So this guy says on his 100dB sensitivity system he recomends 3 X 300 w amplifiers, this is on top of the 750W once built into each sub woofer assy. that's 3 X 300 for EACH side!!!! Min recomended these things are 100dB 1 watt, JV has no clue about why you need watts, his solution is more sensitive speakers, not gonna make it happen. Uninformed misguied preconceived predjudices, mostly just uninformed, watts, it matters, all the up to total watts, not milliwatts, stick to head phones then http://legacyaudio.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=77&Itemid=209

http://legacyaudio.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=63&Itemid=192

But, what about all that scientific engineering that is supposed to determine
this sort of thing? You know, ohms law and all that. What scientifically
engineered principle says that all those extra watts are needed to produce
a specified sound pressure level? Specifically, the part that says certain
amounts of watts produce more realistic and live sounding sound pressure
levels despite the relationship between speaker sensitivity, efficiency and
watts needed to produce a desired spl?

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A few milliwatts ain't making any speaker sound realistic,

Of course they're not making any speaker sound realistic. The speaker must be capable of reproducing what is real and presented to it by the system in front of it before any amount of watts can achieve that goal. But unless you only consider LOUD! to be real, realism is not to be found at 112dB if those few milliwatts aren't doing their job at all times. dup, when Pass speaks of milliwatts let's assume he is not talking about playing the system at no more than milliwatt peaks so, please, let's forget your BS about headphones and so forth.

What you don't seem to understand is the realism of the recording exists in the milliwatts. Which is why you believe all you need are 10 A.W.G. cables and everything will be hunky-dory. Reproducing space is not a killowatt affair. How many watts does it take to reproduce ambience? If you don't care whether your system can reproduce ambience or have never heard ambience from your system at 112dB, that's too bad for you. I and a fair number of others want what sounds real and ambience is part of that sound. Space itself exists in those milliwatts. I don't believe nuance is accomplished at 4800 watts, it exists in the milliwatt levels. Tone has nothing to do with how many watts are available, the first few milliwatts either contain the correct tone or the rest don't. The microdynamics of each performance reside at millowatt levels. Pacing and timing have nothing to do with how many watts you own. Comunication is not dependent on how big your amplifier is. Emotional connection happens at what amount of watts?

As I've said before, if you only have one quality that defines realism for you, then you don't care about any of those other important qualities that make reproduced music sound more real for the rest of us. However, if you only have one quality, and that quality is LOUD!, then you shouldn't be preaching to anyone else who requires more than one quality when they judge what sounds real and what doesn't. If you believe a Big Mac is fine dining, don't try to instruct me when I'm cooking. You have your killowatts and I have my milliwatts. I assume you enjoy yours as much as I do mine. I do believe mine are the more difficult to accomplish well. Your's are simple, just get LOUD!

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That's AD's pre conceived predjudices. And Nelson Pass is hardly teh final word on amplifiers, he has his pre concevied predjudices, and that is what he uses to market his stuff

I disagree that both men have "prejudices" just as I don't think listing equipment prejudices accomplishes much. I will, however, agree that everyone approaches this thing called realism differently and no one should brow beat anyone else into believing 10 A.W.G. cables and 5k watts are the only way to get there.

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... JV has no clue about why you need watts ...

Are you getting frustrated, dup? You seem to be resorting to personal attacks lately. Why don't you just stick to your audio prejudices?

Bingo! See ya at the hut!

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http://legacyaudio.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=63&Itemid=192

I like eggs. I am prejudiced to see eggs without cheese and think they won't taste cheesy. Then they hatch!

http://sound.westhost.com/articles/pwr-vs-eff.htm#s2 If you READ this and comphrehend it, you will see 1000W amps is hardly extrodinary after he has determinded, the losses and the formula is there on what you need for say 110dB SPL...and it ain't no 10 Watts!!! I said that's impossilbe, unless you want to listen to clipped distorted 50's hi fi.....read this, you may get it!!! All the formulas, now do your gazintas

JV read this about having fewer MOSFETS like you seem to imply fewer parts means better sound, are you really beleiving that nonsnese? Read how he mentions the ckts involved in making the original recording, JV reads way too many ads, that's OK, but teh problem is, he beleives it is real facts....that's what ads are meant to do..... http://sound.westhost.com/cables-p5.htm#monoblock

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The lower one can make the source impeadance the less effect the amp will have on the speaker. Lowering the speaker wire impeadance can only be a good thing. Larger guage can only help.

That would seem to be a perfectly logical conclusion - if you were listening in an anechoic chamber. The very slight frequency errors introduced by shifting from this guage cable to that guage cable are too small to be of concern in a real room with actual walls. We have another thread which argues shifts in magnetic fields within a cable or conductor are too small to be of concern when compared to the size of the signal through the cable or semiconductor. It is illogical then to suggest moving to the lower resistance cable once you've met the basic requirements of the amplifier/speaker circuit would be of value. A room with rather typical six decibel troughs and peaks would overwhelm the difference a cable would introduce in this affair. And its effect on damping factor would actually be what? What is the ideal damping factor? Are we not back to when do you "need" 10 A.W.G. cable? If ten guage is better, isn't 000 guage even better still? What marks the end point? Do we really need 1000:1 factors or is that mere hype that establishes another prejudice? Do we really need speakers that require such high damping factors that 10 A.W.G. cables would make any improvement in the amp/speaker interface?

OK, I'll admit to an audio prejudice. The idea that watts are cheap is a stupid piece of non-thinking that has led this hobby down a path away from the music instead of toward better sound quality. I am prejudiced against anyone wanting me to believe numbers are what is important in any area where sound quality and common sense should take precedence.

You are correct, just because following a formula indicates that using a cable of infinite diameter would be a good thing based on having a lower resistance. Obviously this is a stupid suggestion. This is were the "point of deminishing returns" becomes relative. We have to choose a point somewhere on the curve between doesn't work and not practical. Of course we all disagree as to where that point lies.

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If you READ this and comphrehend it,

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JV reads way too many ads,

dup, you're getting downright insulting again. Why don't you just discuss something instead of making it a personal attack? I'm perfectly willing to grant you your love of killowatts and you just have to give me my love of milliwatts without further comment or insistence your way is the only way. We can both exist peacefully on this forum without constantly bumping into one another. I'm right for my way of listening and you can be right for your's. But you aren't right for everybody. OK? If you can't manage that, dup, then stop your yakking here and go find another thread to terrorize before you get yourself banished again.

This is from the link you provided, dup.

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There is a realisation that 'power is cheap', and this is quite true. High power amplifiers are now very cheap compared to even a few years ago. Since power is so cheap, loudspeakers with efficiencies even below 90dB/W/m are common - all you need to do is use a more powerful amp and everything is back where it should be, right? Wrong!

Since the majority of all electrical power is converted to heat, the higher the power applied to a speaker, the more heat you have to get rid of. The typical loudspeaker is not a good design for heat disposal, and many of the more dedicated manufacturers have gone to extreme lengths to get the best possible cooling for their driver's voicecoils.
http://sound.westhost.com/articles/pwr-vs-eff.htm#s2

You're arguing against yourself?! This says buying more cheap watts is wrong! Hmmmmmmm ...

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JV has no clue about why you need watts, his solution is more sensitive speakers, not gonna make it happen. Uninformed misguied preconceived predjudices, mostly just uninformed, watts, it matters, all the up to total watts ...

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http://sound.westhost.com/articles/pwr-vs-eff.htm#s2 If you READ this and comphrehend it, you will see 1000W amps is hardly extrodinary after he has determinded, the losses and the formula is there on what you need for say 110dB SPL...and it ain't no 10 Watts!!!

dup, I'm quite surprised you picked Elliot as your reference here since everything he says is pretty much in direct contradiction to what you claim to be true. Maybe if someone else reads this they'll find where Elloit suggests speakers that require 1k watt amplifiers are anything other than dumb and provide less sound quality not more sound quality. He also suggests a simple alternative to the problems related to high power systems. It's the same alternative I said you needed, dup.

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If I never see another loudspeaker rated at 1,000W (or more) again, it will still be too soon. Well apart from that fact that no voicecoil can withstand that kind of power for more than a few seconds or so without self destruction, why would anyone think that a 1kW loudspeaker was a good idea?

In the first instance, just consider a typical loudspeaker voicecoil. It is typically wound on some type of cardboard, thin aluminium, Kapton, fibreglass or some other similar material. I have never seen a ceramic or quartz voicecoil former, but that's what would be needed to take the temperatures involved at such an insanely high power - not to mention the wire and insulation used. I doubt that asbestos insulation would be considered a good idea these days. Think in terms of a typical old-style bar radiator or an electric toaster. These were/are typically around 1,000W and the resistance wire glows red hot (not surprisingly, this is the whole idea ).

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These power ratings for amplifiers and speakers are designed to appeal to those who have no understanding of efficiency, and think that power is the only thing that matters. For such people, a 1000W speaker must be better than a 200W speaker. What they don't understand is that a 200W speaker at 100dB/W/m is louder than a 1000W speaker at 90dB/W/m - the higher efficiency driver will achieve 123dB with 200W, vs.120dB for the 1000W driver. This is ignoring all losses, which are dramatically higher in the high power speaker - see below to find out why.

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While it may appear that many of the calculations in this article are based on the type of SPL (Sound Pressure Level) usually needed only for large scale public address, the same things apply for audio and home theatre. The effects are reduced because of the lower sound level normally used in a home environment, but are no less real since domestic loudspeaker drivers are normally rated for significantly lower power and efficiency than professional drivers.

Notice the phrase, "The effects are reduced because of the lower sound level normally used in a home environment." This suggests you don't have to and most people don't play at concert levels in their home. Now, dup, is Elliot your hero or what?

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There is absolutely no good reason that anyone should imagine that a loudspeaker driver capable of 1kW is a good idea - it isn't now, and never was.

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Consider that the average high efficiency loudspeaker is typically no more than about 5% efficient. This means that only 5% of the applied electrical energy is converted into sound, the rest is dissipated as heat from the voice coil. This 5% efficiency speaker will be rated at 99dB/W/m - this is much higher than normally achieved.

If we could get one, a 100% efficient (direct radiating) speaker would convert 1W of electrical energy into 1W of acoustical energy. This will give us 112dB SPL (at 1W, 1 metre, when radiating into half space). Since no such loudspeaker exists, we must use what is available. Typical hi-fi loudspeakers are typically around 90dB/W/m - only 0.62% efficiency! 99.38% of all applied power is wasted as heat.

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There is a realisation that 'power is cheap', and this is quite true. High power amplifiers are now very cheap compared to even a few years ago. Since power is so cheap, loudspeakers with efficiencies even below 90dB/W/m are common - all you need to do is use a more powerful amp and everything is back where it should be, right? Wrong!

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Even so, there are limits. These limits are physical, metallurgical and chemical, and no amount of marketing hype will change any of these. The adhesive that bonds the voicecoil to the former has a difficult job, high temperatures, often extreme forces acting upon it, and high vibration levels all stress the adhesives. It is not uncommon for a voicecoil to reach (or exceed) 200

Oh, yeah, I also think ported speakers over-emphasize the frequency the port is tuned to.

Open baffle speakers seem to capture more true timbre and ambience.

Random crap on your walls and in your room is generally sonically better sounding than sonically planned crap on your walls and in your room.

It's often easier to tweak yourself than your room.

If your wife can hear the difference, it's probably real.

If you like the way a subwoofer sounds, then it's a good subwoofer. If you like the way a speaker sounds, then it's a good speaker. Then, the two will probably sound good together.

If you need lots of watts before you can hear what's going on, that's a bad sign.

If your sonic reference is an amplified venue that you've never been too, leave the hobby.

If you are never wrong, then you have nothing to learn from an audiophile forum, so why are you here?

If live "unamplified" music is always thrown into teh mix as a reference, then why would you try to play it back on equipment that is horribly colored with tube bloat, high distortions etc...since somehow using amplifiers at the original performce is just no good, but if you reproduce it using horrible colored bloated electronics, that's good. Makes no sense, doesn't matter what the original performance was the goal is to reproduce it at home, doesn't matter what it was. More watts is not just louder, which I have said 100 times, it always has more control, less constrained sounding, more open. Due to the facts presented in the ESP article. His predjudice about not using more watts, but higher efficiency speakers, is his predjudice ain't it, but the article presented the reasons why more watts is needed, and it gave numbers to prove it. Someone was asking for how much power is needed for a 112 dB SPL, it's in there. More watts, better sound, my speakers are well over 90dB 1 w And with each increase in available power, got better and better, not louder.

That would be me, Dup.

I was merely attempting to give you the same business that you seem to
give everyone who doesn't subscribe to the 3600 watts times 4 style of
audio. Clearly, as indicated by the articles that you yourself posted in
effort to bolster your opinion, the science simply doesn't support your
advocacy.

There are two ways to skin this cat. I happen to actually agree with you
to a certain extent. My experience is that lots of reserve power seems to
give the music a certain effortless ease. It's usually better to have plenty
of reserve power for the wild dynamic swings than to just barely have enough.

The second way is clearly favored by many and the science and math are both
straight forward and absolutely logical. You can't get around the math.

I don't mind that you have your prejudices and that you get a kick out of lots
of power and think that it's the way for you. What I mind is that you use your
time in these discussions picking and choosing the science that allows you to
singularly ride your high horse in being a Johnny One Note.

It's really simple. High efficiency speakers need fewer watts, far fewer in some
cases. Low efficiency speakers need more watts, sometimes many more watts. Both work
and both are supported to some degree by audio nerds.

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I don't mind that you have your prejudices and that you get a kick out of lots
of power and think that it's the way for you. What I mind is that you use your
time in these discussions picking and choosing the science that allows you to
singularly ride your high horse in being a Johnny One Note.

Since we're still discussing prejudices, let me say I am finding many to admit too in this thread. I am prejudiced against anyone who;

1) Links an article that contradicts what he is trying to prove and can't figure out what the article actually states.

2) Challenges someone he dislikes to "comprehend" the linked article after claiming superior knowledge of audio - superior it would appear to whom?

3) After the article is correctly interpreted, the person in question claims the exact opposite is true depite the quotes provided to the contraty. Quotes that are as clear as, "There is a realisation that 'power is cheap', and this is quite true. High power amplifiers are now very cheap compared to even a few years ago. Since power is so cheap, loudspeakers with efficiencies even below 90dB/W/m are common - all you need to do is use a more powerful amp and everything is back where it should be, right? Wrong!", and, "It is only by choosing a driver whose efficiency is matched to the requirements that the requirements have even the slightest chance of being accomplished in practice. Quite obviously, a higher efficiency loudspeaker driver will need less power to achieve the result, but not so obviously, high efficiency should be sought whenever possible - it will always give a better result (all other things being equal)."

4) Despite the proof provided that pounding more and more watts into a loudspeaker will inevitably result in less and less sound quality and less and less SPL's, these facts are denied.

5)I am prejudiced against anyone who uses their
time in these discussions picking and choosing science they wrongly interpret which can easily be proven wrong in order to singularly ride their high horse while being a Johnny One Note.

6) I am prejudiced against anyone who is faced with opposition to their opinion and can only resort to, "Pass is prejudiced", "Dudley is prejudiced", and, the supreme hillarity, "Elliot (who was used as a refernce by this person} is prejudiced". In short, I am prejudiced against anyone who uses their own prejudices to batter me about the head on a constant and unrelenting basis and then screams "PREJUDICE" when confronted with the facts.

7) I am prejudiced against anyone who turns what should be a simple discussion into a personal assault weapon against anyone simply using his own evidence against him.

8) Mostly I am prejudiced against anyone who has been offered a truce that allows everyone to have some degree of rightness and then the person offered the truce pisses on everyone just to prove he can.

9) I am prejudiced against anyone who, when proven wrong, starts another thread that is simply yet another poorly disguised attempt at slamming someone else's system - referencing the very same person who he just called prejudiced and using words that again contradict this person's intent and then having this person not admit he also uses tubes in his system. That one really chaps my fanny!

I had an egg this morning - with cheese. And I no longer own a suspended sub-chassis turntable unlike the person who claims turntables are bad but owns a suspended sub-chassis turntable.

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my speakers are well over 90dB 1 w And with each increase in available power, got better and better, not louder.

According to Elliot - whom you want to both believe and throw under the bus while simultaneously misunderstanding everything he says - you are correct in one respect. As you drove your speakers with more and more watts, they did not get louder and louder.

dup, if you get this wrong when it is in black and white before you to see, just what else might you have got wrong?

Hmmmmmmmm?

I digress back to the subject at hand- Besides my previously posted prejudice for the QUAD/ Wharfedale kinship dynamic, I have other tangential areas of scientifically unsupported opinion. Specifically, the cowbell on Mountain's "Mississipi Queen" totally smokes BOC's "Don't Fear The Reaper." Attack me if you must.

Personally, I prefer the cowbell in Fleetwood Mac's song, The Chain.
I would add, Mick is the best drummer on the planet.

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Personally, I prefer the cowbell in Fleetwood Mac's song, The Chain.
I would add, Mick is the best drummer on the planet.

Excellent choice. It wistfully punctuates the pain and regret of lost love- in DVD-A it is metaphysical!

Hmm, or was it "Gold Dust Woman." Yeah, it was Gold Dust Woman.

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Hmm, or was it "Gold Dust Woman." Yeah, it was Gold Dust Woman.

I'm prejudiced for the one, definitive cowbell hit on "Chain." The cowbell track on "Gold Dust Woman" lopes along like Gene Autry's horse on a hot day at the ranch.

LOL. I'm from Texas. Maybe that's why I prefer the latter.

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Mick is the best drummer on the planet.

Not by a long shot.

http://search.yahoo.com/bin/search?fr=ybr_sbc&p=Paul%20Motian

Is it a cowbell on the Rolling Stones Honky Tonk Woman in the first opening sounds? Cus' that in SACD is fabulous...On the regular Cd, it's flat and lifeless, dull. But then i am predjudiced for DSD/SACD. Cus' it's better.

Checkout how even McIntosh loudspeakers follow teh rule of PHYSICS..larger drivers go deeper into real feel it bass, and lotsa power handling....does McIntosh have it right, probably, JV? They do not make anything using a single driver, they advertise as producing lifelike realism...the best system uses the most drivers, and larger ones, and handle lotsa power... http://www.mcintoshlabs.com/mcprod/..%5Cdata%5Ccompare%5CSpeakers_2.08.pdf

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Mick is the best drummer on the planet.

Not by a long shot.

http://search.yahoo.com/bin/search?fr=ybr_sbc&p=Paul%20Motian

You're just prejudiced.