damping factor?

[saltyreefguy 10+ year member]

what exactly does the damping factor due to an amp? some are higher than others...

Click to read more...

 

[thylantyr 10+ year member]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Damping_factor

Some argue that DF as low as 10 is good enough to drive a speaker well.

In the Wiki, there is a note that Nelson Pass and others claim there is

a way to drive speakers with DF = 0.

Marketing literature tells you that you need DF = a million to drive a speaker

well. lol

Since most good amps already gave a DF of a few hundred, then it's safe to say

those amps have more than enough to do the job.

Sometimes high DF is a byproduct of an over engineered design.

 

[Schuey2002 10+ year member]

*bump*

To quote Robert Zeff:

Anything over 50 is gravy. I'd like to take this time to dispel another myth, that super high damping factors make an audible improvement. A damping factor of 50 means that the amplifier's actual output impedance divided into the load impedance is 50. In this example (he was testing a Diamond Audio D7 amplifier for Car Audio Magazine) the amplifier's internal impedance is .08 ohms. A typical four ohm speaker typically has 3.2 ohms of internal DC resistance. So, the actual damping factor could not be better than 4/3.2 = 1.25! That is why emphasis on ultra high damping means nothing sonically.

 

[JimJ 5,000+ posts]

My monoblocks (like any SET amp) have extremely low DF's...

Sounds great //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/smile.gif.1ebc41e1811405b213edfc4622c41e27.gif