Considering M60 for towers and looking at either HK or Onkyo 703. Is either reccomended more for music than the other with these speakers and is thx any big deal or worthy upgrade? Thanks

nick53, any receiver will work for the M60s. Just look for the one that offers the features you want. I like HK because of its bass management. THX is a huge waste of money. Don't even worry about it.

Hey thanks for the reply, can you expound on the HK and bass management. Also HK seems to have low outputs, is that because its cleaner wattage? Is 55 watts enough power rating on an HK?

The bass management allows you to set crossover points for each set of speakers--L and R mains, center, and surrounds. For example, say you have floorstanders for the main channels and small bookshelves for the rear. You can set the crossover for the larger speakers at 60Hz and 100Hz for the rears.

There was a thread recently that pointed to an article that stated bass management features actually use an average of all the speakers, rather than truly using specific crossovers. I'll see if I can find it.

Nick, I'm sorry, I don't know enough about output power vs wattage to give you an answer. In most cases, 55 watts is enough unless you have a huge room and/or plan to use hard to drive speakers. I think the main problem to look for may be dynamic peaks during movies if you have the volume at an insane level.

Well, I couldn't find the thread about the crossover average thing. But I did see that the Onkyo 703 offers bass management as well (thanks JohnK).

Nick, welcome. I'll add to Sean's comments on ratings. HK follows two practices in arriving at its power ratings which lead to lower published numbers than some other similar receivers. The first is that the rating is with all channels driven simultaneously at the full rated power for at least five minutes continuously. There's no requirement in the FTC regulations that this be done and it results in a lower number than the required rating with two channels at a time being driven(a more realistic situation for home use, since driving all channels simultaneously at full power for an extended period is a laboratory torture test which wouldn't be duplicated at home). The second factor is that HK conservatively takes the power rating at a lower point on the distortion curve than the published distortion number, again resulting in a lower rating. The result is that, for example, an HK 55 watt rating might be given as about 75 watts if rated less conservatively.

Since typical speakers, such as the M60s, use about 1 watt at a comfortably loud average listening level and even brief peaks would be unlikely to use 100 watts except in a very large room, don't be overly concerned with power ratings. Pick the features that you want and either the Onkyo 703 or the corresponding HK(probably the 635)would be excellent with your M60s.

Welcome Nick,

As the others have stated, the m60's can be driven easily by most receivers, they are very efficient and sound great. I have the Denon 2805 and love the sound it makes with my M60's. It also has a crossover setting, which I place to 80hz, this is for all speakers. Any low freq's below 80hz gets rerouted to the sub channel. Many receivers allow you to adjust each individual speaker, as some speakers can play lower than others. Try to find a receiver that has all the bells and whistles you want, and one that is easy to operate. Denon's can be a little hard at first...

Randy

Hey thanks for all the informative posts. I have decided to scrap the Onkyo with the THX and go with my origional choice of the HK. I got the 635 and cant hardly wait. Still looking at speakers. Thanks

Sounds like you'll have plenty of power to handle most speakers. Picking a receiver is the easy part, now on to the speakers. . .