How many watts do I need?
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- Опубліковано 22 вер 2016
- How much power should your amplifier have to properly drive your speakers? (subtitled in English and Dutch - Nederlands ondertiteld).
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Amazing. Not only does this guy have an epic name, but also drops that physics based knowledge like a real engineer.
🙏
Amazing explanation Hans, thank you very much! Your videos are really informative, clearly you know your stuff.
Great video!! This is a topic that needs a lot of clarification from many sources and this source is bang on.
You are a great teacher Hans.Thanks for sharing your knowledge.
Goed verhaal Hans! Zeer begrijpelijk uitgelegd!
Greetings. An absolutely stellar video explaining the truth about watts and how they are utilized in hifi. Great presentation and and setting. Bravo!
This is I"ll say generosity. so much of information free!!! Thanks Hans!
Well you could support my work here: www.patreon.com/theHBchannel
I absolutely love your explanations on these topics.
My speakers are about 85dB (8Ω) sensitivity. And I normally never cross the 2.83v mark and normally that is more than enough volume for me.
This video is awesome, and you are awesome!
You make me blush:-) Thanks
+Amir Farhan I agree, this video was very well done and accurate! Though I'm not always in agreement with you Hans, this video is excellent!
wouldn't it be boring if we always agree on anything😉
The Hans Beekhuyzen Channel Very true, very true! A little debate never hurt anyone ;)
Hi sir I got most part of your vdo, but I have one serious doubt and its bothering me a lot,as I am about to build a diy home theater,so for example a low sensitivity speaker will have around 88db@1w@1mtr,
91db@2w,(3db increase by doubling watt)
94db@4w,
97db@8w,
100db@16w,
So the same speaker Will have 6ohm,10watt on the backside,does that mean it will produce 97-100db
(because 97to100db lies between 8w-16w from the above chart) at 10watt at 1mtr distance.
Goeie video Hans!
This is the best video by far about power handling and current, simple but extremely clear. Congratulations Hans! Greetings from Switzerland
You're most kind. Spread the word so I can keep doing it (for I love it).
Hans love your knowledge on this complex subject ,you explain it so well for laymen like myself ,Ps iv started buying blue ray audio disks , not sure if this format will last ,another white elephant ,one more question ,will a good blue ray player ,be as good as a cd player dollar for dollar many thanks ,😊😊
Buy a Oppo 203 or 205 is on the market in the next 2-4 mounth.
wow, explained it so well in such a simple manner.
Thank you for making these helpful videos.
Good Luck Sir!
Best Regards from India.
What a breath of fresh air listening to your straightforward explanations and the use of the automotive analogies; it really helped me visualize what is going on. Thank you, sir!
Wow, thank you!
Great video, very well done. I'm an electrician/ stereo freak. So I love these detailed breakdowns, especially the cartoons. My theory is, whatever the rated peak power handling of the speakers is, get an amp that can provide at least that much power. Then you never have to worry about headroom when you're rockin' out. My speakers are 400w peak, I have a 500wpc amp. Never have distortion at any level, and they go well beyond a comfortable listening level, so I never overwork my speakers. Edit: Yes I am a primitive.
Glad you enjoyed it!
Great video, thanks Hans
Brilliant. Just what I was looking for! Hans you talk so sensibly, supported by solid technical understanding, that anyone who follows you cannot be misled by the marketing mumbo-jumbo. Great effort. 👍
Glad you enjoyed it
You are easy to understand, Thank you, you have helped me a great deal. I will be watching.
My pleasure sir. Please consider supporting the channel through Patreon (www.patreon.com/theHBchannel)
Great video! Thanks for the complete explanation. Best!
Excellent Presentation!
very well done hans thank you from florida usa
Wow ! Very well done ! Il wonder why I did not find your channel sooner ? Thumb up, and thanks a lot !
Welcome!
Another articulately explained video. Thanks Hans.
🙏🏽
This video is absolutely fantastic. This guy is amazing. What a great teacher. Excellent and very useful information. Great presentation. Thanks a million. Great job.
Wow, thanks!
Glad somebody made a beautiful rendering in making one understand speaker wattage to match an Amp
Wow, you are simply the best Sir. You remind me of true teacher from School - his learners were all smart because he taught like a legend!
Blush..
Thank you Hans. very informative indeed.
You are very welcome
Hans great job demystifying electricity, amp power and speaker efficiencies. I would enjoy a video dedicated just to tube amps, and what is required to drive speakers that are not horns, or less than 92dba. Logical pairing with tube amps has been high efficiency speakers, but it would be interesting if you could delve into this more, if you have not already done so. Kudos Hans!!!!
Very informative videos Hans and thanks for the spreadsheet.
My pleasure!
Hans at last intelligent informative information without the hard sell
Top Man 🇬🇧🤝👏👏
🙏🏽
Great teacher all time 👍👍👍👍👍
Thanks for the information.
Great complete and easy to understand explanation, compliments!!
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Great video!
Love your videos. Thank you!
🙏🏽
This is what I needed to know thank you.
My pleasure
Thank You. Absolutely fantastic
Thanks for the spreadsheet.
My pleasure!
Excellent basics! Thanks!
Thank you so much for your videos.
It gives so much insight.
Keep up the great work :)
If you were a teacher, paying attention wouldn't be hard.
Thanks a lot!
Truly amazing explanation! Thanks a lot.🙏
Glad you liked it
Very well explained. A very good tutorial, this.
🙏
Great video and hello from Charleston, SC! (USA)
🙏
You do a wonderful job taking the mysteries of audiophile to layman, bravo.
One of the clues I look to in a speaker is its impedance curve. A speaker with wildly varying impedance curve would usually require an amplifier that has a high current capability. In the early days I had a Martinlogan SLS electrostatic speaker that has its impedance dropping to 1.6 ohms at around 100+ Hz. You can see poorer amplifier struggling to cope fully illustrating the "torque" example you raised.
Watch ua-cam.com/video/8DL6cH3K0tw/v-deo.html
Agree with the rest of the viewers. Wonderful explanation of the topic using charts that explain a lot!😁 you should get an Enemy for this video😉 Great explantion using the cars engine size as reference.
excellent !!!
Another informative piece Hans. I downloaded the worksheet and while watching I calculated my watts "needed" which turned out to be exactly what is output by my amp (15 watts). I then thought but, wait, I have a tube amp aren't they able to deliver higher current watts than solid state? Nevermind that the amplifier rating is into 6ohms and my speakers are 4ohm rated...
Pretty sure that I am safe though as in the past ten years or so, no speakers have given up the ghost yet. I will keep watching and lean on you to get through your review gear and educate us on what makes tube watts different ;). Thank again!
In normal use most speakers will play at about 1.5 watts RMS
Great Explanation !
Glad it helped!
Thanks for this excellent knowledge!
🙏🏽
Thanks Hans. I always get a lot of value out of your videos. They're really informative, well structured, well metered, clear, concise and easy to understand. Plus I really like your presenting style too. The only slight difficulty I'm having is that I find your voice really soothing and calming, so I sometimes have to re-watch sections. That's not a criticism though. In fact sometimes it's an added bonus. Have you ever thought of branching out into ASMR, lol? Just kidding, keep up the good work. 😁
I wouldn’t know what ASMR is.. but thanks for your kind words
@@TheHansBeekhuyzenChannel ASMR is just something that is used for relaxation and sensory bliss, (in a family friendly way) and mostly involves various relaxing sounds or sounds that trigger sensory experiences. Just to be clear though, I wasn't being serious when making the ASMR suggestion. Just my attempt at a bit of humour. 🙂
@@juddery I learn every day again 😂
@@TheHansBeekhuyzenChannel As do we all, but I think that is what keeps life interesting. I have a saying I use that goes: “You learn something new every day and if you don't? Just make something up.”
Very Nice Explanation Sir
Thanks
informative sir..thanks
Superb knowledge
That's a very good explanation. Great video!. I kinda hate when people say an amp delivers x wattage and speaker vice verse. Amplifier delivers Voltage, speakers represent an AC impedance that varies. So the Watt numbers specified in amps and speakers are just reference points. Nothing to do with reality music loads. No speaker is a linear resistor, so the wattage produced varries over the entire frequency band - and dynamically with music program. One thing is the impedance in that band that the speaker has, another is how much energy density in the signal at a certain band. We can go even deeper, technical when speaking *power compression - especially regaarding high power load (*impedance increased further).
The purpose of this channel is to give the non-technical user some insight into the tech, not to be a course in electronics.
I really like the video. Great video. I have a question for you: What items you need to measure the speaker sensitivity and how to do it? Thank you!
John Soto Music In put 1w. Put mic 1meter or 3feet away. Measure db.
Hello! Great video! I was hoping to hear so.e explanation about amplifier specification (100 Watts peak @8 ohm vs. 100 watts 20hz-20khz @8 ohm with .5% THD). This sort of specification manipulation easily confuses a novice and often leads to poor purchase decisions. Perhaps you've made a video on that... sorry :)
Good video. I think it's worth mentioning, because or the negative connotations of the word inefficiency, that inefficiency in a speaker isn't a bad thing or a good thing in respect to sound quality. It just means you will need more amp power to get the same loudness from the speaker. I suppose a bigger, more expensive amp is a negative for some people, but when I bought my last car stereo, money was not much of an object. My goal was to have the highest audio quality. The speakers I chose after to listening to dozens was pretty inefficient, so I just knew I needed a good and powerful amp. Sounded incredible for the 11 years we had it.
Well, bigger currents are harder to handle, consume more power and generate more heath. That all can be fixed by spending money. Only if the same sound quality can not be achieved by higher efficient speakers, you might find it acceptable. As you obviously did.
thank you
Thank You
Excellent video on a very mis-understood topic!
You are genius sir.
Excellent, shared!
sir .. you're an angel.
Please don’t tell my wife 😐
Great video! May I request your advice on how speaker impedance can be added to the equation in your excel file.
It is automatically included into the equation since nowadays efficiency is measured with 2.83 volts and not 1 watt.
Thanks for shraing. I have a question, what factors will give speaker a higher power handling ? Thanks
wattage = power
amperage = current
320 watts
Another great video Hans! Thank you
I still have a question: i have a Cyrus 2 (50w/Channel) and driade 44 speakers (120w continue,350 peak, 90db/1w/m). When calculating with these specs it became clear my amp does not deliver enough power. My question is now: is my amplifier really not suitable for my speakers and can the speaker (tweeter) Gets damaged when playing quite loud due to clipping energy building up in the tweeter, or is de sound quality worse due to the absence of headroom, or both?
You have more than enough power for those speakers unless you want to fill a house party.
Blown away by the accuracy of your info :)what about the reverse power that the speaker send to the amp(especially around the frequency of resonance) that is also an issue that would need mentioning.
The basic answer to the question of how much power you need to properly drive your speakers is simple. You need an amp that, when connected to your speakers and playing a volume of music that you desire, never clips.
The issue here is how does one know if your a driving an amp into clipping condition and thus distortion galore? Sometimes you can listen and hear the unpleasantness of said distortion but, the only way to know for certain is to grab an oscilloscope check the output waveforms to see if they are being chopped off. If they are, your amplifier is not sufficient and needs to be replaced.
Unfortunately, a very small number of audiophiles actually bother, or are capable, of doing such a test so, who knows how many of listeners are using inadequately powered amplifiers in their systems?
Like everyone has a scope at hand.... for the rest I agree.
Considering how much time, energy, effort and $ most audiophiles invest in their systems, I have often wondered why so few of us have not bothered to spend the needed time, and little amount of $, investing in such a valuable tool Maybe, some of wary of what objective results they might see?
One would think with the massive amount of music that is now digital and the science behind the encoding of MP3's etc, someone would have put together a piece of software that would capture the waveform like a scope. Im willing to bet its been done.
As someone that is into electronics in general I would be one that would be doing things like the scope analysis. Back in my younger days there were 3 of us that were basically testing radios, amps, and speakers. The one guy ran a shop that had access to the components. Scientific or not we concluded that an amp with the lowest THD produced the best sound. Of course this was in the early 80s. That and we loved it LOUD. lol That and we never drove the amp or the speakers near their rated values. Drives me nuts to hear cars these days where all it sounds like is busted speakers. No quality of sound. They want to hear beat and that's it. I'm in no way an audiophile. If I was I certainly wouldn't be stuck with that radio my car came with. lol I do love catching bits and pieces that people are working on. These days I'm playing with microcontrollers and capturing and playing back speech but it doesn't require near the quality. So I enjoy the discussions.
All small amounts of clipping do is affect the sound quality. The question is does the tweeter exceed its maximum power rating as a severely clipped signal has a disproportionate amount of high frequencies compared to most music genres. Also rock and hardstyle and "bro step" are more likely to overload tweeters and if you severely clip them even more so.
Very good video! I have learned alot lately about hifi. Really interesting. So I decided to try assamble complete system for myself. My living room is about 40 m2. My listening position is about 4m from speakers. Need to say that I'm 2 ch. fanboy. So I found speakers with 8 ohms of impedeance, sensitivity 90 db and power handling RMS 150 w. For amp I chosed 2ch. 140 w per ch. RMS. Does it look like good match? For me it seems so after I've read alot about this intresting topic. But I can be wrong, still plenty to understand. All the best!
Thanks Hans, great explanations in your videos! One question on this topic remains (for me at least):
My amp, as an example, has specs tp deliver 7x50W @ 0,08% thd, and 7x80W @ 10% thd. The power supply is rated with 200W.
Let's say I use 5 channels. What would this mean under heavy (base) load with high volume of all 5 speakers? If the volume and signal would demand 50W the power supply would fry (because it can only deliver 200W)? So I guess the spec of 7x50W RMS only means each channel can handle a 50 (or even 80W with higher distortion) peak on its own, but if all channels would do so at the same time the power supply is not enough?
The reality is probably, like you explained, that there will only be short peaks with high demanding power. So maybe in case of using 7 fullrange speakers that all need to reproduce deep base, and listening to a movie with lots of base at high volume it would be too much for the amps power supply. But in the case most speakers are actually small and hence do not reproduce deep base (and probably sending these frequencies to an active sub) the problem becomes irrelevant at normal home volumes.
Did I get that right?
Your AV receiver certainly won't deliver 7 x 50 = 350 watts. Only close to 180 watts if vey efficient class D power amps are used. S0 7 x 25 watts. I consider that bad practice by the manufacturer. Luckily only three channels in a 7.1 setup will cary energy: left, right and sub. The sub has it's own amp. The surround channels, even if full range speakers are used, will cary only little energy with perhaps the exception of occasional bursts for effects.
@@TheHansBeekhuyzenChannel it's an class A/B amp, so probably not even 180W then. It is a shame that specs do not always seem to help the normal consumer without having a deeper understanding. But that's what channel like yours are for :)
I will try to play around with your excelsheet also. Thanks again.
awesome
🙏🏻
tI have fast track c600 audio interface and focal cms 50 monitor speakar and it works fine .Do i need to worry about anything?Thank you for your information.
Thanks..
Welcome
Hello Hans..... could you recommend any decibel measurement android/iOS application that you use and trust? I am planning on buying a new music system hence I want to use my old music system as a reference to measure the loudness I usually listen to and buy the amplifier & speakers of correct wattage for me. Thanks again for all the great information.
I use SoundMeter X on iOS
@@TheHansBeekhuyzenChannel thanks hans
Hello sir the video was awesome. But I have a doubt i.e is speaker with RMS Power Range - Amplifiers- 24 Watts.
n Nominal impedance -4 ohm
n Sensitivity -90 dB
is good to buy will it give me the amazing output?
as this my first speaker so i dont realy know that will it be good or no.
pls help me decide sir.
My Mcintosh MA5100 (40 watts SS) + JBL C37 (95db guestimate) computes 106.5 on the excel sheet.
The actual room peak level is actually louder, which is expected due to the jbl's high efficiency with it's large cabinet.
Thank you Hans for sharing your knowledge and providing us a tool to measure sound preasure.
This is awesome. Subscribed. I thought this was going to suck so badly. like blah blah blah. but it wasn't. It was awesome. Like super awesome.
Thanks Jeff.
question sir...it is ok if used for a dual 21" sub 5k watts per channel of a amplifier 10k watts stereo for mobile dj application..
Lol , Hans I tried for 20 years to help people understand speakers and amps . I had two audio shop's and I had 7 bays for cars and a listening room or I should say a display room . The big question was always what do I need for my car, most of the time I said a better question is how much do you want to spend ? Then we can go from there . Or they would say "I want the best their is , I don't care how much it cost" and I laugh and say you must be richer than I ever dreamed of being . Then they say what brand is the best and I say "You have never heard of it , so lets get back to what you can afford " Hans it would be easier to tell people what sex toy they would like best than what audio equipment they would like . The ones that just said " I have X amount of money , fix me up ", were always my happiest costumers . I always told them I will try to get you the most and best sound with your money as if it were my money . And when we went that way I never had an unhappy costumer . And I can't tell you how many times they came back telling me how their buddy spent two times as much and didn't sound even close to as good . I'm retired now and sure glad of it . Good luck on your quest to educate "John Q Public" for me it was wasted time . I would bet that 8 out of every 10 who watched this are saying "WTF did he just say". But if two got it that's two more than I was able to reach lol . I also used cars for examples a lot , but I grew up in the 60's with mussel cars and most of the kids I was selling to had never seen one . Hans Thanks for trying . My point , over 10K views and only 38 comments and 262 likes , lol your doing better than I ever did . Makes your day when you do reach one though don't it . Great video , one of the best I'v seen thanks.
Well, I am rather pleased with the results of my channel. Close to 10,000 subscribers and -before I got ill - 100,000 views per 30 days.
Hans your doing a great job far better than I was ever able to do . Keep up the good work , there are few that can do what you do . I'm just saying few ever understand but if you reach one the audio world is a better place . I commend you for all your effort , thanks .
I need help brother
Yes I think Hans has a unique Talent, at explaining from the bottom of the knowledge base, and then accelerating to the higher tech info, but informing the meek, to quit now in viewing. He is bang on with most topics and explanations.
thanks very much. is there a way to inlcude the distance from speaker to listenting position since most of us dont watch music/tv from 1 meter/3 feet away but instead 2-3 meters or more away. great info thnaks
In this video that is covered and there is a spreadsheet to make calculations: ua-cam.com/video/gXohzklfwPs/v-deo.html
@@TheHansBeekhuyzenChannel ok sorry for any misunderstanding
How does the calculation change when using a separately powered subwoofer with a pair of bookshelf speakers? (1) Would that typically reduce the amplification requirement for the bookshelf speakers by 10%, 50%, 90%? (2) How much does the answer depend on having a high-pass filter between the amp and the passive speakers?
Good question! The energy doubles each octave down. If your main system is specified to have a roll off from 40 Hz, having the sub take over at 80 Hz gives a 3 dB added efficiency. But since the efficiency of loudspeakers normally is measured at 1 kHz, I would just use the spreadsheet and don't take the sub into account. Don't forget the calculation is an approximation, assuming a given room size, wall properties, furniture and so on.
So, under powered speakers are more likely to be damaged by a "clipped" audio signal than if the amp had enough reserve power??
Correct
Hans, I am not sure if I missed something in this video but could you please advise as to the "optimal" wattage of a HiFi tube amplifier that will reproduce the perfect balance of dynamics, overtones and sonic quality of music? I heard the louder the speakers are pushed (more volume) the less and less is their ability to reproduce dynamics, overtones and overall sound quality. Is this true? In other words, perhaps one or two watts per channel (in a valve amplifier) is all that is needed to hear all the beautiful overtones of music? Thank you. Great video!
That is too complex to answering the comments section. Sorry
@@TheHansBeekhuyzenChannel Ok Hans. Thank you for getting back to me.
Very interesting, indeed.
Yet, I am a bit confused. I am setting the loudness on the pre-amp, defining there the voltage and the current demanded from the power amp. Since the inputs from various sources (turntable, USB dac) are not the same, the loudness button on the preamp is in a way the instrument for getting enough SPL without demanding too much from the power amp. Am I right?
My loudspeakers recommend amps form 30 to 250 W, my amp delivers only 50 Watt, so I am actually at a limit for listening to classical music at an average of about 80 db. This is where I have to believe my ears...
The volume control is an attenuator used to compensate for the differences in output from your sources and to choose the playback level. So it's not a 'power knob'. You probably only need somewhere around 1 to 2 watts average power in your living. The 30 to 250 watt indicate roughly what amps you can use. The low end is defined by the current a low wattage amp can deliver while the 250 watts indicate the maximum power that might be applies to the speakers using music to avoid thermal problems that lead to melting the glue that fixates the voice coil. You might to watch my video once again, knowing this.
Without knowing what preamp you have, I can only make a guess. Most likely the loudness button is a preset eq curve that boosts treble and bass to give perceived increase in loudness. That's what most of those loudness buttons/settings do. This is actually counterproductive in that by boosting the bass you're increasing the power demand on your amplifier. You will run into clipping sooner with loudness engaged vs not as lower note require more power and achieve a lower overall max spl
Bedankt Hans,
Ik heb gehoord dat buizen 5x krachtiger zijn dan solid state...
Zoiets ja.
Time 12:20
You mention that
Power for (x)Watt in Tube Amplifier ≠ (x) Watt in Solid State Amplifier (i.e. 25W Tube Amp ≠ 25W Solid State Ampilifer)
Is there any confficient or constant to be added, so that people can direct compared the Power between Tube Amp and Solid State Amp?
Any more reference material
Thank you
People say 10x. I’ve never checked
Hi!. When you speak of headroom does that mean that the amp will be able to reproduce the extra Dbs without any clipping or distortion or strain? So if I want to listen to my music at 83db from my listening position the amp will get to 103 at peak times without any issues? :)
yes, but 83 dB SPL is rather loud....
The Hans Beekhuyzen Channel Thank you for replying. So I guess less than 83 will be more than enough. Love the channel!..
Great video! On more than one occasion I have seen people blow tweeters using under powered amps. It amazes me that people can listen to music with the amplifier clipping. The sound is awful.
Exactly!
People are constantly bombarded with marketing buzzwords, many of them having us believe that, "more is better". In some cases much of the power is wasted. When I was growing up, my Dad's stereo offered only 25 WPC: a NAD receiver. NAD understands that reserve current capability for musical transients is more important than the RMS sine wave method used to come up with power ratings. Music isn't a sine wave.
My Audio Note amp in my setup 1 does 2x15 watts...
What I don't understand at 4:50 is: if I directly play a square wave (which is even more than a distorted sine wave) in a "perfect configuration" at normal level will it damage the speaker as shown in the graph? Because from what i understand even if the speaker has headroom left, the overrun amplifier basically feeds it almost a square wave, that forces the coil to stay more time in a single position. So wouldn't a simple square wave do just the same on a normal amplifier ? Thanks!
It's about heath. Keeping the cone 'in the same position' needs the full current for the length of the cycle which generates far more heath in the voice coil than for instance a sine wave will. It is the heath that eventually kills either the voice coil or melt the glue that holds the former on the cone.
@@TheHansBeekhuyzenChannel Thanks very much for your answer. So basically a square wave generates more heat even if its a distorted sine or not ? Like if you connect a perfectly matched speaker to the amplifier and play a square wave at 50% volume, it is the same as a distorted sine wave from a weak (with half the needed power) amplifier? Hope i'm being clear enough. Thanks again!
Please update the link to the spreadsheet, which is not working, thanks.
Does this one works: www.dropbox.com/sh/csfro9wq3xzzgsl/AAB3U1_J72zovbc4txpNRXM1a?dl=0
Thanks, the link is working now.
Thanks for feeding back
Can the clipping of audio waveforms on some modern rock and other pop music CD recordings cause damage to loudspeakers?
The won’t be as constant as a clipping amplifier
"Life sucks and the you die..!!!!" Wonderful video, thank you... Would you do a video explaining and interpreting VU meters..?
VU meters are like steam engines; fascinating but completely out of date. Furthermore, loudness meters that are used nowadays have little use for music reproduction. And that is what this channel is about.
I didn't know that... Well then, I humbly suggest that you mention that (and hopefully explain) the first chance you get in your videos (provided of course it makes sense). Because as you mentioned they are fascinating and there's a very high probability that there're many of us that don't know what they do and that are obsolete (sadly). Thank you Hans... Great work...
I'll make a note, but don't get your hopes up too high🤔
I'm going to invent a speaker named "60 Watts". 😁
Just playing. Great information on this topic.
Then I will invent the 70 watt....🤔
If a 300 watt 8 ohm speaker/cabinet is parallel wired to a separate 300 watt 8 ohm speaker/cabinet (reducing the load to 4 ohms) then hooked up to a 600 watts per channel (@ 4 ohms) amp, how many watts (if run at full power/600 watts) would the amp deliver to 'each speaker' please? (This speaker load would be the same for the second amp channel also = 4 cabinets/2 cabinets per channel)
I need some advice
Thanks for your goodwork sir. But this Excel tells that i need 300watt for 90db average listening with a 86db sensitive speaker in classical music. Does it mean all of us using 100watt amplifiers will burn our tweeters when listening to classical music?
The spreadsheet is only to give viewers some feeling for what might be needed. There are no speakers that have an impedance of 8 ohms over the entire frequency band - or any other value. But if you want to play at 90 dB SPL using a 86 dB/1w/1m speaker and have headroom yes you might need 300 watts.You should check whether your speakers are capable of producing 90 dB SPL rather than thinking in watts.
Can it be non capable ?
I can’t say. Sorry 😐
Regarding you remark about tube amps - are they something that you would recommend over solid state and also do they not have more distortion ?
Are cars better than motor cycle?. They both are alternative solutions for the same problem but with different accents (and far less apart than cars and motor cycles;-)
They usually do, but not all distortion is equally audible. For example, odd-order harmonic distortion (3rd, 5th, etc.) can be heard much more easily than even-order (2nd, 4th, etc.). Also a tube's maximum output is not a "brick wall" like solid-state devices. They actually limit themselves as they become hotter, unlike the thermal runaway of bipolar (NPN and PNP) transistors.
Not all distortions are equally audible to each individual. Therefore general answers don't help that much. I am still thinking about a way to explain the difference. Will take some time.
Measured differences between triode, pentode, and solid-state overload distortion are quite consistent. Solid-state devices produce much more high-order harmonics (more than 10x) than either triodes (lowest, 2nd dominates) or pentodes (somewhat higher, 3rd dominates).
Solid state amps use either Field Effect Transistor's (FET) or Bipolar Transistors (BJT) for the output stage. FET's like Vacuum tubes are current (measured in amps) devices while BJT's are voltage devices. As measured in a normal operating range (not the overload condition mentioned below) Vacuum tubes have more distortion, but it is even order harmonic distortion. Some prefer the sound of Vacuum tubes (a warm sound) versus solid state neutral sound.
It is likely that the power supply in the amp make more quality difference than tubes versus solid state. Usually the heaviest amp wins.
Thanks for your video, it is awesome as always. Could you please tell me if you get time to research about the solid state vs tube watt requirement difference. I need your way and your thoughts on that.
People far more knowledgeable than me in that field can’t explain it. So I am afraid I can’t help you there. Sorry.
The link to the exell sheet does not work..
Thanks for reporting. It looks like Google doesn't allow linking to my dropbox. if you copy the link (tinyurl.com/hvetlyq) and paste it into your browser, it does work.
Can I connect two speaker's with different wattage (eg.300w/8ohm,200w/8ohm to 500w /4ohm amplifier output)
The wattage only states how much power a speaker can handle. You can mix speakers of any wattage without a problem except when the amount of power exceeds the power handling of the speakers. For the impedances (ohms) see this video.
Some amp manufacturers supply a 'Damping Factor' - mine says 1,000. What does the spec tell me?
I would also be interested in hearing Hans take on this topic. My understanding of damping factor is limited. I understand higher damping factors are desirable and I believe anything over 100 is pretty good. I understand it is supposed to help dampen a drivers motion after the signal stops by providing very low resistance to the speaker terminals (in effect short circuiting the speaker terminals). This is particularly effective with drivers that have a low Qe (electrical damping coefficient). Speakers with powerful magnets and well designed voice coils tend to have lower Qe.