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Reciever wattage question? Importance? (1 Viewer)

Jesse Sharrow

Supporting Actor
Joined
Jul 11, 2003
Messages
745
If a speaker says power handling 25-100 watts @ 6ohms, now if I put a 200 at 8ohms receiver on it.... is it going to damage the speaker? I work car audio and I am just getting into home audio... so Im not sure. Im guessing if its good clean power it will be fine.

Im talking Infinity kappa 200's and a sunfire Ultimate Reciever.
 

John Royster

Screenwriter
Joined
Oct 14, 2001
Messages
1,088
Jesse,

You are correct. Good clean power is everything and your ears will tell you when your speaker can't take it or your amp is wimping out. Carver/sunfire can seriously push power..most times the speaker cries mercy before the amp.
 

Myo K

Stunt Coordinator
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Mar 27, 2003
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189
to avoid any problems that may result in impedence mismatch, i wouldnt pair 6ohm speakers to an amp unless the amp is capable of handling 6ohm speakers.
 

Jason.Soko

Stunt Coordinator
Joined
May 30, 2003
Messages
219
Current is what drives your speakers. Don't worry about wattage being to low. I've seen a 20watt per channel tube amplifier make speakers sing, LOUDLY. Wattage means very little.
 

Chu Gai

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Joined
Jun 29, 2001
Messages
7,270
Thou art safe and very correct in your thinking. One could of course damage speakers in a variety of ways. I'm guesstimating that somewhere around 75% of the maximum continuous power of your speakers, that their distortion will start to become a factor in your listening pleasure.

Technically that's not an impedance mismatch. Most speakers are designed to be driven by a voltage source so impedance matching in this matter involves an amp or receiver with a low output impedance (call it a high Damping Factor if you will) into a higher impedance. Something like a 100:1 ratio ensures that the receiver is not also functioning like a tone control or equalizer where it's ouput is dependant upon the impedance curve of the speaker. However, I'm figuring that you're probably thinking along the lines that one should use a power source that's specifically been stated by the manufacturer to provide continuous power into a particular load like a 4 or 8 ohm speaker. That's certainly the approach I'd take in developing a short list of products to consider. The Carver I believe has no issues with 4 ohm speakers. 6 ohms speakers aren't a problem for the vast majority of receivers.
 

Luis M

Second Unit
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Jul 2, 2000
Messages
282
I have floor stading JBL speakers as my front speakers, The HP-520, They are decent speakers. They are rated at 4 ohms (200 watts maximun power handling)from 34-27,000 Hz and a 90 Db sensitivity. I am runing them with a Marantz 8200 and I am wondering if the load it's just too much when all 5 channels are engaged? I hear nothing wrong with this combination and when listening to stereo material in direct mode this receiver sounds very, very good.
I was thinking about adding a couple of mono amps to the left and right front channels to help in this matter, not that I hear a problem, the receiver actually sounds very powerful but I may be pushing it.
 

Bill Cowmeadow

Second Unit
Joined
May 5, 1999
Messages
404
If you were to play the 1812 (Telarc) through your system at a high volume, I would expect you to damage those speakers using a 200 watt receiver. That title is extreme, but there are other titles that could do the same. Don't automatically assume the speakers can handle the volume.

Bill
 

Jesse Sharrow

Supporting Actor
Joined
Jul 11, 2003
Messages
745
So for the money would you guys recommend going with something smaller? Denon 4802, Yamaha RXVZ1, Pioneer 47tx?

Check my other post.
 

Chu Gai

Senior HTF Member
Joined
Jun 29, 2001
Messages
7,270
If there's nothing else in the audio world, there's no shortage of products to meet various needs. And all of us have different needs. Different feature sets that make maybe one product right for us but wrong for someone else need to be identified.

With respect to power, I'm of the philosophy that having an excessive abundance is a good thing. I'm not too worried about dumping 500 watts continuous into a speaker that can only handle 200 watts tops. I'm not worried because hell I'm not about to do something like that or at least I hope that I wouldn't. If I was really worried that a teenager might not be so careful, then I'd fuse my speakers. OK, I'd give up some accuracy and compromise their performance a bit, but at the end of the day I'd also have my speakers.

However, looking at only power as the deciding criteria is very short sighted and you may find after a couple of months, as you discover the unit's capabilities, that it just doesn't have something you wished it had.
Maybe part of your entertainment involves gaming. In that case having an adequate number of inputs of the proper type is important. Maybe the bandwidth of the video switching is important due to you running HDTV or something. You're 5.1 now, but is that where you see yourself down the road? Perhaps a bit more flexibility in setting the crossover points for the sub is good to have. Maybe you need that phono input for this turntable you've been meaning to hook up.
What about service and warranties? While I can't speak with any certainty about the percentages of Carvers needing service, if it did, how're you going to handle it? Need to ship it? Are you prepared to eat s/h one way and then waiting for a couple of months till things work out? Maybe having a receiver that does a bit of crude room analysis to set itself up is good. Maybe having a multiple of playback formats is important. If so which ones? Some people get hung up on a particular DAC. You a Burr Brown kind of guy or maybe a Crystal? If so, does it have the specific model you're interested in?
What about the layout of everything...the way the remote works?

The friggin list of things that ought to be considered, and aren't by many people, can be quite staggering. If this is your first somewhat substantial venture into buying or wanting something more upscale or capable, then give the above some thought. Write down what's important to you to help you develop your short list of products to consider. Sometimes, what's best at first, is to choose somewhat modestly in terms of price. Call it the learning curve, where you learn about you and what it is that you really want and what it is that you could care less about. It might mean that in a year or so you'll be saying, 'Damn, this thing sucks, it can't do the following whatever'. Of course, you might be saying something like you should've bought the Carver or that top end Pioneer, or something else.

Life is full of lessons and they all come at some kind of cost. It's not a terrible thing to find you bought something and now need to sell it and find you've lost something like $200 in value. You've used it, enjoyed it, learned from it. That's the cost of your lesson. But to repeat this lesson over and over, losing 200 there, 450 here, a thousand there, in a short span of time, well all I can say is that someone's happy, but it ain't you.
 

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