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I have 4 speakers wires:

  • left red wire
  • right red wire
  • left black wire
  • right black wire

Like this:

enter image description here

I want to take those 4 wires, and make a 3.5mm stereo RCA plug for my iPod. So that I will be able to play the songs from my iPod to the speakers.

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If the situation is really like in the picture, this will not work, because the iPod ill not be able to drive the speakers without some kind of amplifier. – 0x6d64 Jun 18 '12 at 16:48
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iPod doesn't have an audio amplifier capable of driving your speakers directly. It can only handle earphones. – Juancho Jun 18 '12 at 16:52
This is a consumer electronics question, which is off-topic here. We are about the design of the electronics themselves. – Kellenjb Jun 18 '12 at 17:27

closed as off topic by Kellenjb, Kortuk♦ Jun 18 '12 at 17:57

Questions on Electrical Engineering Stack Exchange are expected to relate to electronics design within the scope defined in the FAQ. Consider editing the question or leaving comments for improvement if you believe the question can be reworded to fit within the scope. Read more about closed questions here.

1 Answer

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Your iPod was designed to drive headphones, not speakers. It outputs a line-level signal which just carries signal. It has no power to drive a speaker.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Line_level

You need to send the signal from your iPod to either an amplifier or a powered set of speakers. Both of which will probably take a 3.5mm directly.

But just for information's sake, there are many different "flavors" of 3.5mm jack. And if you were to connect speaker wire to a 3.5mm jack for whatever reason, how it gets connected depends heavily on which type of jack you are using.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TRS_connector

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