Amplifiers for Whole Home Sound System

[aglozier]

We recently bought a home with a 14 speaker sound system. The amplifiers to power the system didn’t come with the house. I need to purchase them.

There are eight speaker zones. They are on three stereo circuits (three pairs of wires coming out of the wall). The circuits are:

• A pair of outdoor speakers mounted under the roof eaves in the backyard.
• A pair of large ceiling speakers mounted high up on a vaulted ceiling in the great room. The electronics will be located in this room.
• Ten ceiling speakers located in six zones (rooms). There are four stereo pairs and two single mono speakers. Each room has a wall mounted volume control. The previous owner had this professionally installed. I assume that they are wired in some parallel/serial fashion to so that the resulting impedance of the speakers can be powered by a standard stereo amplifier.

The previous owner had two receivers and a pair of small black components (amps, speaker selectors?) powering the system.

The new components I purchase will be located on a HDTV stand where I have a Samsung Smart HDTV, a Blu-Ray player, a cable DVR and a Google Chromecast. The Samsung HDTV has both analog and digital audio outputs. I intend to connect it to the audio system as a music source. I still need a receiver for local radio stations. Note: I don’t want a surround sound system for the Samsung HDTV as I have a home theater elsewhere.

I considered purchasing a stereo receiver and a 4-pair speaker selector with volume control to power the sound system. However I’m concerned that this would be underpowered for driving 14 speakers. What do you think?

Alternatively I could purchase a receiver with a preamp or zone 2 output. I would purchase one or more power amps with it. Optionally, I could also use a 2-pair speaker selector with volume control to connect both the outdoor and great room speakers to the receiver.

I think selecting a receiver and power amplifier(s) depends on the power requirements for the three speaker circuits. I don’t have a good feel for this. Can you offer some advice or estimates? What would you recommend I purchase?

 

[markw]

First off, there are many multi-channel amps that can power the speakers but that's the least of your issues.

Now, there's a reason the previous owner had this installed professionally. That could be a very complex installation.

The first questions you'll need to answer are these, and probably more as you go along.

1) Are there volume controls in each room/zone? If not, how will you control the volume in each room?

2) Will you want the same source to be playing in all zones, or will you want different sources in different zones?

3) If you want different sources, how will you control what plays where?

 

[aglozier]

Good questions. Here's my answers:

1) The six rooms on the same circuit all have wall mounted volume controls. The Great Room and outdoor speakers do not have volume controls. I assume the previous owner attached those speakers to his two receivers and controlled the volume at the receivers. During the initial showing of the house I adjusted the volume in the great room using the volume control on one receiver. I can use the receiver I purchase to control Great Room volume. Depending on how I power the outdoor speakers, I might need some sort of volume control for it. I'm guessing the the other six room will have there own dedicated amp and the volume would be controlled using the wall mounted volume controls in each room.

2) I'm OK with one source playing at all locations. If the receiver I buy has a Zone 2, I'll have to control it at the receiver. However one receiver with two zones I'm considering has an Android phone app which could allow remote control throughout the house.

3) I would have to control it at the receiver. However the above mentioned receiver has internet streaming sources which could be controlled remotely. Also the Google Chromecast can be controlled remotely.

I'm thinking of purchasing a stereo receiver and then connecting it one at a time to the three speakers circuits. Based on how they sound I can guess at the power requirements. I can then purchase additional amps as needed to connect to the receiver's pre-amp/zone 2 output. Note: I previously temporarily connected my home theater amp to the wires coming out of the wall to determine what speakers were connected to them. I didn't do any listening tests with it.

 

[Hookedonc4]

The house across from me just sold and the people that bought house just bought the equipment for a fraction of the cost and that made for easy transition.

You might want to get an AV company out and give you some options once you figure out how and what you want your system to do. They should even give you suggestion to future proof your system.

Not sure where you live but you should be able to get a couple quotes and decide on path forward.

We use control4 to control all our AV equipment and 11 zones of music.

There are a lot of systems out there that's why I think an AV company might help point you in the right direction

 

[herbu]

2) I'm OK with one source playing at all locations.

If you do this, be sure you understand how the Zone-2 and Zone-3 work w/ your source. Many, (most?), AVRs w/ multiple zones require analog inputs for the analog Zone-2/3 outputs, if you play them and your main zone at the same time. Also keep in mind that your Zone outputs will likely be stereo only.

 

[tmurnin]

We have a similar setup. When we first bought the house, I used the second zone of my receiver with a speaker selector box, then eventually replaced the speaker selector with a Speakercraft multi-channel amp. However, I eventually found that controlling the whole-house audio with my main receiver was a bit of a pain and not at all wife-friendly (she just wants to quickly listen to music and not worry about zones or anything else). So, I ended up hooking a Sonos Connect up to the Speakercraft amp. That way, if she wants to listen to music, she just grabs her phone and turns it on, no need to worry about turning the receiver to the right setting, or even being in the same room. If you want to match the main room audio to the whole-house, you'll need to add another Connect as a source to your receiver and then you,can group them. Sonos isn't the cheapest system, but it's very easy to use and we've been very happy.

 

[herbu]

Many, (most?), AVRs w/ multiple zones require analog inputs for the analog Zone-2/3 outputs, if you play them and your main zone at the same time.

I forgot... there is an exception that you should check w/ your choice of AVR.
Without using separate analog inputs, (I mean using only HDMI to connect all components), you CAN play the same source in multiple zones at the same time. However, the AVR may "dumb down" the signal in your main zone to Stereo only.

Here's what I mean. Say you have a Satellite box, Bluray player, Receiver, and TV all connected w/ HDMI cables. Your AVR has 9 amps. In your Main Zone, you have 5.1 speakers. In Zone-2 you have Stereo, (2 speakers), and Stereo in Zone-3.

You turn on the Main Zone and put a movie in the BDP. It provides 5.1 audio for your listening pleasure. Now you decide to also play the movie audio in Zone-2 so your wife can hear it while she folds laundry in the other room. )) You turn on Zone-2 and select your BDP as the source.

Depending on your AVR, you could get movie audio in both rooms, BUT your Main Zone "dumbs down" from surround to stereo. Using only HDMI connections, your AVR cannot decode surround for one zone, AND stereo for another zone at the same time.

The "fix" is to use HDMI cables for your main zone surround, AND analog cables for your Zone 2/3 selections.

 

[herbu]

I'm not overly bright, and this was all a bit complicated for me to grasp when I went through setup of my Denon X4000. I finally thought of it this way...

A complete integrated audio signal arrives at the AVR via an HDMI cable. The AVR checks how you set up your system... stereo, 2.1, 3.1, 5.1, etc. It then takes the integrated audio input and manipulates it to match your setup.

You just have 2-channel stereo? It takes traditional Center and Surround channel stuff and divides it between your Left/Right. You have a Center speaker? It splits out the Center stuff. Have L/R Surrounds? Have a subwoofer? Rear Surrounds? The AVR processes the integrated HDMI input to match whatever setup you have specified.

You add Zone-2 on top of your Main zone. Uh oh! Now you're asking the AVR to process the HDMI input 2 different ways. You want it to process the signal into 5.1 for your Main zone, AND you want it to process the same input into 2-channel stereo. No can do. Your AVR can only process the HDMI input one way at a time. So to give you audio in both zones, it chooses 2-channel stereo and sends that output to both zones.

To keep 7.2 processing in my Main zone, AND play the same thing in Zone-2, I have an HDMI cable to the AVR for Main zone surround, AND a stereo pair of analog cables from BDP & SAT box to the AVR for Zone-2. With this setup, the AVR only has to process the HDMI signal once to suit the Main zone. For Zone-2, the AVR simply takes the analog input and amplifies it. No processing.

You should carefully check how your prospective AVR handles zones. Hope this helps.

 

[aglozier]

I want to clarify that I do not want surround sound. I already have a home theater else where. I just want plain old stereo. There is a Samsung smart HDTV and Google Chromcast at the same location as all the speaker wires. I can use it's audio output as an source (Pandora, Google Play, etc). I don't want to wire it for surround sound.

tmurnin, you have a good point about being wife friendly. My wife will value ease of use also. I look at Sonos. One receiver I looked at does Bluetooth. She already plays music from her phone over a Bluetooth speaker. If the receiver is as easy to use she'd be happy.

I pulled one of the volume controls and determined it's a SpeakerCraft VSI60. The "Multiple Speaker Switch" is set to "D' which is the maximum setting (most speakers).

On advise from another forum, I bought a better multi-meter and checked speaker wire resistance. The resistances are approximately:

• Great Room - 8 Ohm
• Outdoors - 4 Ohm
• Six Room Set - Six Ohm one channel and 4 Ohm the other (weird).

Does this seem reasonable?

I'm thinking that it would be best to buy amps that can handle 4 Ohm speakers.