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Power Uber Alles ?

Hi Gang,
Another thread that is about to go sideways brought up an interesting question: Is power alone an important quality indicator for you?

Of course, they're nice to have, but have you experienced that bigger amps sound better, or is the overall quality of the amp more important.
Assume you have enough power for a modest living room. If a listener was happy with a particular 100 Watt amplifier, would you suggest they find more power?

Please include experience, speakers, and size of listening area while replying!

Also, for a 12' x 18' living room with 86 dB speakers, what range of power do you think you would personally be happy with?
erik_squires

Showing 1 response by jtcf

jtcf's avatar
jtcf
1,620 posts
 
In a 12x18 room with 86db speakers a 100 watt amp that can double it's power into 4ohms would be sufficient.My former house had a 20x16 living room but was open to the dining room and kitchen and I needed 300 watts for the 89db  speakers to get any dynamics at all.
Now my room is 16x17 and lower powered tube amps give me plenty of power with more efficient speakers.The sound quality is so much better to me-realistic and palpable.If I could have afforded more powerful tube amps back then I certainly would have.The quality is more important to me but $$ make for comprise sometimes.
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