.One really does not know if you would benefit form an external amp or not. I haven't had a receiver in my music system in so long I really can't make a fair judgment. One thing I do know is the only times I have ever had a speaker fail on me when I was using a receiver. It was from pushing the receiver into clipping. One thing I don't think there can be much arguing over is you are more likely to damage a speaker when playing your music to high levels with not enough power.
I have even had a power amp (215 @ 8ohm) go into protect mode when listening at high levels. Since going with the Rotel, Axiom combo I have not experienced any problems what so ever. I do at times really push it too, well over 100 db.
Give it a try and see if you would indeed see an improvement.
