Will my reciever be powerful enough for monitor70/60

Ister

I recently built my first Ht setup I have a Onkyo tx-sr608 receiver, CS2 center, M50 fronts, M30 surrounds and a Bic f-12 Sub (came highly recommended on avs forums).

I was thinking of adding monitor 60 or 70 fronts and moving my monitor 50s to to rears and monitor 30 to wides. The Onkyo 608 has no pre-outs which I new before I bought it however what I didn't realize was the 100 watts per channel is just a lie (but everyone's lying whats up with that) and with a full setup may only be pushing 40 watts per channel. Would adding monitor 60s or 70s to this setup not have enough juice to drive them and cause damage (clipping) or just not allow them to shine to their full potential?

I can't believe how great surround setups have gotten with auto setup tools like Audyssey sitting in the sweet spot the sound beats anything I ever heard before. I'm very happy I upgraded and for the price newegg been selling these speakers for its impossible to beat.

EndersShadow

You have enough juice to power the Monitors with no problems.

Ister

xcapri79 wrote: »

With your setup, adding the Monitor 60's would work just fine. I have a bedroom system with Monitor 60's and a CS2 up front and Monitor 50's for surrounds and I enjoy it very much.

With the Monitor 70's, I would upgrade the receiver and want the ability to use an external amp so they sound their best.

So if you have no intention of changing your receiver, you wil be quite happy with the Monitor 60 choice.
If you plan on upgrading your receiver, then consider the Monitor 70's.

I'm thinking about upgrading my receiver in a year or two and getting a amp for my fronts, However if I got the monitor 70s now and had my 30s and 50s running well would this cause clipping and damage the monitor 70s?

EndersShadow

Ister wrote: »

I'm thinking about upgrading my receiver in a year or two and getting a amp for my fronts, However if I got the monitor 70s now and had my 30s and 50s running well would this cause clipping and damage the monitor 70s?

totally dependent upon the volume level. The higher you crank it the more likely that could happen. If you listen at moderate/low levels you should be fine...

Lietuvis91

Well... not so fast...

EndersShadow wrote: »

You have enough juice to power the Monitors with no problems.

This is dead on...

xcapri79 wrote: »

With the Monitor 70's, I would upgrade the receiver and want the ability to use an external amp so they sound their best.

So if you have no intention of changing your receiver, you wil be quite happy with the Monitor 60 choice.
If you plan on upgrading your receiver, then consider the Monitor 70's.

I have the same setup, so I will will chime in. I initially had my 7.1 HT system setup the following way:

CS2 center
M70 fronts
M60 surrounds
Atrium 5 rears

Setup this way, the system sounded ok for HT, but if you tried to rock out to your favorite song in all channels, it sounded very dull and anemic. That receiver does not have enough juice for this. If all you will do is HT, and no loud music playing, you may be ok. Otherwise, i'd stick to a 5.1 setup because each speaker will be fed much more power and will sound much better.

See my sig, the way I have my 5.1 setup currently sounds extremely good, and what helped big time was setting the center and surrounds to over 100hz and the m60 towers to 80hz, while letting the sub handle everything below 80hz. Once that load was taken off the speakers it the entire system sounded even better yet!

There was a review somehwere of the sr608 receiver and they showed how in 5ch mode it was pumping out much more power per ch, then in 7 ch mode(close to double) and so this actually explains why 4 towers + 2 bookshelves and a center may not be ideal for this receiver.

Anyway, I'm really happy with the way I have my 5.1 setup currently. We have had a number of parties where we cranked this thing up to over 80% volume and the receiver did just fine playing all channels, no clipping, it sounded great.

Good luck!

EndersShadow

Eh, once again depends. I have an Integra DTR 5.9. Its just a higher end Onkyo. Its supposed to put out 125x7 which we can all agree it probably doesnt. As per my sig I have a 5.1 setup of the Monitor line.

With my reciever I never had any problems driving my speakers to a level that made my neighbors complain (I live in an apartment). I did however jump on a dedicated amp as my upgrade path includes LSi speakers which are WAAAYYY to much for my Integra to handle.

Does it sound better with the dedicated amp? No question it does, even at low levels. But I was lucky in that I had pre-outs to begin with. I would bet that while a dedicated amp would really help out the 70's he can still use his Onkyo to drive them.

Lots of folks have that setup and enjoy it very much. Not saying upgrading to seperates would be bad, just that for now he can enjoy what he has and shouldnt have problems...

Also depends on how large a room he has. In a small room he will be fine, in a big room he might not. You have to also take into effect things like room modes, acoustic treatments or lack thereof and other factors.

I would say try it and see but thats just my .02.

Ister

Lietuvis91 wrote: »

Well... not so fast...



This is dead on...





I have the same setup, so I will will chime in. I initially had my 7.1 HT system setup the following way:

CS2 center
M70 fronts
M60 surrounds
Atrium 5 rears

Setup this way, the system sounded ok for HT, but if you tried to rock out to your favorite song in all channels, it sounded very dull and anemic. That receiver does not have enough juice for this. If all you will do is HT, and no loud music playing, you may be ok. Otherwise, i'd stick to a 5.1 setup because each speaker will be fed much more power and will sound much better.

See my sig, the way I have my 5.1 setup currently sounds extremely good, and what helped big time was setting the center and surrounds to over 100hz and the m60 towers to 80hz, while letting the sub handle everything below 80hz. Once that load was taken off the speakers it the entire system sounded even better yet!

There was a review somehwere of the sr608 receiver and they showed how in 5ch mode it was pumping out much more power per ch, then in 7 ch mode(close to double) and so this actually explains why 4 towers + 2 bookshelves and a center may not be ideal for this receiver.

Anyway, I'm really happy with the way I have my 5.1 setup currently. We have had a number of parties where we cranked this thing up to over 80% volume and the receiver did just fine playing all channels, no clipping, it sounded great.

Good luck!

Thanks for all the Info Sounds like I might just buy some 70s for my fronts move my 50s back as surrounds and put my monitor 30s away until I upgrade to a better amp.

As I intend to use this almost excursively for HT do you believe I'll beable to run the 70s without damaging them until I upgrade to a better amp? The highest I've had to put my 608's volume so far was 77 as you probably know its very quite 1-30.

Lietuvis91

In 5.1 and especially for HT you should definitely be fine with m70s and m50s.

My HT setup was initially meant for movies, but more and more is being used for music, so all I wanted to warn you about was hooking up 7 speakers and cranking up your favorite song with all channels going and wondering why the sound is not very filling.

With the space I have and the power this receiver produces, I didn't think 7.1 was worth it. I'd rather have 5 well powered speakers over 7 anemic ones... but if you have extra speaker wire lying around, you can try 7.1 and see what you think for yourself, the receiver will handle it, I just wouldn't expect anything amazing...