Onkyo TX-NR696 to Power Amp advice.

[Nicholas Caged Animal]

Hello, happy new year!
I've recently bought the Onkyo TX-NR696 and have a 5.1.2 set up with the Atmos height speakers. My main 5 speakers are Sony's with 200 watt fronts, 150 watts center and 120 watt rears with 8ohm impendance.

If I were to connect it to a Power Amp, which I've been thinking about, it has 2 line out jacks for this purpose but it doesn't have the RCA multichannel outputs to connect to
the Power Amp. It also runs the Power Amp via Zone B.
I take it this means I can only have 2 speakers running off the Power Amp, one from each line out jack on the AVR and volume for those speakers would have to be adjusted separately from the other speakers.

Questions that arise:
1.By using a Power Amp on this AVR, would I lose the ability to play Atmos and other 5.1 modes? (I did see a vid on Youtube that claims you can keep Atmos by hooking the 2 front speakers to the Power Amp by not turning on Zone B, but I don't get how that can be the case as it would surely mean no signal is sent from the AVR to the Power Amp?)

2.Since there are no more available speaker terminals on the AVR, could I add 2 extra speakers to my room and connect these new ones to the Power Amp? That way I would keep 5.1 and Atmos etc

3.Does the use of a Power Amp mean a given volume level eg 50, on the AVR will sound louder than not having the Power Amp?

4.If I did get a Power Amp, would I be better to get one with its own volume/gain control to give me more flexibility for volume control?

Keen to hear people's thoughts

 

[Trebdp83]

 

[Trebdp83]

The Onkyo does not have multi channel pre outs to use in the way intended.

 

[Truthslayer]

All you can really do is either, set zone 2 to use for speakers in another room with an external amp.
Or you can can reassign zone 2 as Front L+R and use with an external amp.
Amps wont have a volume control (some may have a gain control) you will control the volume with your Onkyo.

 

[lovinthehd]

Wrong avr for external amps for main zone. Even the zone outputs are line-out level so you'd need an amp with a volume control to use those it seems. Weird to have zones as line outs.

 

[EpsilonZer0]

According to documentation the Pre Out Front is a European and Asian models only feature.
The picture you posted is also a European model, I know this because only those models have the AC inlet. North American models have the power cord hard wired.
Better check the unit itself.

 

[Gmoney]

no can do with that AVR.

 

[Trebdp83]

There have been a few posts pop up around here with Euro models being used for reference. I usually look to the manual for any model to figure out what it can do and sometimes that can be difficult if it is poorly written.