Adding "Pre-amp out / Pwr amp in option" to Sansui AU-217

[john cronin]

I intend to modify an AU-217 with "Pre Amp Out / Power Amp In Option". I have a friend who loves the sound of the Amp but wants to drive 4 x 8 ohm speakers but the internal Amp can't cope with nominal 4 ohm loads as protection kicks in etc. Adding additional power amp would be a good option.

Anything special to look out for ? etc

 

[smurfer77]

The AU-217 isn't really an amp that is designed to drive multiple pairs of speakers simultaneously, and that is why it has only one set of speaker terminals.

If your friend loves the sound of the AU-217 (and I don't blame him, I love it too), a good option may be to buy another AU-217 and use an RCA splitter cable to send the source signal to both amplifiers; I.e. have one AU-217 for each pair of speakers. This will likely be cheaper than buying a big power amp and will preserve the sound your friend seeks. Yes, most of the sound may be from the preamp, but the power-amp section may be contributing too.

Or, get a bigger AU-X17 series amp.

 

[CrSens]

In this type of cases I simply use headphone output from the amp (217) to drive another amp. Preferably the other amp will have some gain control to better match levels (a lot of amps do have it). In most cases there is not a perceptible drop in quality (it is good enough).