When first setting up or reviewing a system, start by checking the wiring. Don’t be afraid to disconnect everything. While you’re verifying your connections, you have the chance to straighten and untangle your wires. Do it! This is a great time to label all of your system wires. Do it! You can buy small plastic labels, but masking tape works fine. You’ll feel better about your system if everything is neat, labeled, and connected correctly.

To avoid confusion and tangles, run your components one at a time. To confirm that you’ve connected the inputs and outputs in the right direction, consider where the signal flows.

If you’re connecting your console or DVD player to a surround receiver with a Toslink or coaxial digital cable, set the device to Dolby Digital mode in its audio menu. (They’re usually set to two-channel analog by default.) Some devices also have a PCM mode. Although this is a digital mode, it supports any two channels, so switch to Dolby Digital to send a 5.1 surround signal to your receiver.

Speaker wires are always marked somehow from one side to the next (positive versus negative). Usually, there is a bit of writing or imprinting on one of the two wires. I follow the writing-equals-negative convention, but you can go either way, as long as you’re consistent. You must connect the positive lead to the positive side of the speaker and amplifier. Reversing one of these sets produces out-of-phase sounds that will kill your speakers’ imaging properties; one speaker’s cone will travel outward while the other travels inward.

Test and setup DVDs, such as the Avia Guide to Home Theater (http://www.ovationmultimedia.com/), allow you to determine correct wiring through sound checks, but it’s easier to do things right the first time.

Unlike subwoofers, which play sound frequencies so low that the human ear can’t determine the speaker’s location, normal full-range audio speakers readily reveal their position. It’s important to place your speakers in the right spots and position them correctly.

The main two left and right speakers should form an equilateral triangle with the prime listening position, directly front and center of the screen. In other words, the viewing distance from the speakers to the front row of seats should equal the distance between the speakers. Point your front three speakers directly at this position, as precisely as possible.

Some people use masking tape or even fancy laser devices to make a perfect triangle and correct their aim. You can do well without that work, as long as you understand that you won’t have much imaging if your speakers fire directly ahead into your couch.

You can improve the sound of your system quite a lot by reaiming your speakers. This is the best free tweak I can tell you about: do this right away. Align the main speaker’s tweeters at the height of your ears in your seated listening position. If your speakers sit on the ground and fire into the furniture, raise them to the correct level. You don’t need expensive stands; just be creative and set your speakers at a better height.

This advice also applies to the center-channel speaker. Wherever you have this speaker mounted, point the tweeter directly at your head when you’re watching a movie or killing zombies. Use an empty CD case or two AA batteries taped together to tweak the center channel up or down correctly.

You will find that 60-Hz noise is inherent in and around AC power line cables, so people commonly want to reduce it. Start by routing the AC lines away from the interconnect cables as much as possible. Especially avoid running them parallel to each other! I’ve found that bunching the AC lines together does cancel out noise somewhat.

Hands down, an incorrectly wired subwoofer is the biggest hum and noise generator. This often comes from a ground potential difference. In short, the subwoofer connects, via a grounded plug, to a different outlet than the main system, and the differences in the ground wire lengths cause a hum. One easy fix is to defeat the subwoofer’s ground altogether with a ground cheater plug, though it may leave you open to damage.

If you are experiencing ground hum from another source, such as cable or a satellite connection, try running a separate ground wire to reground coaxial cable lines. The best place to do this is from the splitter, because there are often ground wire connection screws. If this doesn’t do it, you will need an isolation transformer (available at Radio Shack). See the Curing Ground Loops site (http://www.siber-sonic.com/broadcast/GLoopFix.html) for more information.

Now that you have everything wired, placed, and grounded correctly, let’s talk about hardware settings. Even though I fly solo on Christmas morning when I put together my little nephew’s Lego set, when it comes to my gear, I read the instruction manual to save myself time and frustration. Do the same for your surround processor and TV.

People often overlook the bass management setting in their surround processors. Dolby Digital systems have different speaker settings, including Large and Normal (or Small). This affects the bass output of the receiver and the bass load it places on the speaker. Bass management is smart enough to reroute any bass you take out of the center channel to the main speakers, subwoofer, or both. Remember to set the speaker profile to match your system.

Large center channels are still rare, though growing in popularity, so check your speaker’s specs to see if it can handle loads below 80 Hz. If not, set it to Small. The same rule applies to your surround speakers and subwoofer. The sub setting has three modes: off, on, and both. Use “both” when you have large mains that can also handle deep bass and a subwoofer. The low-frequency effects (LFE) channel is the .1 in 5.1; it’s automatically routed to wherever you have sent these bass signals. If you don’t have a sub, set your subwoofer to “off/no” to route the LFE signals to your mains instead.