Can a 6 ohm rated amp drive 8ohm speakers?

Hi all sifus,

my old and faithful Onkyo AV receiver was matched with Tannoy M2 bookshelves... source is computer soundcard - very low budget setup and nothing compared to fellow audiophiles here. Bought them way back in 1999 and planned to upgrade into HT sometime back but end up didnt.

Recently the tweeter driver on left hand side become noisy at times so Im thinking to replace it with a floorstander. Either 1st or 2nd hand depending on budget.

I always wanted floorstand for the looks of it and I will use it to play songs of all genres including occassional watch movies and play games. Furthermore, without space or extra budget for additional sub, I think it suits better....

okok, i think I've diverge too much - the topic supposed to be I'm looking around for speakers but most of them are 8ohms, I think including my M2. So question is, will it affect the lifespan or performance of the speakers? or the amp?

should be able to.


Disclaimer: if u blow your speakers and/or amp ... not my fault.

should be right mate, but not at best performance

thks for the replies, but can u elaborate how it affects performance? or how will it blow my amp/speakers?

btw, I chked it says 70W 6ohm

70w on 6ohm will produce less wattage on 8 ohm, vice versa
& it will have to work more if you decide on 4 ohm speakers

kepish?

should be ok, agree with azri, but not at best performance...as long you not high peak your volume..

azri wrote:70w on 6ohm will produce less wattage on 8 ohm, vice versa
& it will have to work more if you decide on 4 ohm speakers

kepish?

u mean kapish? errrm i think so... so does it mean if i pair my amp with a 6ohm speakers, it would be best performance (provided the power handling of speakers is at least 70w or more)?

yes indeed

*kepish = understood

ok, this is something i copied from another forum where someone asked the same question:


8 Ohm speaker connected to a 6 Ohm amp will be less load on the amp - but will yield less volume at same volume setting.

No damage will occur!

Your receiver feeds voltage to your speakers. For every volt that it feeds to an 8 ohm speaker it will have to deliver one eighth of an amp. Current equals voltage divided by resistance; that's Ohm's law. (We'll skip the complexities of reactive loads for now.)

The good news is that your receiver was designed for 6 ohm speakers. This means that it is capable of delivering one sixth of an amp for each volt. It can but, with eight ohm speakers, it doesn't have to. It doesn't have to work so hard. The only drawback is that you will get less power - for which read less volume. Power equals voltage multiplied by current. Your receiver feeds the same voltage to your 8 ohm speakers but you only get 75% of the current that you would have got with 6 ohm speakers.

It's like having a light fitting marked "Max 100 watts" but you've only got a 75 watt bulb. That lower power bulb won't damage your light fittimg but it won't be as bright either. Actually, reducing your power by 25% isn't nearly as bad as it sounds. It's only 1.25 decibels and most people would hardly notice unless you told them. Just turn the volume up a bit.

sflam wrote: Power equals voltage multiplied by current. Your receiver feeds the same voltage to your 8 ohm speakers but you only get 75% of the current that you would have got with 6 ohm speakers.

U need to delve deeper than the simple power equation. Got to account for the amp's output impedance + cable losses vs the speaker's impedance and then calculate whats the actual power delivered to the speakers.

wow thks for the info, looks like i got lots to learn...