Monday 23 December 2013

What Amount Of Power Do You Really Require From Your Small Tube Amps?

By Sherry Lambert


Taking a look at a few of the technical specs of today's stereo amps, one cannot help but be at a loss in attempting to evaluate different types as well as technical jargon, including "t-amp", "THD" et cetera. I am going to explain the term "amplifier wattage" a bit more in this expose. "Output power" is one of the most fundamental terms describing amplifier performance. On the other hand, it is time and again misunderstood. Several producers also in history have used this term in a perplexing manner in order to conceal the true performance. Some of the technical jargon which amp suppliers show regularly are ambiguous and do not inevitably give a good indication of the true functioning of the amp. Next I am going to clarify the "power" rating of stereo amplifiers. This spec is one of the most essential and perhaps important specifications to be aware of.

If you are exploring to buy an audio amplifier to set up your home sound system, you will often be confronted with a number of bizarre technical jargon describing its functioning. But how do these numbers relate to how the amp sounds and how are these to be interpreted? Now I will describe the "output power" rating of audio amplifiers. This term is one of the most essential and maybe important specs to be aware of.

"Power" shows how loud your amplifier may drive your loudspeakers. Depending on your application, you can choose a little amplifier delivering merely a few watts or a larger one delivering several hundred watts. Most home radios only have amps which have several watts power which regularly is adequate for a small space. If you intend to shake your walls then you clearly wish to opt for an amplifier that offers up to several hundred watts. For best audio quality, you might wish to pick an amplifier that has higher output power than you require because most amplifiers are going to exhibit rising distortion once the audio output power increases.

There are 2 widespread ways to publish amplifier wattage. These are "peak power" and "rms power". "Peak power" describes how much power the amplifier can deliver to your speakers for a brief burst. However, "rms power" shows how much power the amp can deliver for a longer amount of time without being damaged. In the past, vendors have regularly favored listing the "peak power". This figure is bigger than the average or "rms" power. However, "peak power" can frequently be misleading as there is no norm showing the amount of time that the amplifier must be able to output this amount of output power. Music and voice is not uniform in terms of volume. Thus the peak power rating is nonetheless essential, although not as important as the rms power specification. Ideally the audio amplifier is going to display both the rms and peak power spec. Having a large peak power rating is going to ensure sufficient headroom for music peaks that are common in music signals. This is since at specific points in time the signal will show bursts of power which by far exceed the average output power of the signal.

Please note that frequently the peak output power of the amp will depend on the impedance of your speakers which is usually between 4 and 8 Ohms. Amps have a restricted output voltage swing because of the fixed internal supply voltage. Hence the highest output power will vary depending on the loudspeaker impedance. The smaller the loudspeaker impedance the bigger the maximum power the amplifier is able to deliver. Accordingly often largest output power is given for a particular loudspeaker impedance.




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