Multi-room. powered outputs and long cables or pre-outs? (1 Viewer)

[PhillJones]

my receiver (HK 630) allows me to use the surround back channels as a second set of powered outputs for a multi-room setup.

Is it better to buy a load of cheap speaker cable and run it into the second zone or should I use the cheap spare receiver I have lying about to amplify the sound in the second room and run long phono cables from the pre-outs on the main receiver?

Sound quality isn't much of an issue in the second zone. It's only really for listening to NPR while cleaning the apartment. Also the distance between the two zones is quite short as they are adjacent rooms in a small one bedroom apartment.

 

[John Garcia]

If you are just listening to NPR, the doesn't the other receiver have it's own tuner?

Very long analog (not phono) cables are not going to be easy to come by, but you can make your own using RG6 shielded coax and RCA connectors or adapters.

Running speaker wire to another room, depending on the distance, is going to require a larger ga. wire, I'd expect no less than 12ga.

 

[PhillJones]

Sorry john, I didn't mean it literally, I just mean that it's sound quality isn't the big issue. Also phono cables is what us british folk call RCA. I know it's a miss-nomer but we're talking about the same thing.

I guess John's reply that using long speaker cable is the most common way to go about this?

 

[John Garcia]

What I was saying was, the second receiver, which you could probably pick up used for around $50-100, should have it's own tuner, so you might not even need to run wires from one room to the next if you went that route. The advantage to a separate receiver in the second room is that you have volume control, where running from the main room, unless you have a repeater for the remote (or the remote is RF), you cannot control the receiver in the other room.



Knew what you were talking about, I just haven't heard them called that in a while

 

[Wayne A. Pflughaupt]

John, all receivers have tuners. If they don’t they’re called “integrated amps.”

Phil,

John’s absolutely right, it makes no sense to get a second receiver for the second zone and then feed a signal from the first, if all you’re listening to is radio. You should just hook up the second receiver in the room as a stand-alone system.

However, the cheapest thing to do is power the speakers from the main receiver’s second zone outputs, since you already have that capability. There are certainly advantages to using 12ga. wire, but none of them are relevant for a decidedly non-critical secondary installation like this. 14 or even 16ga. speaker wire will be fine.

Regards,
Wayne A. Pflughaupt

 

[PhillJones]

just to clear up any confusion, I may want to play CDs as well.

I was only thinking of using the reciever as an amp. The only reason I said receiver is that I happen to have one just lying arround.

Thanks for the advice. It seems like the best thing is to give the second receiver to a mate of mine and just run some cheap speaker wire to a second set of speakers. The only issue I see is that I can't control the volumes independantly. Changing the volume of zone 2 without changing the volume of zone 1 seems complicated on my HK 630 and odly you can't do it with the zone 2 remote.