xenon 600.1 and hcca comp?????????

[lesesneje 10+ year member]

Right now i have an hcca 12d, dual 2 ohm coil subwoofer. It is amplified by a kenwood kac-8101d pushing around 200 rms x 4 ohms and the kenwood CANNOT handle this speaker. I just got a new phoenix gold xenon 600.1 that does 600 watts 1-4 ohms and i was going to run it to my hcca. Will the hcca be able to handle the xenons power? My friend has a JL w7 on a xenon 600.1 and he turns the gain up ALL the way. He says that an HCCA cannot handle a xenon 600.1 turned all the way up because the hcca can't handle as much as the w7. Is this true? I thought that the hcca was capable of handling 1200 watts but i dont want to screw anything up before i drop in my other hcca. does anyone know if this amp is good to push the hcca? ( this is NOT an H2, it is a first generation hcca with 99db efficiency)

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[squeak9798 5,000+ posts]

My friend has a JL w7 on a xenon 600.1 and he turns the gain up ALL the way. He says that an HCCA cannot handle a xenon 600.1 turned all the way up because the hcca can't handle as much as the w7. Is this true?

Well, to start with.....your friend is an idiot and does not comprehend what the gain control is for. He SHOULD NOT have the gain all the way up, and the gain setting IS NOT an indiciation of "how much power the sub can handle".

Likewise, you WILL NOT want your gain turned all the way up.

Right now i have an hcca 12d, dual 2 ohm coil subwoofer. It is amplified by a kenwood kac-8101d pushing around 200 rms x 4 ohms and the kenwood CANNOT handle this speaker. I just got a new phoenix gold xenon 600.1 that does 600 watts 1-4 ohms and i was going to run it to my hcca. Will the hcca be able to handle the xenons power? I thought that the hcca was capable of handling 1200 watts but i dont want to screw anything up before i drop in my other hcca. does anyone know if this amp is good to push the hcca? ( this is NOT an H2, it is a first generation hcca with 99db efficiency)

Anyways...from what I can find, the HCCA 12d has an RMS rating of 600w, so that Xenon is perfect for it. Just be sure to SET THE GAIN PROPERLY. DO NOT LISTEN TO YOUR FRIEND.

 

[denim 5,000+ posts]

the HCCA will hold the Xenon, they have held much more in the past

 

[lesesneje 10+ year member]

oh i definitely wont be turning the gain up high. I talked to a guy who used to sell hcca's and other old school orion equipment and he said that the hcca will hold a ton more than orion says it will. But to keep the settings somewhere in the middle because power isn't what blows them, distortion is the main problem when the gain on an amp goes anywhere past 75%. im keeping it at probably 50-60% i probably wont have the subwoofer option on my reciever too high either. along with my bass option which i always keep low anyway because that makes even more distortion

 

[gospastic 10+ year member]

just as a footnote, i have a 600.1 and have the gains turned nearly all the way up. i did use a multimeter though and set the gains until i reached about 48V AC for a 4ohm load. i'm basically saying that the gain knob on the xenons are deceptive. just because they are turned nearly all the way up doesn't mean your amp is clipping.

 

[squeak9798 5,000+ posts]

But to keep the settings somewhere in the middle because power isn't what blows them, distortion is the main problem

And don't listen to that guy either.

Distortion IS NOT what damages speakers (this can not be said enough).

POWER is what damages speakers. It just so happens that when speakers start reaching their limits, they start to distort. And typically when you push a speaker to it's limits, it will likewise fail. But that doesn't mean distortion = failure. It means POWER = failure, distortion is just a side effect of too much power (or overdriving the amplifier, in the case of a gain knob).

And he likewise doesn't sound like he has a clue as to how to properly set the gain if he generically advised you to "set it somewhere in the middle".

im keeping it at probably 50-60%

You can't say that. You have no idea where the proper gain setting is on your amplifier without plugging it in and setting it. Could that mean that you turn the gain all the way up? Yes...but your HU would need to have awefully low preout voltage for that to happen. Which, in all likelyhood, won't be the case.

Read the gain setting tutorial sticky'd in the amplifier section. It sounds like both you, and those who you speak to, are severely lacking in knowledge about the function of a gain knob on the amplifier.

 

[squeak9798 5,000+ posts]

just as a footnote, i have a 600.1 and have the gains turned nearly all the way up. i did use a multimeter though and set the gains until i reached about 48V AC for a 4ohm load. i'm basically saying that the gain knob on the xenons are deceptive. just because they are turned nearly all the way up doesn't mean your amp is clipping.

Point taken.

I was just pointing out that being able to set the gain "all the way up" isn't a way to determine how much power a subwoofer can handle, and that you can not just "generically" set the gain knob (i.e. "I turned my knob all the way up because I have powerful subwoofers").

There is a method to it, and a right and wrong way to set it.

 

[lesesneje 10+ year member]

Ok, so the xenon 600.1 is good......thats all i cared to hear. As for the tutorial, clipping causes equipment to break. clipping is caused by pushing your equipment too hard. Clipping IS distortion. And clipping is NOT always caused by too much power to the speaker. It can be caused by the amp trying to push more than what it should. 200 watts or 2000 watts, pushing the amp too hard causes clipping, causing stuff to break. You can think its ALWAYS power if you want to, but the fact of the matter is that an amp doesnt have to push 1200 watts to blow a 1200 watt speaker, distortion is key.

 

[squeak9798 5,000+ posts]

Ok, so the xenon 600.1 is good......thats all i cared to hear. As for the tutorial, clipping causes equipment to break. clipping is caused by pushing your equipment too hard. Clipping IS distortion. And clipping is NOT always caused by too much power to the speaker. It can be caused by the amp trying to push more than what it should. 200 watts or 2000 watts, pushing the amp too hard causes clipping, causing stuff to break. You can think its ALWAYS power if you want to, but the fact of the matter is that an amp doesnt have to push 1200 watts to blow a 1200 watt speaker, distortion is key.

No it's not. Distortion has nothing to do with it. The ONLY way clipping is going to damage your equipment is if that clipped signal contains more POWER (there is that key word again, POWER) than your subwoofers can handle.

I can send a fully clipped signal (yes, fully clipped, I'll say it again) to my subwoofers all day long and they WILL survive, given that the clipped signal is within the subwoofer's thermal and mechanical limitations. Notice how the signal being CLIPPED or DISTORTED has NOTHING to do with their demise....it is SOLELY related to the driver being OVERPOWERED. Stick a 100w clipped signal (200w worth of power) on a 300w RMS subwoofer, and the subwoofer WILL NOT BE DAMAGED.

And yes, the ONLY, ONE AND ONLY way to damage a speaker is to exceed the speaker's thermal and mechanical limitations. THE ONE AND ONLY WAY. It is a physical impossibility to damage a speaker in any other way, REGARDLESS of the amount of distortion.

In your example...assuming 1200w RMS is the subwoofer's thermal and mechanical limits, it is PHYSICALLY IMPOSSIBLE to damage the subwoofer with any signal that does not contain 1200w worth of POWER, regardless of distortion. Why? Because DISTORTION HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH IT. IT IS SOLELY BASED ON THE POWER OF THE SIGNAL. Just the same, you can blow the subwoofer with any amount of power over 1200w, regardless of distortion. But notice in each instance, it is the AMOUNT OF POWER that blows the subwoofer/speaker, and NOT the DISTORTION.