte's, have a dedicated vintage Carver set up just for music, seprate set up for the HT stuff.

oh yes,my house was also built in the 50's, the nutral had been rusting away for years, then it just finaly went, so check it out

 

[41]

You probably have a bad capacitor on the power supply feeding your unit. This allows any AC to get into the audio amp. Get a capacitor of the proper voltage and connect it across the power supply output. If that fails, try other areas on the PC board. Remember this is low frequency so you need a large capacitor like several microfarads.

You also may have a bad or marginal ground in the unit. This is common when hooking other units to your system. But you have already shown the problem is not there by disconnecting them.

Capacitors are the number one failing component in any electrical equipment.

 

[duckloads]

I just turned on my system for the first time today. The buzz was noticably louder as it always is when the system is first turned on. I plugged in the headphones. The buzz noise stopped in all 5 speakers. If I pressed the headphoned tight to my ears, I could hear the same buzz that normally comes out of the 5 speakers.

So, It seems like the problem is in the reciever?

 

[AreB]

Almost certainly receiver. Does your Yamaha even have a ground pin on the AC plug? Many consumer electronics components use two-wire power cords.

Blown capacitor sounds likely. Inexpensive part, labor-intensive to get replaced. Finding anyone reliable and affordable to work on solid state electronics these days is difficult. The Yamaha website probably lists factory-authorized service shops in your area; I have had decent work done by a slightly-upscale shop called Tweeter Audio but I think they went belly-up a while back.

 

[duckloads]

Thnakks for the advice. My Yamaha only has a 2 way plug. No ground pin.

 

[Spotteddog]

Tinnitus?
Spent a great deal of time around mortars, artillery, drag cars/bikes, or
my ex wife?

 

[tom turner]

Hi,

1. Unplug the receiver, reverse the two-prong plug and reinsert into the wall, and see if this helps.

Sometimes different components with two prong plugs can hum if the polarity of the plugs are not the same. There are simple polarity testers you can get at Radio Shack if needed to make sure that you reduce the potential of hum in this way.

2. That failing, take the receiver to the shop and expect 'em to have to replace a bad capacitor, as was mentioned above. Caps ain't very expensive and the labor to replace one won't be excessive either in most cases. If the cap is bad, it NEEDS to be replaced.

I suspect that you'll find that #2 will be required to solve the problem.

T.

 

[JcMack]

If it's a 2 prong plug it's a polarized config with one blade longer than the other so I doubt you'll be able to reverse it without defeating the plug with a converter type gizmo. Try disconnecting all other components from the receiver, take a long piece of wire and strip the ends back about an inch. Back out one of the receiver screws and then loop one end of the striped wire around the screw and tighten it back down. Now unscrew the screw that holds the trim plate on the outlet. Loop the other end of the wire around the screw and tighten it down. Does the hum go away? This process assumes the wall box is metal not plastic and there's metal thinwall containing the A.C wiring to the box and it's grounded. iF IT WRKS DON'T LEAVE IT THIS WAY. ANOTHER STORM COULD WIPE OUT YOUR RECEIVER THROUGH THE GROUND.

 

[Ogandydancer]

Another thing that could give you a problem is near proximity of any cordless phones. If I use my cell phone near my computer speakers I get noise created by the RF from it. Any other devices such as wireless computer hook ups (Linksys) etc could also create a problem.