Sound! Larger Speakers in A150 / zg5

Hello All!

I know that a lot of people around here have been less than thrilled at times by their AAO's sound output, me included. Headphones work fine on an airplane or the like, but not so well when you are using it for navigation in an auto or when you are moving around and want some music playing.



So, after a lot of playing and tweaking, and a bunch of looking at it, I finally found a speaker replacement that had enough umph to do what I was looking for. And the price was outstanding (2.99 +tax from Frys)



Comparison of size difference of the speakers...



The system I used was a plug in amplified speaker set from Kinyo. Specifically their model MS20. The speakers in it are 1/4 oz heavier, and nearly twice as much surface area as the stock speakers. The downside is that they are round, not oval, so it does take a small bit of modification to make it fit. But not where I was expecting, as I will explain.



Got the speaker set, got my AOA150, and got to work. First, I ripped the speaker set apart, 2 screws in the back of it under the batteries, then pop it apart. I unsoldered the wiring, and then had to pry the speakers gently out, as they were glued into the assy.

Next up, tearing apart the AAO.... not for the faint of heart, but not as bad as some other things I have worked on in the past. Fortunately, I installed a memory upgrade some time ago, so I was not totally unaware of what I was up against. So, I took the machine completely apart, making sure to set the screws where I could locate them, and the motherboard where it would be safe.


After total removal, I removed the speakers from the bottom case. The wiring is split apart under the mobo, and goes to each side.

Location:


Left side: The speakers as they sit works fine on the left side. A small amount of foam pack to keep contact from the mobo, and another to space the speaker cone out from the bottom case. The speaker locates nicely between the 2 screw mounts for the speakers and the one mount for the mobo.





On the right side, it becomes a bit more of an issue, since the hard drive sits very close to the right speaker. So, after several measurements, and several test fitments, I finally decided to remove the inboard speaker mounting boss. Since I have disassembled the entire unit, no problem getting a cutting tool into the bottom case. I used an end snip, and then a razor to remove the sharp edges. Then I used a small amount of foam pack to locate the speaker and hold it in place. The wiring for the speaker plugs/usb/right card also help hold the speaker in place.


This shows the mounting boss removed.


After making sure the location of the speakers was going to work, I went to work on the wiring harness to wire in the speakers. At first, I was going to desolder and resolder the speakers in, but the wires on the existing speakers are glued into the speaker assembly. Ugh. So, I snipped the wires as closely to the speaker as I could, then stripped back and soldered them into the new speakers.

Assembly was quite straightforward, mounting the speakers, gently setting the mobo back into place, making sure the wiring clears all around, then together as normal.

After reassembly, I powered the AAO up, and was glad to hear the windows start music. I then went to the test mode in the Control Panel to make sure that I had everything wired correctly (which side, wires connected, etc) and found that they were working quite well, less distortion, and much louder (like about 1/2 again louder) Loud enough to feel the sound on the case! Yes. Much better.

I have some pix of the teardown (camera died partway through, and I didn't have a fresh set of batteries) that I will put on my photobucket and attach sometime later this weekend.

In the end, I am very satisfied with the result.

One last note, (and one that may make some people nervous) but I want to be clear on this. The speakers I put in are 8 ohm speakers @ 1/2w, instead of 4 ohm @ 1w... so what does that mean? With a transistorized amp (esp of this low power) nothing that I can determine. There could be an issue, and it could blow the amp out (in theory, anyway) but from what I've read all over, transistorized amps don't care if you use 8 or 16 ohm speakers on a 4 ohm amp, but not the other way around... again, at 1 watt, it's not a big deal that I can find... still, I want to put this disclaimer out so that if you do this and your machine blows up, it is NOT my fault...

 

it's impossible to blow the amp out
Anything lower than 4 ohms (3ohms, 2ohms, 1ohm) will most likely damage/ blow the amp.
Thx for this guide my man! props to you

 

Well, I started out when transistorized amps were a new thing... and on those, more ohms meant bad... (showing my age!)

I realized I forgot to get the pix up. Will do so post haste (downloading from camera while I am typing this) so they'll be up very soon.

Listened to streaming while working on the bus yesterday... the sound is SOOOO much better now... Wish Acer would have done this from the get go... it could not have cost more than a few cents difference...

PIX ARE UP! Take a look... very straightforward.

 

thx man
Wow, looks impressive
I think I'll give this a shot

 

very nice tutorial mate !

Respect

 

Just a quick update... still working flawlessly... love my little netbook, and now I can hear it over the noise in the bus, or turn by turn in the car!

 

Great looking mod! Any idea where I could find something like those speakers other than fry's? I searched them up on ebay.ca with no results, since it seems to be a cheap set, I'm assuming it's just a rebranded set that you might be able to find somewhere else... I might have a look around dealextreme, if you have any ideas I'll love to hear them.

 

I punched in Kinyo MS20 in google, and this came up as results...

http://www.google.com/products/cata...og_result&ct=result&resnum=3&ved=0CCcQ8wIwAg#

There you go.

 

Drat, Compu America has it though the shipping to Canada is $37... I think I'll stick with the built in speakers for now.

 

I need to get new speakers. Anyone have a update on works well today since this is pretty old and I can't find any other info on replacing /upgrading the speakers in a A150/zg5