Members Torkelboy Posted March 8, 2007 Members Share Posted March 8, 2007 Which is the best setup? a 350w head powering a 400w speaker, or a 400w head powering a 350 speaker? /Erik Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members FreestyleIntruder Posted March 8, 2007 Members Share Posted March 8, 2007 Not that there's much difference either way, but I'd go with the latter. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Torkelboy Posted March 8, 2007 Author Members Share Posted March 8, 2007 Not that there's much difference either way, but I'd go with the latter. Why? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members theoriz Posted March 8, 2007 Members Share Posted March 8, 2007 Definately the second for me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members FreestyleIntruder Posted March 8, 2007 Members Share Posted March 8, 2007 Why? Because I like my head to have as much power as possible Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Torkelboy Posted March 8, 2007 Author Members Share Posted March 8, 2007 I will play two cabs, both of them 8ohm 200w,through my head b2r head-350w 4ohm So that is a 350w head powering cab's a total 400w. correct me if wrong, but won't this setup take better care of my cab's then if my head pumped out more then they could handle? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members FreestyleIntruder Posted March 8, 2007 Members Share Posted March 8, 2007 Well you wouldn't be running your 400w amp at full blast all the time (and if you were, I would suggest that you should get a bigger amp/more cabinets). Speakers tend to be pretty sturdy things, I can generally say that they would tolerate a fair bit more power than they are rated for. On a practical level, though, as I said there wouldn't really be much difference either way. 350w v 400w wouldn't give you noticably more volume (all other things being equal) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Narcosynthesis Posted March 8, 2007 Members Share Posted March 8, 2007 Headroom comes from the amp, so a bigger amp will give you more headroom. A cab always needs to be *at least* equal, if not higher than the wattage you are putting through it, so run a 400w amp and a 350w cab, you will get a bit more power, but running it flat out will kill the cab, running a 350w amp into a 400w cab will be fine whatever the amp is set at. If you are looking for clean headroom, you won't necessarily be actually using all of the available power (running an amp at half volume will give you a clearer sound than half the wattage at full volume) so you can get off with using smaller cabs, providing you know hte limits and don't over power them David Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members 2manband Posted March 8, 2007 Members Share Posted March 8, 2007 If you drive your amp to clipping it will put out more than its rated wattage. With tube amps, the clipping power section sounds nice, so I usually pair them up with a cabinet rated for 1.5 - 2x the amp's rated power. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Jazz Ad Posted March 8, 2007 Members Share Posted March 8, 2007 Headroom comes from the power amp and nowhere else. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Torkelboy Posted March 8, 2007 Author Members Share Posted March 8, 2007 alright!So if you like the look of a voulumeknob set to max you should have a cab that handles a bit more then what the head has to give! Thx for great answers! Gr8 forum btw Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members SA Rios Posted March 8, 2007 Members Share Posted March 8, 2007 alright!So if you like the look of a voulumeknob set to max you should have a cab that handles a bit more then what the head has to give!Thx for great answers! Gr8 forum btw uh... no. You risk sending your amp into clipping which will send square waves to your speakers which is bad. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members SA Rios Posted March 8, 2007 Members Share Posted March 8, 2007 I have a ton of head room. My eden cabs can handle 350 watts. My head puts out 575 watts. As long as I don't crank it up to 10, which I never do, I'm ok. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Torkelboy Posted March 8, 2007 Author Members Share Posted March 8, 2007 uh... no. You risk sending your amp into clipping which will send square waves to your speakers which is bad. A dont know alot about the technical stuff related to amp's and cab's. But if my head gives 350w and my cab can take 400w that means my head wont hurt the cab? is that correct? If so, i understand your answer as if you should never have a volumeknob at it's max? HELP MEEEEEEE! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members SA Rios Posted March 8, 2007 Members Share Posted March 8, 2007 so by that you mean you should never have a volumeknob at it's max? I don't know. Just do it and see what happens. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members jackcheez Posted March 8, 2007 Members Share Posted March 8, 2007 The idea of having a high powered amp and headroom is so you don't have to turn it way up. Then you have headroom. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Torkelboy Posted March 8, 2007 Author Members Share Posted March 8, 2007 okok....then i'm with you! All posts in here make alot more sense to me now! I understood the word 'headroom' in a complete different way! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members i_wanna_les_paul Posted March 8, 2007 Members Share Posted March 8, 2007 The idea of having a high powered amp and headroom is so you don't have to turn it way up. Then you have headroom. This man is right. Also, remember that there are two different speaker power ratings - continuous and peak. Continuous is the power you can pump into a speaker all the time. Peak is what it will handle for a very brief moment. So, in theory, you'd ruin a 400-watt speaker cab if you continuously ran more than 400 watts into it. But there is not standard for speaker or power amp ratings, so it's anyone's guess as to how much power stuff can really dish out or take. Dustin Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Torkelboy Posted March 8, 2007 Author Members Share Posted March 8, 2007 This man is right. Also, remember that there are two different speaker power ratings - continuous and peak (or program...or programme or whatever for you Brits). Continuous is the power you can pump into a speaker all the time. Peak is what it will handle for a very brief moment. So, in theory, you'd ruin a 400-watt speaker cab if you continuously ran more than 400 watts into it.But there is not standard for speaker or power amp ratings, so it's anyone's guess as to how much power stuff can really dish out or take.Dustin Yes i've read about program/rms handling, my Ampegbse410 and the cab i'm probably buyin(SVT115e) are both rated at 200w rms and 400wprogram(peak) Thanks for the head's up:wave: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Bob O'Brian Posted March 9, 2007 Members Share Posted March 9, 2007 Somebody I used to work for, and who knows more about this stuff than I do, told me that when you turn the amp up full and end up sending square (or clipped) wave signals (as was mentioned above) that essentially means you are sending continuous mains electricity through your speaker's voice coil. So even a relatively small amp could destroy a speaker in this way. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members L. Ron Hoover Posted March 9, 2007 Members Share Posted March 9, 2007 Somebody I used to work for, and who knows more about this stuff than I do, told me that when you turn the amp up full and end up sending square (or clipped) wave signals (as was mentioned above) that essentially means you are sending continuous mains electricity through your speaker's voice coil. So even a relatively small amp could destroy a speaker in this way. Yes, no, maybe, sort of? It's kind of hard to explain without getting technical and long winded and no-one wants that. Basically, it is possible to damage a speaker with a head rated for less power than the speaker, but only to a point. The crux of the biscuit is that an amp will put out more than its rated power if you clip it. Theoretically up to twice as much under really hard clipping. It's just as possible to damage a speaker with a more powerful amp as well..... Not to mention that most speakers can't actually handle their rated power at low frequencies and that this can be made worse by cabinet design.... Oy vey! Anyway, to the OP: Either of those setups will be fine as long as you don't have to drive the amp into distortion to get the volume you need. You don't need to get too hung up on speaker-cabinet power ratios. Just go with what sounds good and gives you the volume you want without too much strain on the amp. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.