# Need help with amplifier requirements for surround



## charliedontsurf (Aug 15, 2011)

Hi,

A bit of a long question this...

I'm trying to set up a home surround sound system on the cheap (mainly for music). I already have a jumble of speakers lying about the house and I need to buy an amplifier to run these in a surround sound setup. I have a cheap pair of bi-wirable floorstanding speakers (knock offs but they sound passable!) which I want to use as fronts, with the subwoofers and tweeter wired up separately and then two 50 W speakers to use as the rear speakers. I would like the option to add a centre speaker and separate subwoofer at some point. 

Fronts x 2
Bi-Wirable 
450W RMS
4 or 8 Ohms
Recommends running 50-300W on the back - I don't really get why they should be different?

Rear x 2
50W RMS
6 Ohms

I also have a pair of 75W single cone 12" speakers rated at 4 Ohms, but I would prefer to use the other pair if possible, as these are really for a guitar stack amp.

So what I want to know basically is:

1) Can you get amplifier systems to run 6 Ohm speakers with ones rated at 4 or 8 Ohms? 

2) To run the fronts at 300W and the rear speakers at 50W what wattage am I looking at for the amp?

3) To run the floorstanding speakers bi-wired (?), does this mean I'm then running 6.0 rather than 4.0?

4) Can anyone reccomend an amp to do all this at around £150 ($250)?

Cheers,
Michael


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## yustr (Sep 27, 2004)

Welcome to TSF Charlie :wave:

Q1: Yes, modern electronics should not have any problem driving those loads.

Q2: Wattage ratings of speakers is essentially meaningless. Mfgr's put a number on them to impress customers - nothing more. The vast majority of music will reach your speakers at fractions of watts. Some bombastic outbursts may reach higher levels but would do so only for fractions of a second. Don't worry about blowing up your speakers. Get a good quality receiver rated at around 100WPC and you'll be fine.

Q3: No. In bi-wiring the woofer and mid/high each get the same signal - just from separate wires. The two (pairs of) wires originate at the same terminals on your receiver. HERE's an article that basically says; Don't bother. If you're thinking that you'd hook one set of terminals on the speakers to the Front outputs and the other set to one of the other outputs (say surround back) - you'd be loosing half of each signal. For example the Front output sends a full frequency spectrum signal to the speaker but yours would only reproduce the mid/high portion. The bass information would be lost.

One option that might be worth the experiment would be to hook the R/L Front outputs to the bass driver and then bi-wire the (now) two mid/highs from the Center output of the reciever. Not sure how it would sound and that puts a rather strange load on your amp. But hey, if it works...

Q4: There are many very nice high quality receiver in that price range - especially if you're willing to search the used equipment market. Stick with name brands: Onkyo, Denon, Pioneer, Marantz, Kenwood, Sony (I don't care for it but some do), Yamaha. Look for one that has the inputs you need now and that you might need in the future. Good hunting.


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## charliedontsurf (Aug 15, 2011)

Look forward to getting it set up. Thanks for the help!


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