Thiel speakers--can you power them with reciever?

My Sony 5-channel amp rated at 140wpc sounds substantially less punchy and flat in comparison to other good 60-100W audiophile grade amps. Power ratings on AV amps and receivers are often over-rated with higher-end units an exception.

Any of the high end receivers rated as THX Ultra or Ultra 2 can handle 4 ohm speakers. I would also strongly suggest a receiver with a large toroidal power supply. At 130 watts, I am going to guess that your receiver is rated as THX Select and does not have a toroidal PS, which can technically handle nominal 4 ohm loads, but probably not with much aplomb.

Even a THX Utlra 2 rated receiver with a toroidal transformer will not drive the Thiels with the same ease as a dedicated 2 channel high current integrated or separate power amp of the same wattage rating. In order to fit all those electronics in the same chassis, corners have to be cut somewhere, not to mention noise introduced by having DACs in the box.

Here are test results on Ultra 2 receivers.Anything over two channels kills the power.7 time 4ohms will probably kill the receiver.Denon AVR4308 140 watts.Drops to 111 watts X7 at 8ohms@1khz.Not 20-20,000,might not be possible.Test link below.Yamaha RX-Z9 175 watts.test out at 138 watts X7 @1khz.Not 20-20,000 either.Typical SELECT2 acording to S&V.
I can't think of any receiver that will give a full bandwith
power with all channels driven at 4 ohms!

Denon test link>>>[http://www.soundandvisionmag.com/receivers/2676/test-bench-denon-avr-4308ci-av-receiver.html]Yamaha RXZ9 test link>>>[http://www.soundandvisionmag.com/assets/download/yamaharx-z9inthelab.pdf]

I forgot to mention,A/V receivers use 8 ohms as the standard.They do not have to meet the old FTC standards that were made to regulate two channel stereo amps.

Thanks for the replies. Of the other brand speakers I mentioned, do any of them present an easier load than the Thiels for a receiver to drive?

The Receiver is a Yamaha RX-V1800. It is currently driving a set of Legacy Signature II left/right front speakers, plus a Paradigm center channel and PSB 5T surrounds. I am bi-amping the Legacys via the feature on the Yamaha that uses the surround back amps.

I set the Legacys and the PSBs to large in the receiver setup menu, and I often try the center on each of the available settings(small/large/none) to see which way I like it better.

The receiver seems to drive this setup OK in terms of not clipping at the levels I listen at, which is not super loud. But it sounds like that would not be the case with the Thiels.