AboutCleggsan Expertise Audio Design Engineer; systems, loudspeakers, cd/dvd players, etc. I am knowledgeable in all high end audio equipment and installations. MAKE SURE YOU GIVE A MAKE AND MODEL NUMBER AND CAR IF IT IS AN AUTO QUESTION.
Experience Have been associated with audio design, standards, testing and component systems for over 40 years.
Organizations Life Fellow Member of Audio Engineering Society
Life Senior Member of Institute of Electronic and Electrical Engineers
Publications Review technical manuscripts for IEEE Spectrum
Write occasionally for high-end audio publications
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Question QUESTION: I have the following installed running 4 pairs of speakers and a sub. i want to add 3 more sets of speakers 3 different rooms to run same source to all speakers.
Onkyo M-282 Amp
Audiosource 1A preamp
Yamaha GE-60 Graphic equalizer
Niles SSVC-6 speaker selector with volume controls
I also have available but not connected:
Niles SVL-2
NAD 1130 Preamp
NAD 2200PE amp
NAD 2140 amp
various in wall volume control with or without impedence control
Phoenix gold 8 speaker selector-no impedence control
Not sure how to fire all speakers with this mess?
Any help or advice would be appreciated.
ANSWER: I don't understand what you are wanting to do.
You want to have 4 rooms each with 4 speakers and a subwoofer in each room? In other words, a 4.1 system in each room, all with a feed from the same source. Is that what you are thinking?
The best solution is to have a 4 channel amplifier dedicated to each room. Then, each room needs a sub amp to feed the subwoofer.
Are you feeding surround sound or regular stereo or mono into the rooms? Are they commercial rooms (like a restaurant)? Or are they home rooms as in a residential acoustic space?
Why do you have the equalizer? Are you wanting to do something with that?
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With the separate amplification you can control the sound level in each room independently and you can switch them on or off from each amplifier; in other words you have total control this way. A sub amp, same thing; one for each room with its own power on and off.
One preamp can run inputs into the 4 room amplifiers and the 4 subwoofers; or you can use one of the preamps as an extra driver for rooms A and B and the other preamp to run rooms C and D.
That is a simple system and you can build on it as you desire. I don't see any need for nor any easy way to integrate the Niles switchers into your design.
A most important matter is to match the speaker impedance and amplifiers for proper loading. Also, install the amps where there is plenty of ventilation so as to prevent over heating them.
Maybe this will be a good solution, but let me know more of the story and we can refine if necessary.
C
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QUESTION: No, only 1 sub in room with amp. I want to add 1 set of speakers to 2 other rooms. My question is how to use single source to feed all these safely and control volume in each room. This is for an office. I would like all feeds to be stereo. Total pairs of speakers would be 7.
ANSWER: I still recommend independent amplifiers for each room.
Speaker switching is not so good idea in a situation such as yours. I do not recommend you go that route because of speaker loading on the amplifiers becoming too complicated and compromising. The switching units by Niles are intended for use when only one pair of speakers is connected at a time. Individual driving amplifiers is a good engineering solution as well as an economic one. For office background music you don't need alot of power and you can also easily make voice override if you need to feed emergency announcements or such into the system.
But, I am more confused than ever as to what you are going to put in each room and how many rooms total. However, as before, one preamp output can easily feed the room amplifiers. And each amplifier can feed the stereo speaker pairs in each room.
It is a simple configuration. You only need to add enough amplifiers so that you have one for each room.
Hope this will help.
C
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QUESTION: OK. How do I hook multiple amps to a preamp?
Answer The preamp output cable can be connected to several cables to the inputs of the several amps. It can be done through a junction box or, they can merely be soldered together by taking conventional audio cables and cut off one end and solder all the hot together and all the grounds together.
The output impedance of typical preamp circuits is usually well below 10k and the input impedance of typical amplifiers is around 50k ohms. Therefore, you can parallel up to 5 amplifiers and be okey for low distortion audio drive of the amps. If you go over 5 you should add a booster line amp.
