@dman777 you’ve sparked one of the best threads I’ve seen in a long time with many members taking deep dives into watts / amperage / speaker relationship. A lot of members took a lot of time to delve into the topic and provided a lot of great advice and guidance. I’d echo what others already have form a speaker / amp pairing. Gaining Volume from an Amp relative to your speakers is more complex than just looking at the speaker sensitivity rating and the watts rating on the amp. Improving performance / volume with your current speakers is more complex than manufacture #’s on an amp and or speakers. As many have referenced, having visibility to your set up would really open up the type of detailed advice that could be provided, not just your speakers but everything in the chain. Gain values apply to DAC’s, Streamers, CD players, Turntables and that impacts the volume knob on your Yamaha Reciever.
Best analogy I’ve seen when talking about amplifier performance and the ability for an amp to drive a set of speakers is that to an engine, not all Horsepower is created equal, following that logic, not all Watts are created equal. For an engine, torque plays a huge role in performance of the HP that an engine produces, where and when the torque and HP shows up in the RPM range of the engine plays a huge role in how the performance of the engine translates to the performance of the car. It’s the same for an amplifier, not all watts are created equally. In SS amps, so much of the control of the speaker has to do with the amps ability to control the woofer, drivers and as many others have referenced, deal with the wide variation of impedance requirements. A large power supply coupled with the proper design / implementation is what allows the combination of amperage and watts that drive speakers to effortless volume. Having a reserve of power to then drive watts / amperage is what gives an amp headroom. When you pair an amp with speakers you need to understand what type of car you are dropping the engine into. You wouldn’t drop a race car engine in a Ford Super Duty 350 and you wouldn’t drop a diesel 6.7 liter V8 into a Toyota Camry. Same principles apply when pairing an amp with speakers. You need the right combo of watts / amperage, one without the other however won’t get you to fully realize a speakers full potential. An amp with a lower wattage rating but a higher amperage rating, power supply that can deliver more current will almost always drive speakers to higher levels than an amp that has a higher watts rating but lacks the power supply to deliver amperage / current. Again though, grab a pair of high efficiency speakers and hook them up to high amp / watt Coda or Krell amps and you won’t get past turning your equipment on and you could have music playing rather loudly with the volume dial at zero, create as many problems as not having enough watts / power.
Thanks for starting the thread, it generated a ton of thoughtful, insightful replies within the Gon community, good luck.