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Amp watts vs cabinet watts

#2
Personal Opinion, and it depends on how much power you have available and are planning on using.

Say you have a 1500 watt power amp, well obviously that's a hell of a power supply and you won't really need to turn that up, leaving you with a lot of headroom.
Sticking with the headroom idea, some people prefer to have the headroom of a high power amp so they only have to turn it up to 1/2 volume max. This way you aren't clipping the amp and creating any distortion or problems.

In my opinion, I would get an amp that you won't turn past 1/2 on the master volume and just go with it. Then you can match a cab with the power it produces at 1/2 power, just don't go over that.
Or if you have a cab, find an amp that has 1.5-2.0x the power rating of your cab and don't turn up past 1/2 or so.

That's my view on it.
 
#3
I would like to chime in on this one. Just getting back into the bass after a long lay off , first thing you notice is the power ratings on some bass cabs are really high. IMO if you have turn up more then half way, you don't have enough juice. Right now I have 500 watts @ 4 ohms and a 2x10 and 1x12 both 8ohm 750watts rms total and I don't have to crank my pre gain or master,very loud on 4 and it sounds clean. Some say double the cab I don't but give yourself a little room. there that's my 10cents
 
#4
Bassbasixx said:
I would like to chime in on this one. Just getting back into the bass after a long lay off , first thing you notice is the power ratings on some bass cabs are really high. IMO if you have turn up more then half way, you don't have enough juice. Right now I have 500 watts @ 4 ohms and a 2x10 and 1x12 both 8ohm 750watts rms total and I don't have to crank my pre gain or master,very loud on 4 and it sounds clean. Some say double the cab I don't but give yourself a little room. there that's my 10cents
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That's a good example.
If you have headroom with your cabinets and don't find yourself turning up your amp past halfway you're doing good.

If you have an 8x10 rated at 800 watts and you have a 450 watt Solid State head, which I believe you were referring to by stating it's a power amp, and you have to turn the volume up 7/8 for some reason, you need more power.
^That is basically what Bassbasixx said^
 
#5
so let's say i'm kind of a dummy and didn't know this stuff before now, and so i've had my 160 watt carvin head cranked (7/8th's) into my 500 watt avatar cab because i was competing with two guitarists, a drummer, and a keyboardist. does this mean i've potentially damaged my speakers?
 
#6
Potentially, sure. But beware not to fall into the trap of believing you've created DC from squarewaves. ;) Basically you should listen to your tweeter and speaker cones while playing at that volume. If any of them are distorting (I mean the speaker parts, not the amp) then you may be damaging them.
 
#7
yikes!
i'll check it out tomorrow. as far as making sure i haven't already damaged the speakers, if i play it at a lower volume and hear no distortion, does that mean the cab is probably fine (ie no blown speakers)? sorry if this is a dumb line of questioning, but my amp knowledge has never been terribly much more than plugging in and playing . . .
if'n the cab is fine, i guess it'll be time to start shopping for a bigger head, right?
 
#9
narcopolo said:
yikes!
i'll check it out tomorrow. as far as making sure i haven't already damaged the speakers, if i play it at a lower volume and hear no distortion, does that mean the cab is probably fine (ie no blown speakers)? sorry if this is a dumb line of questioning, but my amp knowledge has never been terribly much more than plugging in and playing . . .
if'n the cab is fine, i guess it'll be time to start shopping for a bigger head, right?
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You are fine. You can't blow speakers by having too little power. It is a myth that a 150w amp can blow a speaker cab rated at 500w by going into clipping. The only thing that blows speakers is too much power than they can handle. And yet, a whole line of people keep trying to claim that it can despite repeated postings on here by experts saying it's not true.
 
#11
JimmyM said:
You are fine. You can't blow speakers by having too little power. It is a myth that a 150w amp can blow a speaker cab rated at 500w by going into clipping. The only thing that blows speakers is too much power than they can handle. And yet, a whole line of people keep trying to claim that it can despite repeated postings on here by experts saying it's not true.
Click to expand...

The potential for a "Mythbusters" episode apparent yet?
 
#12
narcopolo said:
so let's say i'm kind of a dummy and didn't know this stuff before now, and so i've had my 160 watt carvin head cranked (7/8th's) into my 500 watt avatar cab because i was competing with two guitarists, a drummer, and a keyboardist. does this mean i've potentially damaged my speakers?
Click to expand...
No. Speakers are damaged by overpowering. You can't overpower a 500 watt cab with 160 watts. You can't hurt the woofers with even 400 watts at full tilt clipping. Only tweeters are sensitive to clipping damage.

The position if the volume control has no bearing on the percentage of the amp's available power being used.

On average most cabs will only take 20 to 40% of their rated power before reaching what actually defines their output capability, which is the displacement limited power of the drivers, and no, you can't find out what that is because by and large even the manufacturers don't have that information on file.:rollno:
If your amp is rated at even 1/2 what your cabs are chances are it will drive them to full output with a bit to spare. Having more power available is a good thing, as it allows the amp to work easier. But it's not a strict necessity.
 
#15
I'd agree except there's a difference between avoiding complication and providing incorrect information. If we just say "don't clip the power section" then that spawns dozens more novice forumites repeating that statement anytime someone asks the old amp vs. cab watts question, which makes extra work for those people who try to clean up the myths and provide accurate information. And are you advising SVT users not to clip the power section? ;)

I'll admit the "truth" is very complicated though, so we do need to figure out a way to communicate it more simply.
 
#16
bongomania said:
I'd agree except there's a difference between avoiding complication and providing incorrect information. If we just say "don't clip the power section" then that spawns dozens more novice forumites repeating that statement anytime someone asks the old amp vs. cab watts question, which makes extra work for those people who try to clean up the myths and provide accurate information. And are you advising SVT users not to clip the power section? ;)

I'll admit the "truth" is very complicated though, so we do need to figure out a way to communicate it more simply.
Click to expand...


Really I think that basically when it comes to bass gear that pretty much any amp is going to work with any cab and as long as your not a complete idiot your unlikely to do damage. Unfortunately its the noobs that will act like an idiot out of in experience (bass turned 11 mids and treble down to -11 and the clipping light litterly blown clean out of the amp and stuck in the wall across from it:ninja:)


I'm sure you could find some cab and amp combination where the cabinet explodes just by being with in 10 metres of the amp let along being plugged into it. But as general thing I don't think there's huge danger of doing damage regardless of amp cab combination.

Now if you (or anyone else) could sum it up for everybody very simply, correctly and as laymanly as possible. I'm sure it could be stickied and everyone on talkbass would be greatful.
 

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