Zone 2: Matching Speakers?

[NonEntity]

I apologize if this has been asked before, I tried searching the archives without success on this topic. We just remodeled three rooms in our house and I talked my wife into running speaker wire during the project. I now have a place for the receiver and two speakers in the living room and jacks to connect a second set of speakers in the dining room. I currently have one set of Polk Monitor 70 speakers and I am in the market for at least one more set of tower speakers.

This is a 100% music system and both sets of speakers will be audible from the kitchen. Is it important that the pairs of speakers match each other or could I pick up another brand entirely? I have not been unhappy with the Polk's, but I have seen references to other speakers being better in these forums and I confess I have lusted after the EMPtek E55 speakers since reading the review here on audioholics.

Other relevant information: My receiver died right after the remodel, so I am also in the market for a receiver or integrated amp to power these four speakers (I made a separate post about the receiver in the relevant forum). My music is widely varied, but over half the time I am listening to some kind of heavy metal. I also play blue grass, folk, classical, and classic rock quite a bit. The remodel replaced carpet with vinyl plank flooring, due to the death of the receiver I really have not had an opportunity to determine what impact that will have on the sound of the Polk speakers.

 

[herbu]

Just a little clarification. You call it "Zone 2", and talk about matching speakers with your main zone.

First decide if you want the capability of listening to 2 different sources in the 2 rooms, at the same time. If it is possible you'll want to listen to one thing in the living room while listening to something/anything different in the dining room, then you are indeed talking about "Zone 2". On your AVR, Zone 2 is a pre-out, meaning it is not amplified and cannot simply be hooked to speakers. You will need to buy a second amp.

If you want to only use your AVR, I think your only choice is to use the Multi-Channel setting. It means connecting the second room speakers to your Surround speaker outputs. That has a couple disadvantages. You will lose surround capability in your main room. You will lose easy, separate volume control in your second room. To change the volume in your second room without affecting the main room, you'll have to go into your AVR settings and change the volume of those 2 speakers separately. It's not hard, but it's not as easy as just turning a knob. Without doing this, changing the main volume will change it in both rooms.

Either way, I do not think it is important to "match" speakers in two different rooms for listening in a third room, (kitchen).

 

[NonEntity]

Thank you Herbu, those are some good points! I do not plan on using two different sources; in fact, I don't foresee even having a second input device connected to the receiver as the squeezebox does everything I need. I do really want separate volume controls and the ability to switch between having both sets of speakers going and only one at a time going.