Those of you Running 300 + Watts To Their Comps....

[HiAmplidude 10+ year member]

Hey amplidude. i have the pg elite's also with a pg 500.4. haven't hooked them up yet. should i run them at 70 x 2 or 250 x 2? don't mean to be a thread stealer, but i figured this was a good time to ask.

Yo man, I'd hit it with the 250W/side, actually. Try both and see what you like, but I think if your installation is done well, and the rest of your system can keep up, those puppies will really wake up with the extra power.

 

[bimma85 5,000+ posts]

Just because you have a "180watt" rms amplifier (180 x 2 rms or whatev) doesn't mean you're sending you speakers 180 watts. Use a DMM and a 0dB test tone and set those speakers to 180rms power using AC voltage...and I guarantee you they wouldn't last long
Me, I like head room. You can get an amp that is rated at TWICE the rms power, but that doesn't mean you're sending the speaker that much power. It depends on input signal strength, gains, etc.

NG

Are you saying that you'd buy a 300 watt amp and set it at say 150 watts?

 

[HiAmplidude 10+ year member]

Read this:


NG

Yea, but if you're bridging a powerful 4-channel amp to utilize the additional headroom, and it turns out that to balance the system properly or avoid hyper-extending the drivers with reasonable x-over slopes/ranges, your gains are set so low that you're not even beginning to open the amp up in the slightest... un-bridge the amp, use the spare channels for something else, gain it back up to appropriate input levels, and enjoy.

I don't disagree with you, but I gotta' point out that there can be an area of use that crosses well into the line of wasting the amp's capabilities. Such is the case with my setup. Bridged, I couldn't gain the amp up barely past the first nudge on the sensitivity dial. Serious waste. Un-bridged (2 of 4 channels), I'm still running input sensitivity just OVER 4V off a 4V pre-out deck (about 2/5th of the way up), giving me plenty of headroom, no clipping, and sound that's just right.

Different systems require different setup, no doubt.

 

[DJ Kontakt 10+ year member]

i run my comps with 110 rms, focal 136k's and its as loud and punchy as i could ask for.

I might build some custom components with 8" midbass , and give that set quite a bit more

 

[99StangGt 10+ year member]

I am running a A/D/S PQ40.2 bridged making 400w per channel and running Seas 8 ohm 7" mids so they could only see a max 200w. works great. Tweeters are getting 100w. Nice to have the head room and play the speakers to there most without distortion.