That pinhead is 14, and flatout broke, so nothing much i can do there. As for the reciever living long, it's already 35+ years old, and drives almost anything, so as long as it's an 8 ohm total load it works. As for how much I want to spend, I'd say less than 200 combined, because I just need something that can handle my receiver's 15 blistering watts (per channel) of fury, as I've yet to find something that can tame it. I've even borrowed my dad's 250 watt Klipsch speakers and they can't handle it. At first I thought I was under powering, but I realized that my receiver beats my dads 200 watt sony receiver (I belive he payed $600 about 12 years ago for it) in a loudness and overall sound quality competition. Wow, went a little sidetracked there, anyways, the room is very small, about 10x7 with a slant roof, and to Philonius, I live far from there...
Well, he needs to learn to respect other peoples' property and now is as good as any time for this to happen. He apparently didn't think he should face some kind of consequence for this but I strongly disagree. How you teach him is up to you but I would recommend not leaving any marks. I have heard that a bag of oranges works well for this.
OK, now for the audio lesson. A 15W/ch receiver CAN'T and WON'T sound louder than a 200W receiver unless the tone controls are set differently or the 200W model has a problem. Voltage, current, impedance, whatever- it can't happen. Assuming the speakers' impedance is a nominal 8 Ohms, at 15W the receiver is putting out just under 11V and at 200W, it's 40V. However, if you turned your receiver up all the way, it's clipping the signal very badly and A) it would sound like crap, B) sound loud and grainy and C) it should have killed your tweeters long ago.
BTW- it's not your dad's Klipsch speakers that can't handle the 15W receiver, the receiver runs out of headroom and distorts. Tow a bus uphill with a VW Bug- it runs out of power with a large load. Also, there's nothing to "tame"- 15W isn't a lot of power but it happens to be what you have, so let's find the best speakers you can afford, OK?
In most speaker spec sheets, they print the speaker's sensitivity. This is the SPL (Sound Pressure Level) achieved with a specific voltage and they should also state the speaker's impedance. Impedance isn't the same as what you may find if you use a multi-meter to measure the resistance- that's DC resistance (a meter sends a low DC voltage and shows this as voltage, on the scale). Impedance is the resistance to AC Voltage, which is what a signal with a pitch is- it has a frequency.
You need to fond some speakers that are sensitive- don't look for the "efficiency" because it's always a low number because speakers aren't really efficient, although a horn-loaded cabinet is. However, you don't need or want horns in a small room.
The Cerwin-Vega speakers mentioned might be a good idea but again, look at the sensitivity spec.
Since you posted that you liked the EPI speakers, you might want to check with Parts Express- they recone damaged speakers and have people who can advise on finding a good replacement tweeter. If you use direct replacement parts, you won't need to change the crossover (usually) but if you change the woofers and tweeters, you will because using the existing crossovers won't be what the new woofers/tweeters need and they could be damaged by using the old crossover.
. They are EPI M180 speakers, each cab (had) 2 8inch woofers and 2 ( I never measured them but they appear to be an inch) inverted dome tweeters. they are awesome vintage speakers that I'd rather re-speaker than get rid of... Just wondering if there are any suggestions on good replacement woofer brands.
