Most of my computer’s have come with speakers. But I haven’t liked the speakers that they came with. They’ve been cheap little speakers that sound very tinny. My newest computer came with speakers built into the monitor. This is very space efficient, but unfortunately they didn’t sound very good. The speakers I have been using are speakers that I bought about 15 years ago. There are Reveal Hi-Fi Stereo Digital Series speakers that I bought at CompUSA. They weren’t real expensive, but they sound great. But being 15 years old they have gotten a lot of wear and tear. The volume control became very scratchy. As I went to adjust the volume the speakers might cut out or change in volume erratically. I really dont change the treble or bass knobs much so I really haven’t had issues with those. Another issue with the volume control is it just seemed kind of sticky to where it would just not turn smoothly.
Here is how you fix a scratchy volume control. Go to RadioShack and buy a can of tuner cleaner. This is a small spray can that comes with a little tube similar to what a can of WP 40 comes with. Make sure that your speaker is powered off and unplugged. Open up your speaker; for my speaker I’d had to remove for Philips head screws on the back. Inside the speaker, locate the volume control. These are called potentiometers. Insert the little tube into the nozzle of the tuner cleaner. Find a small little opening in the side of the potentiometers for the volume control. Put the small to the tuner cleaner up to the small little hole in the side of the potentiometer. The hole is usually not big enough to insert a tube into. Spray tuner cleaner into the body of the potentiometer. Now move the volume knob back and forth. You might need to spray some more tuner cleaner into the body of the potentiometer and move the volume control back and forth until it moves nice and freely. If there are other controls such as tone or any other controls you might want to repeat this process on those as well. If you have problems with any switches on your speakers, you can also try this on those. Let the tuner controller tuner cleaner dry. It doesn’t take too long. Then go ahead and hook up your speaker again and see if the volume control has improved. If it hasn’t you might not have gotten enough tuner cleaner into the body of the potentiometer. You may need to repeat the whole process again.
Thanks for the tip I have Creative stereo speakers did not have tuner oil but I used a few drops of WD40 and then compressed air (in a can) to blow out. Works fine now
Comment by Ian Henry — September 24, 2010 @ 5:53 pm
great! this is a nice idea for teaching us how to clean scratchy volume control on computer speaker. this will not cost expensive than to buy a new computer speaker. hope you can post about cleaning the keyboard too. thanks!
Comment by naomae — April 4, 2011 @ 11:41 pm