Dumb question of the day - high level/line level

[sfdoddsy]

A friend of mine needs more power than his receiver provides, although he likes the prepro component. So he is proposing adding one of my spare power amps via a high level to line level converter. He's a car audio guy and says they do this all the time, and that a speaker level signal is just an amplified line level signal anyway.

I've always heard this is a bad thing to do, but I would like to be able to tell him exactly why.

Thanks to all gurus in advance.

Steve

[JonMarsh]

I'ts just that you've got an additional gain stage with it's additional noise and distortion in the signal path, which you're going to then amplify again. Now, they do lots of things in the car biz I'd never let get near my home system...

For him, it may work well enough, if the reciever doesn't have any line level outputs. Some do, which makes them more expandable. I'd look at this as a temporary fix, not a permenant solution. How much more power does your amp have than his receiver, anyway? Going from 50watts to 200 watts is only 6 dB more. Maybe he just needs a sub amp, which would take the strain off the reciever power supply for the rest of the channels.

~Jon

[Scott Simonian]

I'ts just that you've got an additional gain stage with it's additional noise and distortion in the signal path, which you're going to then amplify again.

Reason enough to not do it.