2. home-theater
  3. 1131412856

How to wire a speaker to multiple amps/preamps?

I am considering having in-wall speakers installed by a professional (including wiring and separate volume controls), but I'd like to keep the front-end electronics up to me so I can take advantage of various deals here and other places.

There will be two "source" rooms, one with a stereo music setup and one with a home theater setup, then several other rooms that have pairs of in-wall speakers controllable using either setup as a source. Each room with in-wall speakers will have independent impedence-matched volume controls.

Wiring the various electronics together is no problem for me, but is it reasonable to do the front end wiring of the speakers to amp or receiver myself? How does one hook up a set of speakers to two different amps?
nnyc

Showing 3 responses by nnyc

nnyc OP
28 posts
 
Thanks for the answer. Is it possible the volume controls installed in each room come with switches, or would that be on a "main" switch for all the speakers?
nnyc OP
28 posts
 
Thanks very much for the responses, this is very helpful.

Now I'm thinking maybe I could get away with just having the wiring installed, and do the switches/volume controls and speakers myself (please warn me if that's crazy :), which could save me several thousand dollars.

The installation sounds similar to yours Tasmi, the in-walls (maybe Paradigm AMS100?) are just for ambient non-critical listening throughout the house, the den setup with separate speakers (not in-wall) will be for serious listening, and the surround setup will be for movies. There will be an rf remote to control main volume in both systems, but is it possible to control the separate room volumes with a remote as well?

Is the wiring all done with regular speaker wire, or do I need power (or something else) to the volume control and/or switches?
nnyc OP
28 posts
 
Thanks again for the responses, I'm getting some good ideas...

If I didn't have switches at the volume controls, would I still be able to control the source in each room independently? I suppose I could have a main switch in one room that controlled all the other rooms?

For the remote controls, could I control the volume of each room independently with repeaters? Is there a device that can switch and control volume for each room independently with an RF remote?
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