General Question About Watts to Subs

[Robert 2001 10+ year member]

Agreed 40_ 60 hz for test tone as this is the freq at wich dmms are designed to test at as most homes in us electrical is 60 hz. Europe uses 50 hz electric signal. I prefer a 50 hz tone myself.

 

[dipitydoo 10+ year member]

Ok I'm still a little confused...so the gain doesn't directly affects the watts? I didn't fully understand dipitydoo's post. The guy at the shop who gave me the info said an amp too powerful for a sub would burn out the voice coils. It sounds like i should disregard this?

the simple answer is, too much power to a speaker will blow them, as your shop guy told you. but you have to understand what the gain control on your amp does. the gain knob determines how much input voltage is required for the amp to make full power. with the gain turned all the way up (clockwise), the amp will need very little voltage input to make full power. with the gains all the way down (counter clockwise), it will need a lot more to make rated power. it is possible that with the gain set at its minimum, your source will not provide enough voltage for the amp to make full power. this is how you could potentially limit power output from your amp.

my personal advice is, for typical usage, you should get an amp that matches the speakers power handling capabilities.

 

[Workin for DBs 10+ year member]

Ohhhhh ok that makes sense for the most part. So as long as I set my gains correctly I should be fine then. Thanks!

 

[dipitydoo 10+ year member]

uh, no, not exactly. setting the gain 'correctly' means you won't be able to clip your amp (audibly speaking, anyway). the gains set 'correctly', that 1000w amp is going to potentially output 1000w, twice what the 500w sub is rated for. unless the sub's power handling rating is extremely conservative, you might be looking at a dead sub if you play it too loud.

 

[Workin for DBs 10+ year member]

I musta misunderstood your last post then. It sounded like by turning up and down the gain, the impedance would be lowered and raised accordingly. Alright well that was more of an example. I'm looking for a new setup right now and I'll just try to match amp power to sub power.