Monitor50 or Monitor60 for Onkyo HTS-5200?

gbrennan

Hi everyone,

I'm very new to higher end audio. I have an Onkyo HT-S5200 7.1 channel HTIB, and the center channel speaker was never clear enough, so I just bought a CS1 Series II Center Speaker to replace it. I'd like to make the front of the sound stage all Polk speakers, but I'm confused about the receiver power levels required. According to the manual the receiver has 130W to each channel at 6 ohms, and 75W at 8 ohms. I'd like to get the Monitor60 speakers, but they're listed at up to 200W. Is my receiver too underpowered to drive these properly? Thanks for all your help!

tl;dr - Can an Onkyo HT-S5200 power Monitor60 speakers?

Greg

slowhat

yes.

rebuy

Welcome to Club Polk,

It depends on how big your room is and how loud you listen to music. That receiver might be ok for now, just don't turn it up till the speakers start distorting, at that point your Onkyo is running out of power and could burn up the speakers. Just because a speaker is rated for 200 watts does not mean you have to put 200 watts into them. They will take 200 watts of CLEAN power.
Get your monitors and try them out, I know they will sound better than the Onkyo speakers you currently have. You can use a pair of the Onkyo for the surrounds. We all cannot afford the best equipment so we have to work within our budget. I'd get the monitors and keep building from there. Let us know what you decide to do.

gbrennan

Excellent, thank for the help, and the tip about volume, that makes a lot of sense. I'm going to get the 60s.

Splif

I have the 60's on an Onkyo rc360. I have no problems running them with a cs2 and m30's. I sit about 7ft away from the front stage and a 15'x15'ish room. If i turn the receiver up above 35 on a movie it gets to loud to talk without shouting.