I am looking into buying a vintage Marantz receiver - 2270, 2275 or 2385. I am seeing a lot of discussion about their ability to handle lower impedence speakers 4ohms. While I would like opinions on this topic, I am most interested to know if I can hook an aux amp to to drive some 8 ohm speakersin a separate room. I like to plays same music in multiple rooms but my current receiver cant handle both due to mismatch
The only Marantz that was ever reputed to have problems with a four ohm load was the 2270 and, even then it isn't so much of a "problem" as that, unlike virtually every other amp out there, it produces less power at four ohms than at eight. As such, I wouldn't suggest running two speakers simultaneously from a 2270.
But, I've heard stories of people successfully running power hungry four ohm AR-3a speakers from 2270's.
As for an auxiliary amp, that's not a problem. My suggestion is that you remove (and save!) the pre-out/main-in jumper, replace it with a Male-Male-Female "Y" connector and feed the auxiliary amp from the dangling female connector
I'm still running my 2270 almost every day, which I picked up NIB in the early 70's and all I've had done to it is two FM alignments and replaced the power switch.
