Alpine type r 12" vs 15"?

[sue bee 10+ year member]

These have the same ratings. That can't be right, can it? I want to push a 15" with a hifonics 1500d, that'll be plenty right?

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[psych0ticnemes1 5,000+ posts]

yup, the 12 is 500 rms

 

[sue bee 10+ year member]

wat?

 

[wilzyx 5,000+ posts]

whats so weird about them having the same ratings? and disregard the rms, feed that 15" 1200 or so watts and you will be happy.

 

[sue bee 10+ year member]

i know i wouldn't want to go full tilt on the gain, but how about 90% up for a a day or two? so like, 1400 rms to a 15"?

 

[sue bee 10+ year member]

so if the 12, 15 have the same motors, which should i get? i want more spl and to run as much rms as possible

 

[psych0ticnemes1 5,000+ posts]

listen, the 12 is rated at 500 rms, the 15 at 750... run the 15" with the 1500bd and call it a day

 

[sue bee 10+ year member]

oh, i see.

well...

good day then.

 

[sue bee 10+ year member]

are you still selling your 15 psyc? ill buy it if so. where are you located?

 

[Hayabusa 10+ year member]

15" Type R will make ya happy with your purchase...

 

[dleccord 5,000+ posts]

Edit

 

[dleccord 5,000+ posts]

so if the 12, 15 have the same motors, which should i get? i want more spl and to run as much rms as possible

12 has the 2inch vc and the 15 has the 2.5inchers?

 

[Remotia 10+ year member]

so if the 12, 15 have the same motors, which should i get? i want more spl and to run as much rms as possible

Here goes my gripe…

Look, first of all, RMS doest mean much when you are talking about speakers. There are literately dozens of other far more important measurements to pay attention too. In fact, most of the RMS ratings on subwoofers are either made up or inaccurate to a huge degree. If two different subwoofers use the same size motor but different cones, they are going to have virtually identical power ratings. The RMS is strictly related to the how much power you can put into a coil before it damages from heat after a long period of time. Many things affect this, but typically speaking, large gauge wires, and wider voice coils can take more power. If I honestly cared how much real power a sub could take, I would look at the number of turns in the coil, the size of the wire, the suspension and surround. But who cares? Linearity, THD, frequency response and efficiency are FAR FAR FAR more relative things to consider than power. Many people want competition subwoofers that take huge power and get loud? Well here are some things to consider, define loud? You all want to listen to bass right, but what if the subwoofer is giving 10 even 20% THD, than its really not that loud at 1% THD unless you want noise? Noise is as defined: unwanted sound. No one wants noise so when you want a competition subwoofer consider that you may potentially be buying a driver that it not capable of playing as loud as a SQ driver at a given tolerance.

Secondly sensitivity: Often a measurement blown way out of proportion by many manufactures, (the honest ones excluded). Many of them measure this at 2.83 volts, which is 1 watt if and ONLY if you have an 8 ohm load. If you are running your sub down to 0.5 or 0.25 ohms for your measurements, and you’re sensitivity could jump from a mediocre 85dB to a stunning 100dB! Well, that’s because you’re putting 16, even 32 watts, not 1!, and the measurement is bunk. Sensitivity is important because, lets say you are u sing a very sensitive speaker. Perhaps with only 200 watts it is able to play louder and cleaner than subwoofer X with 1000 watts. But I’m many people (not saying you guys, I know many of you are smart here) would consider sub X to be better. Hardly the case.

Newbie buyers always compare subwoofers via RMS and believe me, many manufactures catch on to this and far to often overestimate the RMS because they know A) no one owns volt meters to truly measure how much power they are really putting into their subwoofer and B) they know a driver can take a lot on a bust if it has time to cool down and typically unless you are running pink noise non stop, it will have time to cool and C) no one is going to break their subwoofer to confirm “oh ya 600 RMS guys, but it broke at 650” and D) higher RMS looks better. Don’t even bother with RMS imo, unless you can trust the company that made the driver. Even then, its almost useless. Also consider that doubling the power only accounts for a 3dB increase if and ONLY if you have not reached power compression -the most important overlooked aspect of a driver. All subwoofers suffer from this. What power compression does is limits the output of the driver after a certain amount of input. At a certain point in all drivers suffer from compression and what will happen is you can keep pouring the in the power and getting NO more output at all, even doubling the power at this point will only heat up the coil more and more and you will no more dB’s. No one even considers power compression when looking at RMS but ultimately it is the true limit of a driver and its severely under appreciated.

If you are concerned about buying an amp because of the power rating on a driver, just get one with more power than you need so you don’t clip the driver. The more power the better and if you don’t use it, big deal, it’s not going to hurt you, and guess what, If you are on a budget you’re in the wrong **** hobby.