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Dumb Multiroom Question

Hi All:

My friend has an old Adcom GFA555 that he runs through a speaker switching box that allows him to play five different pairs of speakers throughout his house. The amp is tired and about to blow so he wants to replace it and asked me to help. I'm wondering: rather than buy another two channel amp to run through the switching box could he instead use a five channel home theater amp and hook each pair of speakers up directly to the back panel of the amp? I know the outputs are for fronts, center, surrounds, etc but if he went this route would he get equal sound levels from all five sets of speakers while playing two channel music? I know this is a dumb question but I know nothing about home theater equipment. Thanks for the assistance.
128x128dodgealum
4 responses Add your response
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markphd
667 posts
 
In addition to needing two five channel amps, in order to get "equal" sound, all five channels have to have the same power output. For example, some cheap HT receivers don't have as much power for the rear surrounds.

If this is just a convenience thing to get sound to all the rooms for mostly background listening, a switching box is probably a lot more economical.
dodgealum's avatar
dodgealum OP
1,404 posts
 
Thanks folks. I'm going to recommend a good quality integrated going through the switching box. I appreciate the info.
elevick
2,636 posts
 
Niles makes multi channel amps that are really nice. I really like the 12 channel sherbourne. This could eliminate the multi speaker selector. My guess is that the selector is actually hurting the sound quality anyway. Older Adcom units tended to have "melt downs".
I'm using a really nice 2 channel amp with a top of the line niles selector and am very happy.
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