Could No Speaker = Damage To Receiver? (1 Viewer)

[Bob Br]

I recently purchased an Onkyo 898 7.1 channel receiver. The room it currently sits in (new space not yet built) only has room for 6.1 setup. Instead of using 2 back surrounds, I'm using the back Left surround with a center channel placed behind the listening position.
While calibrating, I turned the back Right surround (no speaker attached) down as much as possible -12db. There didn't appear to be any way to tell the receiver that only one of the two back surrounds should be used. I'm not sure turning it down makes any difference, but it made me feel better
Could this situation cause any damage to the receiver or is it similar to having an outlet with nothing plugged in?
Bob

 

[Andrew_Ballew]

You should have no trouble. Solid state devices will carry on just fine without a load. A LOT of people use a receiver as a pre/pro with no load whatsoever on the receiver's internal amps.

Cheers

Andrew B.

 

[Roger Kint]

So why do mfgrs give us the option to enable/disable a speaker signal?

 

[Kwang Suh]

So why do mfgrs give us the option to enable/disable a speaker signal?

So the receiver knows what speakers you actually have, so that you actually hear everything.

 

[Bob McElfresh]

So the receiver knows what speakers you actually have, so that you actually hear everything.

If I might clarify
- Telling the receiver you do not have a external sub will often route the ".1" sounds to your LARGE L/R speakers.
- Telling the receiver you do not have a center speaker will route the center channel to the L/R speakers
Does this help?

 

[Bill_Weinreich]

Bob Br,

At one time, having no load on the amp could cause damage. (I've replace many an output amp IC because of it) But most of todays equipment will have no problem (they have built in protection for it). Besides in most cases that I've encountered, the damage was immediate and definite. Muting or turning down the volume is still safer though.

Bill

 

[Bob Br]

All,

Thanks for the replies.

Bob