Date: Wed, 27 Apr 2005 06:45:45 -0400 From: Malt_Hound <Malt_Houndnospamm*yahoo.com> Subject: Re: I think I blew my amp??!!
Colin Stamp wrote: >>But I don't see why driving a linear amplifier into its limits (that's >>what clipping is) would cause spikes... >> > > > I don't make a study of it or anything, but I could take a couple of > guesses... > > 1. The amp's power rating will be at a certain, reasonable, distortion > level - say 5%. That 5% distortion doesn't happen *at* the clipping > point but some way before it. So you can drive the amp harder and get > more power than it's rating, but it sounds crap so the manufacturer > can't make any claims about this higher rating. Yes, you are absolutely correct. Clipping is one (very extreme) form of distortion. > > 2. If you then continue to drive the amp harder still, and into real > clipping, the resulting sharp edges on the output waveform mean the > amp is generating much more power at high frequencies than it would > normally. The tweeters in the speaker system would normally only > expect to see a small fraction of the amp's output, so when the amp > starts producing serious power in the tweeter's range, safety margins > can get eaten into. Yup, and to clarify further, the amount of power in the distortion, while higher than normally seen at those high frequencies would be far less than the nominal power. So the end result may be that the tweeters would blow. But unlike the OPs situation, there would still be some sound from the remaining other drivers (speakers). -Fred W
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