Outdoor Speakers w/ Volume control

[artiez24]

I just installed a pair of outdoor speakers with a outdoor volume control. Speakers are OSD AP-640 and volume control is monoprice impedence matching. For now have an older onkyo 5.1 receiver driving only this set of speakers. After hooking everything up and turning them on I noticed that I am having to turn the volume up pretty high on the reciever side in order to get a decent level of volume outside. I did not change jumper inside of volume control since only driving one pair of 8ohm speakers. What is causing me having to turn up receiver so much? Eventually I will add more speakers so I dont want the others to be really loud just to get some volume to outdoor speakers. Any ideas on what is going on?

 

[TLS Guy]

I just installed a pair of outdoor speakers with a outdoor volume control. Speakers are OSD AP-640 and volume control is monoprice impedence matching. For now have an older onkyo 5.1 receiver driving only this set of speakers. After hooking everything up and turning them on I noticed that I am having to turn the volume up pretty high on the reciever side in order to get a decent level of volume outside. I did not change jumper inside of volume control since only driving one pair of 8ohm speakers. What is causing me having to turn up receiver so much? Eventually I will add more speakers so I dont want the others to be really loud just to get some volume to outdoor speakers. Any ideas on what is going on?

First of all
make sure you have the knob on the speakers set to 8 ohms. Those speakers have a built in transformer for 70 volt line systems. Since you are using a low impedance 8 ohm system, you need to make sure the transformer is not being used. That means making sure the knob on both speakers is set to 8 ohms.

The next issue is that line losses in low impedance systems can be severe. How long are your speaker wires? In a low impedance system like that the speaker wire needs to be 12 AWG at least.

The next thing is monoprice make no mention of the losses in those volume controls. In fact their spec page is a disgrace. Impedance matching volume controls use auto transformers. Typical losses are 5 db, so over half your amp power will be lost typically. For long speaker runs even with 12 AWG wire losses are often 3db. So it is possible you have losses of 8db, more if the losses in the volume control exceed 5db.

What all this adds up to is that systems with volume controls in the speaker leads are background music systems and not suitable for high power applications. If you want to "rock the palace" this is not the right engineering solution.

 

[artiez24]

Thanks for the response. The speakers I have do not have that knob to adjust the transformer. I believe that is optional on the speakers and I did not see that knob on back. I am using 16gauge wire as the runs to the volume control are about 20ft and even less from volume control to each speakers. Is. There a way to test how much loss I am getting? I dont intend on blasting those speakers but when this turns into multiroom setup I dont want evrything else to be blasting just to get decent volume outside. Would another iption be to replace volume control with higher quality option from niles for outdoor speaker depot?

 

[BMXTRIX]

Keep in mind you are running a volume control into a volume control.

Typically, distributed audio systems run from a dedicated amplifier, not a surround sound home theater receiver, into impedance matching VCs or into a speaker selector w/impedance matching.

That amplifier will typically be set at 0dB. That is, full power for the amp. Then volume control is handled by the... (get ready for it) ...volume control.

Set your Onkyo volume up high, that's where it is supposed to be. Let the volume control outside be the one to adjust the volume.

Also, be aware that outdoors you need more power and more volume because you are dealing with a space where sound just floats away. You aren't going to easily get nice tight sound outdoors.

I personally wouldn't have used the Onkyo for the outdoor setup, but that's up to you. It's not the best way of doing things is all.

 

[artiez24]

Yeah I understand about the onkyo, its what I had laying around for now. I dont intend on sticking with that. That being said with the intent on creating a multiroom setup, should i be looking for a reciever with a seconary preamp out and then running a dedicated amplifier for the outside zone? Or is there a specific option on a home theatre reciever that I should be looking for that will accomplish what I want.

 

[crossedover]

aside from the aforementioned, if found those speakers sensitivity to be more around 84dbs, so depending on run length and wire gauge that will be a contributing factor.

 

[TLS Guy]

Yeah I understand about the onkyo, its what I had laying around for now. I dont intend on sticking with that. That being said with the intent on creating a multiroom setup, should i be looking for a reciever with a seconary preamp out and then running a dedicated amplifier for the outside zone? Or is there a specific option on a home theatre reciever that I should be looking for that will accomplish what I want.

Home theater receivers are a really poor choice for whole house and outdoor audio.

You need a receiver with zone 2 preouts. Make sure it sends digital sources to the Zone 2, a lot only send analog.

Then your choices are a distribution amp, or a 70 volt amp and taps on the speakers. If runs are long 70 volt systems are the way to go.

With your gauge of wire, your resistance is estimated at just under and ohm, which is too high. You need 12 AWG to get you where you want to be. If you can't easily change the cable, that would push you in the direction of a 70 volt system. You can wire up the speakers with bell wire for those, since it is a high impedance system and line loss then becomes insignificant.

I doubt changing the volume controls will help you, a 5 db loss seems typical. The loss in yours is not specified.

Unfortunately we get a lot of posts on this sort of thing. People underestimate the complexity of what is involved to do it right, and the expense of it come to that.

 

[BMXTRIX]

Yeah I understand about the onkyo, its what I had laying around for now. I dont intend on sticking with that. That being said with the intent on creating a multiroom setup, should i be looking for a reciever with a seconary preamp out and then running a dedicated amplifier for the outside zone? Or is there a specific option on a home theatre reciever that I should be looking for that will accomplish what I want.

Do you have the outdoor volume control cranked up to 100%?

Do you have your indoor Onkyo unit cranked up to 100%?

What are the actual volume levels you are talking about?

For distributed audio, there are many solutions, a dedicated amplifier for outside is one of them. Getting rid of the volume control outside in favor of a preamp/amp setup is solid as well. I've personally run 16 AWG cabling a hundred feet to outdoor speakers and they sound great, but they were good speakers and it was using a preamp and a dedicated amplifier rated at 40WPC dedicated, full time.

You can pick up a multi-channel amplifier for your whole house distribution if you would like and some systems have integrated pre-amps and source/volume control from keypads which can be located closer to the seating position.

ie: HTD Mid-Level Whole-House Audio System

In a properly wired volume control, I have not seen a serious drop in audio output levels, but cheaper speakers and larger spaces certainly don't allow setups to 'blast' when in use.

 

[artiez24]

All good info. I thik what I am taking away from this is to swap out the 16gauge with 12gauge and to start looking for reciever with preout and install secondary amp for powering outdoor. I really want to keep volume control for outside since I know that area volume would have to be different than inside. Hopefully i can get 12 gauge wire to fit inside volume control was hard enough with 16. Another question is I would only have to change wire on runs from amp to volume control right. Volume control to spreakers are short runs.

 

[TLS Guy]

All good info. I thik what I am taking away from this is to swap out the 16gauge with 12gauge and to start looking for reciever with preout and install secondary amp for powering outdoor. I really want to keep volume control for outside since I know that area volume would have to be different than inside. Hopefully i can get 12 gauge wire to fit inside volume control was hard enough with 16. Another question is I would only have to change wire on runs from amp to volume control right. Volume control to spreakers are short runs.

The long run will give you the most improvement. Your speaker manual recommends 12 AWG wire and I agree.

 

[artiez24]

Sounds like a plan. Thanks all for the help.