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Am I underpowereded?
- Thread starter Southpaw5
- Start date
I agree with consensous here that the guitars are probably too loud. I have also found that some of my basses with the correct settings cut through the mix much better than others. My G&L SB-2s and L1000 and stingray all seem to cut through the mix at many different settings that other basses I have. That said, convincing the guitarists to tame the 1/2 stacks seems to give us better overall balance and clarity. Too much guitar crank just ends up dulling the sound, and bass turned up too high starts getting boomy and distorted especially in smaller rooms/bars. If the guitars turn down you can hear the vocals better, but in some bands you don't want that (hehe).
What do you guys think about the load going to the 115, 275w going to a cab only rated for 200w? i figured its only overpowered by 75 watts so...
Your band might need to turn down as a whole. Still with that said, for running two cabs, you seem a little shy on watts. Even with the band turned down, and playing at lower volumes, I like having a lot of watts at my disposal. It fattens the sound nicely. I run 1000W even if the guitarist in the arrangement is playing with a little practice amp. This puts the volume in MY control. I'm a big fan of turning down, even though I can tickle my own balls with my volume.
It should be ok. It might be pushing it if your cranked to 11 and your playing full bore the whole time. But all and all you should be ok. Most cabs can take blasts a little past their maximum capacity, but what will destroy it is a consistent stream of sound that is above its capacity. I run my 8 ohm 600 watt handling capacity cabs with my 1000 W head all the time. No problem. I'm never cranked full output though.
The 200 watt rating is the speaker's THERMAL rating, which means little or nothing in the real world of playing bass. Your little amp can still kill the speaker with over-excursion, which is how I predict it will someday die.
Anyway, you would be MUCH better off with another identical 4x10 cab instead of that 1x15...I'd sell it before it blows up, which it probably will.
thanks Maki
Also too, I'm not sure if it's been said, but you can tell your guitarists that the more they have their precious amps(especially tubes amps) at high volume, the more wear and tear it puts on'em. Like running a Ferrari 150mph all the time.
So a 200w cab should be comfortable taking even 400watts of output from your amp. That's what I was always told and it worked for me.
TimC's point is right on though -- you should have plenty of "power," but you, and the band, should work on refining your overall mix. Mastering that can really help end volume wars, and will make more people like your band!
I came to understand "underpowering" as a misunderstood and under-explained concept -- with my stereo I was just told "more people blow speakers by underpowering them than overpowering them"...and then wouldn't explain why or how -- they just wanted me to buy a bigger amp. I'm no expert, but what I've heard over time is this: a big danger to your speakers is having the cones pushed out non-stop for long stretches -- as you get when your signal is clipping non-stop. Hence the "set gain to just trip the clip light" -- frequent brief clipping isn't a problem, but steady clipping is. So the underpowering problem comes up when you play, say, a 200 watt amp into a 1000w cab, but to get loud enough at a show you crank that amp to the point of non-stop clipping -- THAT will kill your cab, even though it's rated at 1000w. So it's the clipping, not the power. But low-powered amp + overly loud band = maxed out amp which in turn = clipped signal that destroys your speakers; so you can see why someone might point to the amp's power as the issue...but the same scenario would destroy a 100w cab, so it's not really the amp-to-cab power ratio...
As for your rig, in your shoes, I'd see it like this: 500w cab + 200w cab = 700watts, 1400watts max; 550w amp...No issues. And if that rig isn't loud enough, then my band isn't very good at mixing itself, and my hearing is doomed.
I played in a 5-piece with two brilliant guitarists with great screaming tube tone...never needed more than my 300w swr, a 4x10 and a 1x15. Later I changed to a Schroeder 2x10, 1x12 (21012...something ridiculous like 1400watts RMS) and my same 300watt swr...never had a problem -- it all came down to the fact that they were extremely good at setting the band's overall mix.
Your setup is fine!
ltt
TimC's point is right on though -- you should have plenty of "power," but you, and the band, should work on refining your overall mix. Mastering that can really help end volume wars, and will make more people like your band!
I came to understand "underpowering" as a misunderstood and under-explained concept -- with my stereo I was just told "more people blow speakers by underpowering them than overpowering them"...and then wouldn't explain why or how -- they just wanted me to buy a bigger amp. I'm no expert, but what I've heard over time is this: a big danger to your speakers is having the cones pushed out non-stop for long stretches -- as you get when your signal is clipping non-stop. Hence the "set gain to just trip the clip light" -- frequent brief clipping isn't a problem, but steady clipping is. So the underpowering problem comes up when you play, say, a 200 watt amp into a 1000w cab, but to get loud enough at a show you crank that amp to the point of non-stop clipping -- THAT will kill your cab, even though it's rated at 1000w. So it's the clipping, not the power. But low-powered amp + overly loud band = maxed out amp which in turn = clipped signal that destroys your speakers; so you can see why someone might point to the amp's power as the issue...but the same scenario would destroy a 100w cab, so it's not really the amp-to-cab power ratio...
As for your rig, in your shoes, I'd see it like this: 500w cab + 200w cab = 700watts, 1400watts max; 550w amp...No issues. And if that rig isn't loud enough, then my band isn't very good at mixing itself, and my hearing is doomed.
I played in a 5-piece with two brilliant guitarists with great screaming tube tone...never needed more than my 300w swr, a 4x10 and a 1x15. Later I changed to a Schroeder 2x10, 1x12 (21012...something ridiculous like 1400watts RMS) and my same 300watt swr...never had a problem -- it all came down to the fact that they were extremely good at setting the band's overall mix.
Your setup is fine!
ltt
From the guitarists point of view: maybe they should get LESS powerful amps, so they could crank them and get their sound without killing everyones ears. 50 watts is a lot for a (tube) guitar amp.
This is interesting, another perspective. my "underpowered" title was not quite appropriate though, i meant from the perspective of whether i should have been running an amp with more power wattage wise on the 410. the little 115 is not so much an integral piece and can be replaced if need be. this should have maybe been a thread about optomized power, and how close or far from it i will be.
Sure, you can run a 400 watt amp into a 200 watt cab. Usually it's not actually putting out 400 watts, because it isn't turned up all the way with a constant signal through it.
The 200 watt rating of a cab comes from measuring at what sustained power the voice coil stops working due to thermal damage. The speaker can fail due to overexcursion far before this if too much low end is dialed in.
A 500 watt cab plus a 200 watt cab is not the same as having a 700 watt cab.
When you use two cabs at the same impedance (say, both of them being 8 ohms), the wattage is split equally between them. Unless there have been some developments I'm not aware of, the amp is not that smart and does not automatically send more wattage to the cab that can handle more. The wattage is split half and half. If you're putting out 300 watts, 150 are going to each cab. If you're putting out 500, 250 are going to each cab.
If one of your cabs can only handle 200, this is a problem. A chain is only as strong as its weakest link. That, in this case, is the 200 watt cab. Now, just because you're using an amp that is capable of putting out more wattage than your cab can handle doesn't mean you'll blow the speaker, as you probably aren't actually using the amp's full output most of the time. You can still use it and be fine, but you have to be careful and listen for signs of speaker strain.
billfitzmaurice
Commercial User
- Sep 15, 2004
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One more thing the "danger" to a 1000watt cab from a heavy driven 200watt amp is to the high frequency drivers (like horns, small mids and ribbon or small cone tweeters), the woofers will care less.
Ah! I actually opted to turn that little tweeter OFF. it didn't sound good anyway.
Well the 115 sounded great at very low volumes but terrible at practice level, this amp is definately too much for it, I'll definitely sell it, or trade it. the goliath ii sounds great but since its an 8 ohm cab i want to pair it with a more appropriate cab than the 115 to get the most out of the 550X. I played around with the eq and can definately dial in some great sounding tones with this rig(minus the 115 of course). if anyone in the Boston area is interested in the 115 let me know, sell or trade + $$.
ya, 115's are most excellent, but with a 410, they get buried. get another goliath 2 for best results.
