How loud do Perfects get? Are they good subs?

[JustPerfect 10+ year member]

Hey guys,

About three months ago I bought an Infinity Kappa Perfect 12.1D (dual voice coil 12" sub) and a 1 cubic foot sealed box. But at the time I didn't have much cash layin' around so I just grabbed one of my older bro's very old Jensen amps from the garage and hooked it up to the sub. The amp says "300 watts!" on it, but I'm guessing it's much less than that.

Anyway, I like how the sub sounds. It gets real low (Many Men by 50 cent sounds great), so I'm pretty happy with it. But it's tough to tell how good the sub really is because I'm not giving it enough power. And winter in Wisconsin definitely isn't much fun.... I'm always worrying about blowing the sub, so I pretty much just play music on very low volumes. So, I'm planning a spring upgrade. I think I'm going to get another 12.1d, a new sealed box (obviously), and a jbl 600.1 amp.... I'm hoping it's going to sound much better than what I got now, but I'd feel much better about it if I could hear some opinions from you guys. How are Perfects with their recommended wattage? If anyone has dual 12.1s or 12.1ds, how many watts are you giving it and how does it sound? Loud? Clean? Neither?

Another big question I have is how much of a difference will I notice going from one sub to two, and probably quadrupling the power? I'm kinda expecting a good, big difference.... But I really don't wanna be disappointed.

Thanks a lot for any thoughts.

- Dane

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[nosaj070 10+ year member]

I personally really like the perfects. My brothers roomate actually has two with about 600 watts going to them, and they don't get that loud, but do sound very good. When you can get them for 100 bucks a peice they are a good deal as well.

 

[EarDrummin. 10+ year member]

I ran 600 watts a piece to them. They hit hard. Then they blew. Given the 350 watts they want, they're sq drivers.. sound great. Their sensitivity is quite high as well, if that's what you mean by loud. I had two drivers, obviously adding another will increase your spl. The 600.1 should do nicely, it's a good setup if you're not a bass machine.

 

[EvilknievalPSA 10+ year member]

you can get good infinity perfect prices at etronics.com i bought one there for 136 i believe and its 15 $ shipping . thats the 10 inch.

 

[JustPerfect 10+ year member]

Thanks for the replies everyone.

I bought the 12.1d for $150 shipped from a guy on ebay, hoping to pay about the same for another one. Also, it's really weird, but the past couple of weeks (during which time it got to about -35 windchill, -10 Fahrenheit here) the sub has been much louder than usual, but not really in that good of a way. It seems like it's not getting as low as it used to, and it's weird, but now it sounds maxed out (to the point where I'm afraid of going louder) at a volume of about 13, and i used to go to about 21. I checked the head unit for bass settings and everything, and it was on the regular setting of "0". I think I'm just being paranoid about not getting as low, since it still sounds real good for most songs, but I'm a tad worried. Hopefully the sub's okay.... Maybe it's just the crappy amp that's doing weird stuff.

Now I'm debating whether I should get another 12.1d or maybe try to sell the one I have (after making sure it's in fine condition and nothing's broken, of course) and switch to something else. But I really don't think I should do that, since I haven't really even heard the sub's potential.... Just gave it about 175 watts from an old amp. I think I'm gonna stick with the Perfect, but I'm still kinda thinking about it.

And I'd say I'm more into sound quality, but, I mean, I want something that can be really loud. That's kind of hard to explain though. See, I haven't heard that many setups.... My brother has dual 10" Alpine Type E's in his car with 500 watts and they get really loud. I'm not sure if that's considered 'loud' by you car audio experts, but that's kind of what I want..... But still sounding good and getting low.

 

[nosaj070 10+ year member]

They're 100 at http://www.ikesound.com , but anyway, perfects aren't made to get loud, they just sound good. If you are set on alpines get Type-r's, but there are better for the money. ED-k is 135 and blows the perfects out of the water, Diamond CM3 is even cheaper, and Adire Shiva is right around the K.

 

[JMOCK 10+ year member]

u can get 2 kicker comp vr 15's which are 500 watt rms for $105 or the same model 12" for even cheaper those will give u a ton of power

 

[nosaj070 10+ year member]

u can get 2 kicker comp vr 15's which are 500 watt rms for $105 or the same model 12" for even cheaper those will give u a ton of power

In my opinion the Perfects anhilate the Vrs, i even feel the Type-r's are quite a bit better.

 

[EvilknievalPSA 10+ year member]

I heard the Infinity Perfect VQ's were good subs. 400 rms i think 1600 peak, its supposed to be a step above the Perfects.

 

[EarDrummin. 10+ year member]

They're sensitivity really isn't that high when you consider that it's taken in car @ 40 Hz with 2.83 volts (~2 watts for the SVC model, ~1 watt or ~4 watts for the DVC model) and not using the convential method ... Using the convential method, it works out to 86.244 dB (1W/1M) for the 12.1 and 86.572 dB (1W/1M) for the 12.1D ...
Also note-worthy, build quality is sub-par for a speaker of this price, power handling is smack-on (Don't give it more than 350 RMS), and the cone is quite delicate ... I can't speak on the VQs, but the original Perfects, while still excellent speakers, are not the best value by far ...

I agree that they aren't the best value, but far from the worst. Whoever payed 150 dollars, you didn't look very hard for good prices.

Around 100 dollars for a really decent driver is hardly a bad bargain. To those that don't think it won't hit, I got 2 to hit almost as loud as my Brahma 15. Again, I eventually blew them, but it took a few months. //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/smile.gif.1ebc41e1811405b213edfc4622c41e27.gif

As far as sound quality is concerned, they sounded as good as my B15 as well. I'm speaking from experience, I'm not blowing it out my *** like so many people who haven't even heard 9/10 of the drivers they talk about.

If you have 1 already, I would say go with 1 more. As far as not giving it more than 350 watts rms, it's a smart idea, but you definately don't have to. It took me months to volume-master mine into submission, at 600w each. You can run more and enjoy every bit of it.. so long as you're careful.

 

[sneekerfreek 10+ year member]

I have seen two 12" perfects hit 144.8, in a old school celica

 

[TheVanMan 10+ year member]

Infinity seem to sound really good for SQ setups. They don't get loud but I don't think thats what they wanted to do with them.

 

[WalkDogg 10+ year member]

just b careful not to give em' too much juice... i'm on set number two! Great SQ, but they left me wanting more SPL.

 

[antler skills 10+ year member]

A friend of mine has 3 Perfect 10's in his Taurus doing about 275W each. It is very clear and accurate, and more than enough SPL for a daily driver. I'd duplicate that setup if I had the money lol.

 

[EarDrummin. 10+ year member]

Who had the shovel that dug this thread up?