500w amp - into 1000w cab? Underpowering question

[swspiers]

Apparently not.

Will new TB readers EVER read a sticky?

Apparently not.

Pretty sure it applies to many of the veteran TBers as well...

 

[Gord]

That's pretty much all I needed to know I was worried that having an extra 500 watts of headroom would make it a bit harder to get that broken up sound, but these guys sound like absolute beasts. I already have a littlemark ii, but I think this guy is different enough to justify having both

 

[IntrepidCellist]

Plus, the Tiny Terror has plenty of grit at any volume, albeit in a slightly 'wooly' voicing.

 

[billfitzmaurice]

edit - interesting that the underpowering thing seems to be more widespread than the "it's not true!" thing. I wonder how that concept became so popular, but I'm glad I know that it's not true.

Read this. Then omit the key phrase 'high frequency components (tweeters)' and you've gotten to the source.
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Like all myths under-powering has a basis in fact, but long after the facts have been forgotten the myth remains.

 

[seamonkey]

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I'm not sure everyone will every agree, but clipping of a sine wave does not as many harmonics as you'd think. Instead the high frequency output is much higher between clipped plateaus of the bass frequency notes. You'd blow out a tweeter sooner with a clipped musical instrument waveform over a sine wave any day.
In any case it's overpowering the tweeters that kills them.