Most high-quality loudspeakers are 4-Ohms

Putting on my speaker designer hat for a moment, if I have the option of allowing the impedance to drop to 4 ohms (or below) I can often get a bit more bass extension out of a speaker, and/or use more aggressive equalization.

On the other hand as long as they're not pushed into clipping, I think most amps sound better with an "easy" load (even if the amp is capable of driving a very difficult one). Neither the "nominal impedance" nor the "minimum impedance" tells the whole story, but rather the impedance curve plus the efficiency need to be examined in the context of the application.

My personal preference is to err in favor of amplifier compatibility, as some of the best-sounding amps are fairly load-sensitive.

Duke
dealer/manufacturer

Thanks Duke, that's what I expected.

I agree with Swampwalker - most really high efficiency speakers are 8 ohms or even 16 ohms. There are a great many of us who prefer these mostly vintage speaker types (that were designed for tubes, not solid state) to most if not all of the modern designs.

Preposterous generalization.
Do left-handed tennis players make better soup?

Learsfool, no that I totaly disagree with you, but I don't think that Swampwalker actualy posted that.