Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion Advice from Axiom Owners The M80's just got here....the AMP will not work

M60's might be an excellent choice.

The Onkyo M-504 power amp...is a great amp. It had great reviews and works perfectly..for 20 years. The problem here is it dose not work with a 4 ohm load. Which it was never designed to do i guess. But high end stereo speakers of the time, were not 4 ohm either. Don't fault the amp. It is the best amp Onkyo ever made.
This is nothing but a power amp..hugh, weighs a ton.
Stereo hi end speakers of the time were never 4 ohms. The amp works perfect, with all the others.

Just a while ago, a Denon receiver would have been enough.

I run M80s at reasonable volumes off a 75 WPC Harman/Kardon receiver. I think there's something else going on here--either a problem with the speakers or a short in the wiring.

I thought you only needed 2 WPC!

Speaking of Outlaw, this looks interesting:
http://www.outlawaudio.com/products/7900.html

An amp that requires dual 15A breakers is quite a beast...

I know of one speaker from the past that has always been 4 ohm, Magnepan. I doubt it was unheard of.

That was exactly my thought as I read this. AFAIR when I first started reading this forum several years ago only new Onkyo’s were being recommended for the M80s as previous models were not cutting it. That was exactly why I torture tested mine when I bought it just to make sure it could handle the 4 ohm load.

I agree.

Ken.C. is right.

I use an Onkyo Integra M-504 to drive a pair of Thiel CS 3.6 towers. They are 4 ohm rated speakers and reportedly a difficult load to drive. The Big ONK has no problem whatsoever driving the Thiels to high volumes with no discernable distortion and no problems, all day long.

There were many 4 ohm speakers available in the 80's, including Dahlquists, and KEFs - I'm sure there were more, but those are 2 that come right to mind.

Something is wrong with your speakers, cabling, or your M504.

Good luck.

PS

I just pulled out the manual for the M-504. They are rated at 165 wpc at 8 ohms at 1KHz, 0.003% distortion. They do not give an output rating at 4 ohms.

Worse, the manual indicates that the fault protection circuit may initiate when excessive current appears at the terminals as when speakers of lower impedence are being used.

Looks like I am lucky with mine and the Thiels.

I also have a bunch of old Yamaha M80 amps. They are rated stable to 2 ohms.

I THOUGHT I had heard that amp name floating around before. Thanks for backing me up.