Can I connect 2 Amps to 1 set of front Speakers? (1 Viewer)

[Jeremy Irons]

Please can anyone help my costly mistake?
I have 2 amplifiers, a straight Nad amp and a Onkyo AV amp which I bought while my Nad was in repair and thought it just might replace the Nad in thinking the Onkyo would be a good all rounder, (I was going to give the Nad to my son) Wrong. This is what I have resorted to, my CD player is hooked to the Nad, my DVD player is hooked to the Onkyo, when I listen to CD, I connect the front speaker cables to the Nad, which gives a much better pure audio sound. When I watch a movie, I then have to take the cables out of the Nad and hook them to the Onkyo. I excepted this until we moved house and now due to location, cannot get to the back of the amps to switch the speaker cables, HOW can I sort this one, the Onkyo has no speaker pre-outs, I thought of some kind of switcher box, but am not sure if that would do the job and getting hold of one.
Someone suggested hooking the Nad from the Onkyo tape out and have both amps running while watching movies, but how would this work when I would have to switch sources from DVD to Tape on the Onkyo???
Any plane English suggestions would be very much appreciated as I feel like just buying a decent Nad all rounder for which my wife would cut my balls off!!!!
Cheers
Jerry

 

[Joe Sabato]

I handled a similar problem ( using an amplifier in the TV and the amplifier in a receiver with one pair of speakers) by using a DPDT ( double pole double throw)switch in each channel to select the amplifier I was using.

If there are Radio Shacks in Australia (really any electronics supply would do) just buy 2 switches ( 15 amp capacity) and wire them with the speaker on the the center contacts, and each amplifier on 1 pole. I mounted the switch on the back of the speaker which was easily accessible; or you can mont them in a box close to the receivers.

Caution! If you buy a ready made switcher (they are usually pushbutton) make sure it CANNOT have both "speakers" (which would be the amplifiers in this case) on at the same time as that WOULD be a costly mistake.