Anyone have 7.1 system where the surrounds can handle a continuous 300 watts?

What about headroom? Let’s assume for a moment that even if you’re running your system hard, you’re still going to allow 6dB of headroom for spikes. If 300 watts continuous is 0dB, then –6dB means about 75 watts continuous. When the spikes come, they’ll be short lived.

While the average circuit breaker may trip when a continuous current reaches 80% of the breaker’s rating, the average circuit breaker will not trip for short bursts that mildly exceed the breaker’s rating.

I’m not going to buck the manufacturer’s recommendations, but I do know that on a single 15A circuit I can run two power-hungry ‘cube’ subs and a 770 into seven 6-ohm speakers (about 250 wpc max), driving them with raucous music such that my SPL meter reads nearly 110dB without the subs and over 120dB with the subs (not a large room), and still the breaker doesn’t trip. “Your experience may differ.”