hifi speakers, 2 pairs from 1 source, do i need a booster ?

[timmy toad]

Hi chaps, for a long time now i have had a fairly powerful Sony hi fi, which has been connected up to a Switch which enables me to control 2 pairs of decent speakers, eg, 2 on, 4 on, the other 2 on.

However the Sony HiFi has just died, the CD Changer got all jammed up, so looking for another Sony HiFi I could not find ANYTHING with a cassette player (the wife will never use it anyway) !, so the only unit i could find that didnt look GAWDY was a Sony model (almost indentical to my old) with only DAB/FM Radio and a MP3 Cd player. BUT it only has 10 watts output, 5w per channel. the standard speakers are tiny.

So i am thinking that driving my two pairs of fairly decent speakers would be beyond the scope of the new Sony HiFi unit.

Then i think again, if i use the standard pair speakers plus only one pair of decent speakers that would probaly still be too much for the new HiFi.

So i am thinking again, for the final time, perhaps i could purchase somewhere, if i knew what it was called, a small amplifier with input of 10w and an output of perhaps 50w to 2 pairs of speakers. So please any ideas of what i should be looking for, if indeed it is ACTUALLY made.

I currently have a pair of speakers in my Lounge, and i have a pair of speakers in the kitchen/diner all controlled by the switch.

Do i need to be more accurate on the rating of all the speakers ?, i can see the 2 silly little speakers i have are 4ohm if that means anything ?

tim

 

[OwainDIYer]

If the existing speakers are 4 ohm then it's probably fine to run two sets of hi fi speakers (which are probably 8 ohm)

Whether the amp will be powerful enough depends on the speakers. Try it and see, but don't turn it up too loud or distortion or speaker damage may result.

Most amps are designed for a line level input and feeding them from a speaker output will overload them. Car booster amps have speaker inputs but use 12V power supply.

If your new sony has a line level output you could feed that into the input of an conventional stereo aplifier. A headphone output would also usually suffice.

 

[ChrisFrost]

HiFi speakers are likely to be more efficient than some cheapie speakers that come as part of a hifi system. They're going to be easier to drive rather than harder.

Having said that, two pairs of speakers are still going to try to suck quite a bit of current from the amp, so if the power supply isn't up to the job then it's not going to be great. A better amp would be a wise investment. BTW, it's easier to kill speakers by driving them with an underpowered amp that's going to distort really early than with a very powerful but clean signal.

 

[timmy toad]

OK thanks Lads, very good of you both to offer the advice i was asking for, i feel a bit happier about it now. yeah i did think that the cheaper speakers were easier to drive, so to speak, but the opposite is true, thanks.

BTW, it hasnt got a line input socket. it simply has headphone and audio in sockets.

tim