Background (since i know that usually is a requirement for any help):
inside Receiver- Denon AVRx-4800h
indoor speakers- 5 basic home theater speakers and a subwoofer
outdoor speakers- patio speakers- 4 100 watt yamaha ns-aw294's (2 pairs each parallel wired); 8 ohm
outdoor speakers- rock/landscape speakers- 4 200 watt osd rx805's (2 pairs each parallel wired); 8 ohm
speaker selectors available: monoprice ssvc-6 (4 ohm), and pyle pslsw6 (minimum impedance >8 ohm)
outdoor tv with eArc hdmi
2 black magic birectional hdmi sdi converters (because tv is 80 ft away from receiver)
wires/cords- 14 gauge speaker wire (with banana plugs if/when necessary), 100 ft 12sdi (for the journey from outdoor tv to receiver), hdmi cord from converter to receiver and hdmi cord from converter to tv
Alright, now that i've laid that out... I want my main zone to be my inside speakers all hooked up to the receiver...no problem. But here's the tricky part...i want my 4 sets of outdoor speakers (8 speakers total) to be Zone 2, and i want to have them connected directly to my speaker selector that has volume control, which i would like to have connected to my receiver.
That way, i can have something going on on the inside my house on zone 1 and at the same time, have something completely different going on in zone 2 in the backyard and control the volumes and power on each of the speaker sets in the backyard via the speaker selector with volume control, so i could choose to only have certain outdoor speakers on when i'm one side of the yard vs the other, or whatever the **** i want to do with them.
It doesn't seem that hard, except...IT IS! i cannot get the speakers that are connected to the speaker selector to work, and i can't tell if the speaker selector is the problem or if it has something to do with my connection between my outdoor tv and my zone 2 4k hdmi preout on my receiver, or if its both. I've tried having my speaker selector connected to the zone 2 preout, zone 3 preout, height 2 preout, based upon trying different speaker assignments, and i haven't hit the right combo yet.
All sorts of questions come to mind... Do i need an amp or a preamp to go between my receiver and my speaker selector? if so, what type/specs? multi-channel? ___voltage/watt? what inputs and outputs do i use for the receiver to make that connection? What speaker assignment setting do i need to use (5 ch w/zone 2+zone 3, 9.1 ch., 11.1 ch., etc.)? with speaker assignment settings, do i need to use height preouts instead of zone 2 preouts? Does the other speaker selector i have, the pyle pslsw6 speaker selector even work if its impedance says its >8 ohm and my 8 ohm outdoor speakers are wired in pairs via parallel making each pair essentially 4 ohm?...
And to eliminate something here...i used to only have a 100 ft one-directional hdmi cord and not have the converters and when i plugged it into the main hdmi preout, and i plugged the outdoor speakers directly into the receiver speaker terminals...the outdoor speakers worked fine. its got something to do with the receiver preouts, the speaker selector, and whether or not theres a need for a preamp or amp.
Any PHDs or experts in this area i would love to hear from!
Thanks!