Mixing AV pre-outs with direct speakers

[GheeTsar]

I'm looking for some AV advice.

I've recently shifted my living room around and now have my main stereo hifi speakers in what is now the rear surround position if used for 5.1 sound. Formerly I had dedicated rear speakers for 5.1 sound, but there were just too many wires visible to meet the wife-acceptability test!

My plan was to use the pre-outs from the Denon AV amp to connect to my two-channel Rotel amplifier to drive these speakers for use in multi-channel sound, but keep the wired speakers connected to the AV amp for the front/centre speakers. While this set up seems to work when testing each channel individually in the AV set up menu (and could be balanced OK), when it comes to playing a 5.1 source the rear two speakers just produce a low white noise and crackle.

Anyone have any ideas on why or what I can do to solve it?

Thanks lovely Hexus members!

[g8ina]

A picture tells a load of words, a wiring diagram would help my brain... Cant *quite* visualise this