2. amps-preamps
  3. 153225-130247

Watts and power

Can somebody break it down in layman's terms for me? Why is it that sometimes an amp that has a high watt rating (like, say, a lot of class D amps do) don't seem to always have the balls that much lower rated A or AB amps do? I have heard some people say, "It's not the watts, it's the power supply." Are they talking about big honkin' toroidal transformers? I know opinions vary on a speaker like, say, Magnepans - Maggies love power, right? A lot of people caution against using class D amps to drive them and then will turn around and say that a receiver like the Outlaw RR2160 (rated at 110 watts into 8 ohms) drives Maggies really well! I'm not really asking about differences between Class D, A, or AB so much as I am asking about how can you tell the POWER an amp has from the specs? 
redstarwraith

Showing 2 responses by cousinbillyl

cousinbillyl
190 posts
 
I have a pair of Ralphs Atma-Sphere amps.

The last thing the signal (music) sees are two large 27,000uF storage supply caps. One for each phase of the sinusoidal waveform.

As my amps where getting older, I replaced the stock output caps with Mundorf high current ones.

The high current aspect controls my Acoustic Elegance 15 inch woofers like nothing I've ever heard.

Ralph, is it possible some amps have too low an omph factor?. 

I remember years ago, some amps had 60,000 + uF of storage?


cousinbillyl
190 posts
 
I have Acoustic Elegance 15 inch woofers. 140 Ohm impedance at Fs. Fs is 21 Hz. In the enclosure, Fs is 32 Hz. Again, 140 Ohms at 32 Hz.

The above mentioned fabulous amp. One of the most powerful available.
3000Watts @ 8 Ohms. 6000Watts @ 4 Ohms. 12,000Watts @ 2 Ohms.

Let's go the other way;
1500Watts @ 16 Ohms. 750Watts @ 32 Ohms. 375Watts @ 64 Ohms. 187.5Watts @ 128 Ohms.

Now my poor tube amps.
140Watts @ 8 Ohms. 120Watts @ 4 Ohms. ???Watts @ 2 Ohms.

The other way;
160Watts @ ....... everything above. Therefore @ 16. 32. 64. 128 etc. it just keeps on chukin'

The average 400Watt SS amp;
400 @ 8, 200 @ 16, 100 @ 32, 50 @ 64, and, are you ready? 25Watts @ 128 Ohms.

Please correct me if I made a mistake.


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