• TalkBass has been independent since 1998. Add your voice.
    Create a free account to reply to discussions, view embedded media, and browse with fewer display ads.
    Join free Log in
    Want zero display ads or expanded classifieds tools? Compare plans.

True power output?

#41
The whole point many of us are trying to make: they provided a certain metric. A number, with units assigned to it. However, the amp did not meet that published metric. It's not a case of saying "well it sounds just as loud as...." because they gave a specific metric, a measurable quantifiable unit.

If they had advertised it as "a 250 watt RMS amp that sounds like a 750 watt amp" then that's permissible--we could accept EQ or compression or transient-shaping or whatever, kinda fudging but hey they would've been upfront about it. When someone specifically says "this amp does 'X' of units 'Y' " and it doesn't, any other "after the fact" comparisons--"it's just as 'blank' though" are irrelevant to the reality that the manufacturer specifically claimed 'X' of units 'Y' .

Maybe the amp sounds great. Maybe it is bulletproof and 100% reliable. Maybe it's loud as all get out. Maybe its users are happier than a clam. For us engineers and tech geeks, though, we live in a world where numbers matter. 750 does not equal 250. Q.E.D.
 
  • Like
Reactions: dincz, Downunderwonder, JackANSI and 5 others
#43
Scottkarch said:
LOL that's hilarious. It's OK when a 450 watt is measured to output 450 watts on the bench but is a dog in the real world... ( blame the user ). But if an amp with clean headroom and dynamic range ( IMO ) is as loud as needed in the real world, but doesn't measure well on the bench, it's no good. That's rich. I think I'd rather have the louder amp rather than the quieter one.

Although the power transistors may only be 236 watts, the rest of the power and output section probably are configured for high dynamic range and peaks... yes, very transient, but I'm guessing that the peaks match the voltage swings of a bass running through a 450 watt or 750 watt amp. TC isn't just compressing the signal.

I used to have a 40Watt Proton stereo with 6db of clean headroom. It was much louder and cleaner than 250 watt stereos of friends back in college. It could only do 40 watts but the 6db of headroom gave it clean peaks much higher than my friends amplifiers. I don't know, but I'm assuming that TC is doing something similar.

I'm sick of these threads. It's complicated. It's also more complicated than people want to spend the time to understand. TC did not produce the 450/750Watt RMS amp they insinuated and even looks like they specified in their own manual. Shame on them. IT's too bad that what seems, to me, like a clever output section can't be appreciated because people won't get past the RMS rating... or realize that RMS isn't a particularly good measurement of how loud an amp might be. Just look at Jimmy's post. An amp measured to be 450 watts on the bench underperforming.. not being loud enough. Parts of the discussion are black and white, parts are not... people keep latching on and reposting the same measurements and opinions. What a waste of time.. Oh well.
Click to expand...
I used to have a 3 Pro, and I stand 100% by what I said. It does not underperform in the real world whatsoever.
 
  • Like
Reactions: JackANSI and CL400Peavey
#46
Beat dead horse.jpg
 
  • Like
Reactions: Scottkarch, Chef, wcriley and 3 others
#47
nashvillebill said:
If they had advertised it as "a 250 watt RMS amp that sounds like a 750 watt amp" then that's permissible....
Click to expand...
I think it's still problematic, because every decent amp is already designed to sound as loud as possible within its normal power rating [1]. We have to give the 750 watt amp the benefit of the doubt, of also being designed to sound louder than its power rating. It leads to the paradox where every amp sounds like a more powerful amp, and we're back to square one with ratings. So we might as well have used conventional rating methods in the first place.

I think the only way to get objective ratings (of anything, not just amp power but also things like the resolution of photographic cameras) is either by independent third party review, or open design.

[1] Is this really true? I suspect it is. Every bass amp that I've tested, save one, (not a random or exhaustive survey of course) has had some way of avoiding symmetrical hard clipping when overloaded. Some go into soft clipping. Some have compression. Some have non-flat EQ (realize that EQ and filtering are two sides of the same coin). There are patents on this stuff. And people talk about how one amp sounds louder than another, when both have similar ratings. Ironically, a lot of amps that receive favorable reviews are described as being louder than expected given their power rating.
 
  • Like
Reactions: deepwave, Scottkarch and Sartori
#48
JimmyM said:
The 3 Pro's alleged underpowering problems are totally from people not knowing that they should ignore the input light and crank the gain pretty hard. It's a 450w amp and independent measuring confirms it. And the RH750 also has a 236w power amp.
Click to expand...
It's really more a "you have appropriate gain" light.

I always crank gain knobs on bass amps anyway. Well, not always. But pretty often. On Ampegs I almost always do.

Scottkarch said:
LOL that's hilarious. It's OK when a 450 watt is measured to output 450 watts on the bench but is a dog in the real world... ( blame the user ). But if an amp with clean headroom and dynamic range ( IMO ) is as loud as needed in the real world, but doesn't measure well on the bench, it's no good. That's rich. I think I'd rather have the louder amp rather than the quieter one.

Although the power transistors may only be 236 watts, the rest of the power and output section probably are configured for high dynamic range and peaks... yes, very transient, but I'm guessing that the peaks match the voltage swings of a bass running through a 450 watt or 750 watt amp. TC isn't just compressing the signal.

I used to have a 40Watt Proton stereo with 6db of clean headroom. It was much louder and cleaner than 250 watt stereos of friends back in college. It could only do 40 watts but the 6db of headroom gave it clean peaks much higher than my friends amplifiers. I don't know, but I'm assuming that TC is doing something similar.

I'm sick of these threads. It's complicated. It's also more complicated than people want to spend the time to understand. TC did not produce the 450/750Watt RMS amp they insinuated and even looks like they specified in their own manual. Shame on them. IT's too bad that what seems, to me, like a clever output section can't be appreciated because people won't get past the RMS rating... or realize that RMS isn't a particularly good measurement of how loud an amp might be. Just look at Jimmy's post. An amp measured to be 450 watts on the bench underperforming.. not being loud enough. Parts of the discussion are black and white, parts are not... people keep latching on and reposting the same measurements and opinions. What a waste of time.. Oh well.
Click to expand...
The fact is that the SVT 3Pro can put out its rated, advertised power, while these two amps from TCE cannot. Nobody is saying that they're bad amps, just that the claim that they do 450 and 750 watts is a blatant lie, given the independent bench testing. It's not even close enough to be fudging.

People don't take issue with the amp being only 236 watts. People take issue with it being that wattage while TCE claims that it puts out almost twice as much.

It's not an issue of loud enough. It's an issue of blatantly lying. TCE claimed 450 (and 750) watts RMS. The amps don't get anywhere near that. Not even close. There are more watts between the 450's advertised RMS power rating and its actual power than there are being put out by my amp at all.

Also not sure how you're getting that the 3Pro is underperforming from Jimmy's post. He just said you have ignore the light to get it right. A design flaw, true, but by no means a fatal one.

Jazz Ad said:
It's not a matter of practical use. Watts measure power, not sound level.
If you sell a 750w that only outputs 236w it's fraud, regardless of how loud it goes.
Click to expand...
Yep.
 
  • Like
Reactions: wcriley
#52
Mike A said:
I don't put a ton of stock into it. I figure it's a "target rating" for the market anyway. Same thing with motorcycles. My bike is a "1600" but actual displacement is 1552 cc.

Does it bother me? No, I test rode it first.
Click to expand...

There's a difference between calling a 1552cc motor 1600cc and calling 236W 450W. 1552 is 97% of 1600 which is close enough. 236 is ~52% of 450 which is a rather larger disparity. I bet you'd have a problem with the manufacturer if your 1600 was actually 840... :D

This whole TC thing is too bad because I think the blowback over the false power claims is overshadowing some interesting technology in the amps in question. That said, I do think that it was a seriously poor marketing decision at best. It was dishonest and they should be called on it. Any manufacturer should be held to that standard and there have been plenty of examples where other companies haven't met it, so it's not only TC. Anyone remember the Accuswitch?
 
  • Like
Reactions: deepwave, Sartori, Scottkarch and 2 others
#55
Mark Reccord said:
Really? You wouldn't have an issue with a blatant lie about the displacement of the motor, all performance metrics aside?
Click to expand...

Not really. I wouldn't buy it, so that would be the end of it for me.

I might inform others that asked me about it, but I don't feel the need to start an all out crusade on the matter. I have better things to do and more important stuff to be angry about.
 
#56
IIRC the RH450 is capable to hold a sine burst for a short duration of 20 mSec at 450 Watt, and then goes down to continous power level.

Bench Test Comparison of pro audio amplifiers.
Invalid Link Removed

Note:
there is at least one amplifier at this bench test that starts at a remarkable big number of power but immediately drops down and falls (after around 110 mSec) well below the rated power.

This drop is very obvious at minimum Ohm load with all tested amplifiers. At least one of these amplifiers can provide "rated" power for around 1 second but, 1 second isn't continous IMO.
 
  • Like
Reactions: agedhorse
#60
JackANSI said:
That is actually a good point. Has anyone actually done an SPL test of an RH450 and some other "around 450w or 250w" amp from another maker through the same cab in the same room?
Click to expand...
Not sure why that would matter. An amp either meets its advertised specs or it doesn't. And the method they use to measure wattage may not tell you everything about loudness, but it's the established standard, and "sounds like X watts" isn't good enough.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Sartori

Latest posts

Top Bottom
Back