Watts? Watts ?? Watts??

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metalj

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OK is it possible to REALLY lay this question to rest??

First off my music store guy says something differnt than the tech rep from the company, then throw in about 5 other sound techs that i have talked to and they all give me different answer.

I am looking at buying PA speakers that have all these different power ratings on them.

What IS the difference between.........

Continuous Power?
RMS Power?
Peak Power?
Burst power?

actually if you could tell me what size of power amp to hook up to a speaker enclosure that is rated at the following at 4 ohms.(i copied the description from the manufacturer). Notice the 3 different power ratings.

3-way, full-range enclosure houses a 15" Black Widow® woofer, 2-way asymmetrical Quadratic Throat Waveguide™ horn, and an RX 22 - 2" titanium-diaphragm compression driver. Includes Sound Guard™ III tweeter and midrange protection. Handles 600W continuous power, 1200W program, and 2400W peak. Baltic birch construction. Frequency response: 54Hz to 16kHz. Max SPL: 132dB peak.

Now hows am i suppose to know what size of power amp to hook up to these?

Help please if you can.

If anyone posts their opinion or facts, ill tell you what my music store guy said and what the manufacturer said.
 
As I understand it....

Continuous power and RMS are the same thing.

Peak power and burst power are the same thing.

when reading power ratings for amps, make sure you pay attention to the resistance (ohm rating) and whether the numbers are per each channel or for bridged (mono) mode.

Here's sweetwater's guide to matching amps and speakers:

http://www.sweetwater.com/shop/live-sound/power-amplifiers/buying-guide.php

general rule of thumb is that you want to have some headroom in your poweramp (for bass spikes and so that it will run cool).

For the speaker you listed, I think you'd want an amp that delivers 1200watts per channel @ 4 ohms (or 600 watts per channel @ 8 ohms), such as the crest ca12 or the crown ce4000.

Hope this helps...
 
A lot depends on whether you are going to use the speakers full range or add in a crossover and sub. You can get away with less power if you are crossed over.
 
metalj said:
What IS the difference between.........

Continuous Power?
RMS Power?
Peak Power?
Burst power?
Click to expand...
This usually depends on the company. That's probably why you get so many different answer. Sometimes continuous is a minimum load and sometimes it's the same as RMS. I usually think of it as minimum load and program is around the amp rating I'd want. I usually heir on the side of more power than less and just make sure to keep the faders down a bit.

3-way, full-range enclosure houses a 15" Black Widow® woofer, 2-way asymmetrical Quadratic Throat Waveguide™ horn, and an RX 22 - 2" titanium-diaphragm compression driver. Includes Sound Guard™ III tweeter and midrange protection. Handles 600W continuous power, 1200W program, and 2400W peak. Baltic birch construction. Frequency response: 54Hz to 16kHz. Max SPL: 132dB peak.

Now hows am i suppose to know what size of power amp to hook up to these?
Click to expand...
I've heard both the double the program and double the continous lines. I'd go with what the manufacturer's recommendation. If they blow, they can't tell you they were overpowered.

But not knowing that I'd probably use a Crown CE2000 into each speaker, assuming they are an 8ohm load. That puts you just above program. Bridged that gives you 1350W each. Ignore the peak rating, it's usually meaningless and is there more for marketing purposes.
 
Doubling the power wouldbe the minimum I would reccomend. A crest CA12 is a good reccomendation. A Crown CE4000 would work, but in my opinion a CE2000 would be asking for trouble. The CE series seems to clip and overload really eaily. They thermal easily as well. In general, they just aren't built nearly as well as the Macrotech line and have nowhere near the ouput power per rated watt. Now, Assuming the speakers you are talking about are 8 ohms, you ought to be able to run 2 linked speakers off of each side of the amplifier you choose. If they are 4 ohm speakers, you could still run 2 a side if whatever amp you purchase is rated well at 2 ohms. It is important to remember that running two small an amp is even more dangerous for your drivers than running to large an amp. Personally, I would look into a CA 18 for 4 speakers or a Crown Macrotech 3600. I normally run my ca12's just to the mids in my cabinets (2x10" drivers per cabinet) and never run more than 4 cabinets off of the same CA12.
 
wow, what a hard thing to understand. ive been doing some research and have come up with thing. everybody has a different answer.

basically, what i gather is you just have to know your systems limmitations. i guesss what i take out of all this is as long as you cover your rms or program power you just need to know when to leave the faders alone, by using your ears and eyes on the meters and clip lights.

i guess Its kinda like a car stereo. You can only turn it up so loud before the quality of the music degrades, and starts to distort. If you keep running it at that volume your speakers are gonna blow. so relate that to a live band playing through a pa. find that point and stay clear or on the safe edge of it by either turning the whole mix down or finding the freq that is casusing the distortion through eq, compression, and adjusting it ???

am i on the right track ??

thanks for all of you taking the time to help me. i made sure to give all of you a bump :)
 
One thing to keep in mind, and there's a post here somewhere that explains it in explicit detail, is that its just as easy, if not easier to blow speakers by underpowering than it is to overpower them. If the amp is underpowered it can be driven into clipping more easily and can change the signal into a square wave which is like sending DC right to your speakers. I think thats how it went, at least. Someone correct me if I'm wrong.
 
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