Will the 4 ohm double if I bridge my Mcintosh???


Hi (Aball) All,

I recently aquired a nice Mc7100 via "The Gon". That I really adore. Thing is it didn't come with a manual. I know from internet searches that it's rated: 100watts X 2 8ohms/ 150watts X 2 4ohms & 300 watts mono at 8ohms(no 4ohm listing when bridged to be found). I also know that I could probably purchase a manual from www.audioclassics.com
But, thought I should try here first.

Will the 4ohm also double if bridged???

Reason for asking is I plan on getting new speakers in the near future and may grab another 7100 (dual mono's) should I decied to go with some power hungry monsters like Dynaudio's, Martin Logan's, and Maggies just to name a few.

Thanks for your time,
jalen01

Showing 1 response by karls

The reason that most amps aren't rated at 4 Ohms when bridged is that bridging effectively drops the load in half. In other words, the "300 watts bridged into 8 Ohms" is twice the "150 watts into 4 Ohms" rating, because both channels are driving half of one 8 Ohm speaker. Putting a 4 Ohm load across a bridged amp makes each channel think it is actually driving 2 Ohms. The amp isn't rated for it, and will likely get very hot if you drive it at high levels (which is usually the justification for bridging in the first place).