In 55 years, I've never blown a tweeter or speaker. I've used 16 watt Sherwood S7100 receiver to 200/400 watt hybrid Counterpoint amps. Electrostats and dynamic speakers. My 35 watt voltage regulated highly modified Dynaco ST70 lacks the watts to really exploit my Legacy Focus 6-12" woofers and provide ultra resolving sound as my 125 watt custom monoblocks but they have the same sound signature. It takes a lot of watts to increase 3db of sound, especially for low impedance, inefficient speakers. I match the amp to the speaker and don't worry about loudness (my current listening rooms can go above 110db clean and easily but that's more than I want or need).
Perception and Watts: Doubling of power
There's a curious rule of thumb, which to my ears seems mostly true:
- To double the perceived volume, you must output 10x more power.
10x power = 10 dB by the way. We've read this as we were buying amps and trying to decide between 100w/channel and 150w/channel. We are told, repeatedly that 50 W difference isn't really that much.
On more than one occasion I've tested this and found it's pretty much spot on. Here's my question:
How can any of us really tell what half as loud, or twice as loud is?
I mean, think about this for a bit. I cannot tell half as bright, or twice as bright, but it seems I actually CAN tell what half as loud is. How does this even begin to work in the ear/brain mechanism?? 😁