[waldo563]

I am shopping for some replacement speakers and had a question about speaker impedence. I have a Denon AVR-1910 receiver and I am looking at the Axiom M60 floorstanding, VP150 center, and QS8 surround speakers which are rated at 8, 6, and 6 ohms, respectively. Is mixing speaker impedence like this not recommended? According to the manual, speakers with 6-16 ohm impedence should be used although the Denon site states that 4 ohm speakers can be used. If the speaker impedence needs to be match on all channels, it seems that would limit the scope of my speaker selection. If it's ok to mix speakers, do they need to be close, i.e. 6 and 8 ohm vs 4 and 8 ohm? I'm guessing that it would be ok to mix impedence but wanted to get input from the experts on this forum.
Thanks

 

[Sycraft]

There are no problems mixing speaker impedance on a receiver. If the speakers end up being different volume levels because of it, well that's part of the whole MultEQ setup. It'll measure the volume levels and adjust them.

The only thing you have to be careful about is not running any channel at too low an impedance. So if you have 6 ohm speakers, don't put two of them in parallel on one channel or you'll probably overload it.

Also, the lower the speaker impedance, the more heat the amp will generate. So if you are running lower impedance speakers, make sure you've got plenty of ventilation and don't crank the volume too high up.

Depending on how large your room is and ow loud you plan on playing stuff, you might want to consider one of their better receivers. Not only does it get you a better amp, but also you can get a pre-out feature, so you can hook up your own external amp(s).

 

[tonyvdb]

Sycraft is correct, Let me add to what he has said.
You also need to consider the efficiency of each speaker and as well the power requirements, if they are all below 90db efficient and require RMS100watts to drive them your Denon will struggle and the result will be distortion and unclear sound.

 

[waldo563]

Thanks for the quick replies. Your answers are pretty much what I was thinking but it never hurts to tap into the knowledge base of the Shack members. I realize the AVR I am working with is definately not a premium level device which really is the main reason for my concern. If I was using one of the higher end receiver or separate setups, I would think this would be much less of a question. Maybe next year...