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Topic: 8 0hms speakers w/ 6 ohms reciever (Read 8483 times) previous topic - next topic
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8 0hms speakers w/ 6 ohms reciever

I just bought a receiver that  I dearly love(JVC  RX-D205) and it does 6 0hms output. My speakers are 8 ohms. Is this going to hurt my receiver or be extra hard on the receiver?
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8 0hms speakers w/ 6 ohms reciever

Reply #1 –
No, it won't. Nothing bad can happen.
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8 0hms speakers w/ 6 ohms reciever

Reply #3 –
Short answer: If the speaker impedance is higher than the receiver (as in your case) then the receiver won't have to work as hard, but your maximum volume will be less.

Don't ask me what happens when the speaker impedance is less. I just went through that in a recent thread and have no desire to reopen that can of worms.

8 0hms speakers w/ 6 ohms reciever

Reply #5 –
If you follow the link Seiitsu has posted you will either learn a lot or else get hopelessly lost, probably the latter.  I'll try to summarize.  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.  As pdq points out, 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 (apart from the audio experts on this forum) would hardly notice unless you told them.  Just turn the volume up a bit.

8 0hms speakers w/ 6 ohms reciever

Reply #6 –
Also, it says in the manual (and on the back of the receiver) that it is compatible with speakers from 6 ohms to 16 ohms. The 6 ohm rating is just the minimum recommended impedance, and it would probably be happier with something higher (like 8 ohms), especially because some speakers can dip significantly below their nominal impedance at certain frequencies.

8 0hms speakers w/ 6 ohms reciever

Reply #7 –
Quote from: bryant on
Also, it says in the manual (and on the back of the receiver) that it is compatible with speakers from 6 ohms to 16 ohms. The 6 ohm rating is just the minimum recommended impedance, and it would probably be happier with something higher (like 8 ohms), especially because some speakers can dip significantly below their nominal impedance at certain frequencies.


What I was actually claiming in that thread was that a 6 ohm rating means that 6 ohms is the optimum load, in the sense that it will deliver the maximum undistorted power into 6 ohms. Higher or lower than 6 ohms will still work but with less undistorted power. Unfortunately not everyone agreed with me.