Find the ground pin and go from there. For example, if pin 2 is ground on both speakers, you'll have to connect the pin 1 to pin 1 and so on.

I took apart some ACS450 speakers in Feb 24. They do have glue around the entire assembly, so I got it apart using a plastic spudger. It took a while as I had to go carefully.

The ACS500 is different to the 450 as it has Pro-Logic I think? Anyway, you can probably go pin-to-pin on those speaker connections as the wiring is unlikely to be complicated. I didn’t get photos of the DIN plug circuit but I do have a pic of the 450’s internal connector and wiring. To be 100% sure you will need to crack yours open though. Keep us posted, there isn’t much info out there on these speakers.

Thank you for the pics. I know now I will not be dealing with any plastic clips. Looks like the "platforms" are what glued and holding it together.

JD

I I was able to get it apart. Unfortunately I broke the power pcb with the pry tool. I am posting a pic to show others that if you use a pry tool go up at least 2 inches from the base of the speakers to avoid doing what I did. It looks like the trace that I broke is a ground trace and I will just solder a jumper wire over the break.

The Dolby board is huge. I now know what two DIN pins go the the "lower" center speakers on the satellite . I will rewire my DIN wire and see what happens. Will post when I get it working or either blow it up . 🤣.

Hello! First time posting... This thread in particular brought me here.

I just purchased a set of ACS500's with the ACS250 sub. they're... functional. But they're WAY more "used" condition than the seller let on, and although it doesn't blow me away, I can definitely smell tobacco/tar built up. I may make a restoration thread. Upon getting into them one of the wires is broken, which is odd to me. Is there a good way of getting the separator flaps out?

tehdrewsus wrote on 2025-01-15, 18:51:

Is there a good way of getting the separator flaps out?

The rear part of the "flaps" was glued with silicone. The front part looks like they used epoxy so no way of removing the entire flap but no need too anyway really.

Could you please put a ohm meter on both ends of the DIN cable and tell me what pins are what? Like is pin 1 on one side pin 1 on the other side and so forth. A standard MIDI DIN cable will no work with these speakers and I think they crossed a wire in the cable or something.

Doombringer4u2nv wrote on 2025-01-18, 14:09:

tehdrewsus wrote on 2025-01-15, 18:51:

Is there a good way of getting the separator flaps out?

The rear part of the "flaps" was glued with silicone. The front part looks like they used epoxy so no way of removing the entire flap but no need too anyway really.

After 25+ years, they came apart without too much of a fuss. I removed them so I could remove the speakers without cutting wires and having to re solder. on to more testing though. these don't work near as well as the seller let on... go figure.

For what it's worth, I've tested the ACS450 speaker cable and it's wired straight through. While it's not impossible, I wonder if A-L would have created a special cable for the ACS500, given these were a mass produced speaker with common parts to the ACS400 and other sets. Certainly none of the pictured speaker interconnect cables in ACS500 sold listings have special markings. Hopefully tehdrewsus has a multimeter!