2. amps-preamps
  3. 195314-188853

Driving speakers in more than one room

Hello, I am trying to set things up so that I can have independent volume control for a pair of in-wall speakers in a room that's separate from my main listening area.
 

With my current set up, I have a Home Theater receiver that I just use for watching movies, and a stereo integrated amplifier that I have all of my 2-channel sources connected to.  The integrated amp has a bypass so I can use my main speakers for both stereo listening and for the Front L/R channels when watching movies.

For the in-wall speakers in the other room, I have them connected to a secondary integrated amp, and I have the fixed line out of my main integrated amp going to the secondary integrated.  I figured this would be a great solution, but I'm getting distortion issues when I have the secondary integrated in 'standby' and just want to listen in the main room.  Apparently when the secondary integrated amp is in standby the analog inputs are probably put in some kind of state where they are affecting the signal at the main integrated amp (via the fixed line out).

I could control the in-wall speakers using zone 2 on the HT receiver, but then I'd have to use the HT receiver for connecting my 2-channel audio sources and I was trying to avoid that.

What would be a good solution for being able to independently control the volume of the in-wall speaker in the other room if I want to keep my -channel sources connected to the integrated amp (and not to the HT receiver)?

 

Thank you,
Greg

rhythm5
fastfreight
969 posts
 

Weird.

imhififan's avatar
imhififan
2,232 posts
 

I’ve seen on this topic seem to indicate that connecting a fixed line out to an input on another unit will sometimes work and other times not, depending on how the input and output circuits are designed on the two integrated amps/receivers involved.

Yes, the outputs of some preamps do not work properly when one of the two connected devices is idle.

My suggestion is to install an A/B source selector to the Musical Fidlity M5si line output and connect the NAD 316BEE to the "02" output of the source selector. If you want to listen to music in the main setup without turning on the NAD 316BEE, just change the source selector to "01".

 

 

rhythm5 OP
22 posts
 

I was also thinking that maybe I'll just always turn the NAD on when I've got the Musical Fidelity on.  If I don't want to hear music in the secondary room I can just turn down the volume on the NAD.

But since it does seem like this solution (fixed/record line out to the input of another integrated amp) can have issues when the secondary is in standby, I'm wondering what most people do when they have a second room with wired speakers that they occasionally want to use.

 

Thank you,
Greg

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