Which Receiver for Polk Audio SDA-2 Speakers?

RockCrayfish

Hi guys,

First time poster here.

I recently acquired my father's Polk Audio SDA-2s (I think 2Bs, to be exact) and although they sounded fantastic running through his home setup, they're not so great on mine. Don't get me wrong, they sound nice but not as nice as I'd like them to sound.

I'm currently running them through a Pioneer VSX-921K in stereo and I'd like to upgrade to a more powerful and better sounding unit. I've been told to look for an old amp and receiver but I'd like to incorporate these speakers into a 7.1 or 7.2 setup and the Onkyo TX-NR818 is right in my budget.

Thoughts?

Toolfan66

You need an external amp to make them shine. Not sure if your receiver has pre outs but if it don't I would get one that does get a amp sit back and smile..

jumpindick

I agree, need an amp.

gudnoyez

What was your fater running them off of?

boston1450

This is what i did with the ones i had--- i had a denon HT receiver. I went and bought a power Denon 200 watt amp. It worked fantastic.. SDA2b speakers need POWER to get them to sing for you....there are lots of methods you can do. DO NOT UNDERPOWER THEM. You came to the right place. Spend some time here and you will enjoy those fine speakers

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WELCOME

boston1450

If im right they need 50+ CONSERVATIVE PLUS WATTS PER CHANNEL---AND WILL WANT MORE TO GET BEST QUALITY OUT OF THOSE FINE SPEAKERS---- there are people here that will help you with your journey. ENJOY

jon s

I think posted this on AVS as well... Like others have mentioned, the SDA speakers require a LOT of power. They are very low impedance speakers and most AVRs cannot handle the load. If you plan to run them in multi-channel mode, the speakers will suck the life out of the amp and sound terrible.

RockCrayfish

Thanks for the help guys!

My father was running then through an old Sony amp and a marantz receiver. That being said, he did try running them throught just the Maranrz and couldn't hear any degradation an quality.

So, the general consensus is That these speakers need an amp, but does that hold true for an AVR putting out 250 watts at 4 ohms per channel (TX-NR818)? I will only be using this receiver on a 2.0 setup until I move and maybe then invest in an amp.

F1nut

RockCrayfish wrote: »

My father was running then through an old Sony amp and a marantz receiver. That being said, he did try running them throught just the Maranrz and couldn't hear any degradation an quality.

I would suspect the Sony amp wasn't very good.

So, the general consensus is That these speakers need an amp, but does that hold true for an AVR putting out 250 watts at 4 ohms per channel (TX-NR818)? I will only be using this receiver on a 2.0 setup until I move and maybe then invest in an amp.

That AVR doesn't put out anywhere near what you think it does. In fact, it is not rated to drive 4 ohm loads at all.

As you can see it is rated for 6 ohms at 1 kHz only and the power drops slightly.

Front L/R 135 W (8 ohms, 20 Hz-20 kHz, 0.08%, 2 channels driven, FTC)
125 W + 125 W (6 ohms, 1 kHz, 0.7%, 2 channels driven, FTC)

Worthless specs and note that is only one channel driven.

Dynamic Power 300 W (3 ohms, 1 ch)
250 W (4 ohms, 1 ch)
150 W (8 ohms, 1 ch)

RockCrayfish

I did find out that the amp he was, and still is, using is a Sony TA-N55ES. Maybe I'll look for an amp with similar specs and cut my receiver budget back a little..