Will amp with power=45W have enough power for 340s?

[shellylh]

I have been looking into buying a pair of Ascend bookshelves (either Ascend 170 or 340). I am leaning towards the 340s because I have read that they have more bass extension. However, the integrated amp that I have is a Pioneer Elite A-35R integrated amp that has a power rating of 2x45W for 8 Ohm speakers. Since the 340s have a Minimum Recommended Power of 35W, I thought that the Pioneer may have trouble driving them. Does anyone else have experience driving the 340s with an amp with a power rating of 40-50W? Maybe the 170's would work better in this situtation since they only have a min rec power of 25W. I am not really interested in buying a new amp. I will be using them in a room that is approx 12'x12'. Thanks for your help!

[buddhadas]

originally, I had a McIntosh 2505 (50 watts) running my 340se's with no problem whatsoever. I have since graduated to a McIntosh 2120 (120 watts) but I never felt the 2505 was ever lacking.
Hope this helps.

Peace,

Jim

[shellylh]

Thanks Jim!

Has anyone used the Pioneer a-35r with the 340s?

This is a pretty dumb question but why is the min power requirement on the 340's larger than the min power requirement on the 170 even thought the sensitivity of the 340's is larger than that of the 170's. Is it just because the 340's have two woofers and the 170's only have one?

[azanon]

Thanks Jim!

Has anyone used the Pioneer a-35r with the 340s?

This is a pretty dumb question but why is the min power requirement on the 340's larger than the min power requirement on the 170 even thought the sensitivity of the 340's is larger than that of the 170's. Is it just because the 340's have two woofers and the 170's only have one?

The key is probably the term you left out; minimum recommended power. A bigger speaker like that can probably take more power, so I would guess Ascend is recommending more for it to utilize its capabilities.

"Minimum power", period, would be another issue all-together.

[davef]

This is a pretty dumb question but why is the min power requirement on the 340's larger than the min power requirement on the 170 even thought the sensitivity of the 340's is larger than that of the 170's. Is it just because the 340's have two woofers and the 170's only have one?

Not a dumb question at all and Azanon is correct in his response. Our minimum recommended power rating is the minimum amount of power that we feel is required to make the speakers really sing. It is not the minimum amount of power required to make the speakers function properly. Technically, only 1 watt of power into a single 340 SE will deliver about 90-92dB in-room at 1 meter. That is quite loud for most people...

The 340 SE is more efficient than the 170 SE, however, it is a larger and more powerful speaker and should be fed a bit more power to reach its median performance potential (get the woofers moving more). Think about it like a high performance racing engine --- higher revs (up to a point) will provide greater performance than lower revs.

Hope this helps!

[shellylh]

Thanks, these answer completely make sense. I was mistaking "recommended" for "required." So I am thinking of going for the 340's (maybe even refurbished if there are any left to save some money). Do you think they would be overkill? My thought is that I will probably be happier longer with the 340's and can always upgrade my amp in the future if I am not happy with it.