How to Set Up Samsung Surround Sound

By Darrin Meyer

i luxury home movie theater image by Nikolay Okhitin from Fotolia.com

Samsung produces a wide array of home entertainment and electronics products, and among those are a line of surround-sound home theater systems with varying degrees of capabilities, features and options. Fortunately, from the basic to the more expansive models, these systems are designed to make connecting the various pieces that constitute the overall home theater setup a painless process, to have you enjoying crystal-clear audio with your home video viewing in no time.

Step 1

Decide where you wish to place the Samsung surround-sound system, TV and other audio/video components within the room, preferably near the cable and AC outlets and in a centralized location, to ensure that the speaker cables are long enough to reach the receiver from their chosen locations.

Step 2

Determine the placement of the individual speakers to maximize their surround-sound potential. According to Samsung user manual guidelines, the center speaker should be directly above or below the TV, whichever is closest to ear level from the main viewing position. The two front speakers should be parallel to the TV, also at ear level, roughly 6 to 8 feet apart. Place the two surround speakers parallel to the listening position, slightly above ear level, and the subwoofer on the floor anywhere in the room.

Step 3

Connect the speaker cables to the individual speakers, matching the black wire to the black terminal, and red to red. Connect the plug ends of the speaker cables to the receiver by matching the colors of the plugs to those of their appropriate terminals. For models with wireless surround speakers, connect those speakers to the wireless receiver module using the same method, and insert the TX Card into the "Wireless" port on the rear of the main receiver, with the word "Wireless" facing upward.

Step 4

Connect the surround-sound receiver to the TV, if your model features a DVD or Blu-Ray player and/or HDMI inputs for routing other components through the receiver. Use HDMI as your best option, for 1080p HD video and digital audio in a single cable, or component (five-plugged cables for video and audio) or composite (three-plugs, video and audio) cables, depending on what is supported by your TV and your particular receiver. Attach the selected cable(s) from that output on the rear of the receiver to the matching input on the TV.

Step 5

Connect the video source components (e.g., cable/satellite set-top receiver box or DVD player, for models with no integrated DVD player) to the surround-sound receiver with HDMI cables, for models such as the HT-C6600 or HT-C6900W that feature this option. Attach the cables from the HDMI outputs on those devices to the HDMI inputs on the receiver. With this method, the source will be selected by the receiver, and that signal will be routed to the TV.

Step 6

Connect the audio from a source component using a digital optical (TOSLINK) cable if your model does not feature HDMI inputs, such as the HT-C550 and 650 series. Attach the cable from its output on the component to the "Digital Audio In" port on the rear of the receiver, and press the "Function" button on the Samsung remote control to select the "D. In" input to access the audio.

Step 7

Press "Power" on the remote control. The Initial Setting menu will appear on the TV the first time the system is used; set the language and other video and audio settings, including Auto Sound Calibration (ASC) to recognize the distance between speakers.

Writer Bio