Hi John,
The master volume knob of the Genos can be turned very 'high' without distortion.
You mentioned "turned the Genos up to half way", did you mean 12 o'clock position? With the Genos GNS-MS01 2.1 speaker system, I had to maximize the volume knobs on the front and back of the subwoofer, and turn the master volume knob of the Genos to 2 o'clock position to achieve acceptable volume level, which does not have any distortion at all.
Using a very old pair of Yamaha MS-202ii powered speakers, only 20W per side, at 12 o'clock position of their own master volume knobs, the master volume knob on Genos just have to be turned to 12 o'clock and the sounds produced are already very nice and loud, with excellent stereo separation, without distortion.
So in practice, you can turn the volume knob of the Genos to very high, 2 o'clock to 3 o'clock positions, the volumes of your DXR8s very low to achieve excellent sounds without any distortion or noises.
Thanks,
Paul