Does this make sense? (1 Viewer)

[Ashford Little]

I recently bought an Outlaw 1050 reciever to replace my old Rotel DPL pre/proc & decoder. In the process of level-matching the speakers I noticed something that I'm was confused/curious about.

First of all here is the equipment used:

Preamp/rec: Outlaw 1050; aprox. 65 wpc
Main amp: Tandberg 1026 150 wpc
Main speakers: B&WS2
Rears: Paradigm Atoms
Center: Vandersteen center

I realize that the speakers are not necessarily closely matched, but my problem is that I had to increase the level by over 6db in the rears to get to 70db. The efficiency rating on the 602's is 90. I'm not sure about the Paradigm's though. They list two figures: 89dB / 86dB with the labeling being "Sensitivity -- Room / Anechoic". I don't know what that means.

The other main differing factor is the wattage being used to drive the two sets of speakers. The 602's are being fed with a comfortable 150wpc, while the rears live on something close to 65.

Is this normal?

Thx

 

[Andrew Pratt]

There's lots of factors going on here. The different speaker sensetivity, distances, cable gauge?, gains in the different amps etc. Any one of these can effect the levels required to match the volumes. In my room I have idential amps and identical front and rears yet the rears have to be jacked up a lot more then the fronts for the simple reason there's the second row of seating blocking their path ie there's a multitude of reason that might explain whats going on