Will I notice a difference?

[Good4it]

If all else is the same (ie: speakers, distance and volume) will more output in watts make the sound better or worse?

Another way to ask is do more watts, say 110W vs 150 or 200W, drive the speakers to produce better sound or is volume the only difference?

 

[ryanosaur]

FWIW, a conversation I had with the VP of Eastern regional distribution for the company that imports Monitor Audio... (gosh, that took way more than necessary)...
Anyway, he ,as well as Eric at Tekton, both gave the same answer: having greater Dynamic Headroom is better.
That said, how much is too much? All things being equal, the 1000W per channel that the MA guy cited as an example is crazy overkill.
A lot of other rule-of-thumb examples suggest doubling the RMS rating of your speakers.
A lot of people say why spend money on amplification you won't need or touch?
For me, I wanted to have enough dynamic headroom so that my peaks would clear 'reference level' even though I might never go that loud. so for a speaker with 86dB sensitivity, I need only 1-2w, but to clear 105db, I need ~128w (to produce107dB). Mind then, that to see any greater increase, I have to double that power to 256w for 110dB, then double that again to get me to 113 db. By then, my speakers will probably be smoking.

Beyond that, I have no personal experience here, but I have heard Polks like a lot of power. I have seen/heard under-powered B&W speakers... they should have sounded at least as good as the other speakers in the room, but were not performing at any level that could be called respectable. Now maybe that was just a bad pair of speakers? Maybe they were truly under-powered.

I'm certain that some of the cat's with more experience than I will chime in on this.

 

[Paul DS]

To the best of my knowledge, a watt is a watt. In short, if your system is using 10 watts those 10 watts shouldn't sound any different whether they are coming from a 100 or a 500 watt amp.

 

[Good4it]

To the best of my knowledge, a watt is a watt. In short, if your system is using 10 watts those 10 watts shouldn't sound any different whether they are coming from a 100 or a 500 watt amp.

I THINK you are over simplifying it. That is like saying all cars are the same because they are just cars.

Why are there many amplifier manufacturers if all are the same wouldn’t the cheapest be the favorite?

A Watt is just a watt but it goes thru changes before it gets to a speaker.

 

[Paul DS]

I THINK you are over simplifying it. That is like saying all cars are the same because they are just cars.

Why are there many amplifier manufacturers if all are the same wouldn’t the cheapest be the favorite?

A Watt is just a watt but it goes thru changes before it gets to a speaker.

As I said, a watt is a watt. A well made 100 watt amp shouldn't sound any different than a well made 500 watt amp at a given volume.

 

[PENG]

I THINK you are over simplifying it. That is like saying all cars are the same because they are just cars.

Why are there many amplifier manufacturers if all are the same wouldn’t the cheapest be the favorite?

A Watt is just a watt but it goes thru changes before it gets to a speaker.

He may be over simplifying, but your car analogy doesn't sound right. A watt is a defined unit of power, a car is not, it is a physical thing.

 

[Good4it]

Under that philosophy we should just buy the cheapest because all are the same.

 

[PENG]

As I said, a watt is a watt. A well made 100 watt amp shouldn't sound any different than a well made 500 watt amp at a given volume.

I guess I know what you are getting it, but in making such a general statement you may be inviting valid arguments from people who want to argue. I am sure you can come up with examples yourself to show why a well made 100 watt amp can sound different than a well made 500 amp at a given volume, especially when the "given volume" and the conditions for the x "watt" output are not specified.

 

[ski2xblack]

If all else is the same (ie: speakers, distance and volume) will more output in watts make the sound better or worse?

Another way to ask is do more watts, say 110W vs 150 or 200W, drive the speakers to produce better sound or is volume the only difference?

While a watt is a watt, amp differences most often come about due to clipping conditions, or how the amps recover from such conditions. So to answer your question, it depends on your speaker sensitivity, listening levels, distance to speakers, and the dynamics of the source material you're listening to. 200w will allow slightly under 3db of additional clean power over 110w, which is noticeably but not tremendously louder (a doubling of subjective volume requires a ten fold increase in power, remember). It is conceivable, using recordings with high crest factor, and listening at even moderate or above levels, that the less powerful amp would clip where the more powerful amp would not. Even then, a small amount of transient clipping often goes by unnoticed, so it boils down to a matter of degree. By the time the less powerful amp is audibly clipping, the more powerful amp will probably also be clipping, to a lesser (still inaudible perhaps) degree. <3db is not a tremendous amount of wiggle room.

 

[ski2xblack]

Under that philosophy we should just buy the cheapest because all are the same.

No, unfortunately amps are not all the same when driving a complex reactive load like a speaker. Rather than buying the cheapest amp, one should choose an appropriate amp for their particular speakers and listening habits. That can be done with a frugal approach, but simply going with the cheapest is misguided and an oversimplification of the situation.

 

[Paul DS]

While a watt is a watt, amp differences most often come about due to clipping conditions, or how the amps recover from such conditions. So to answer your question, it depends on your speaker sensitivity, listening levels, distance to speakers, and the dynamics of the source material you're listening to. 200w will allow slightly under 3db of additional clean power over 110w, which is noticeably but not tremendously louder (a doubling of subjective volume requires a ten fold increase in power, remember). It is conceivable, using recordings with high crest factor, and listening at even moderate or above levels, that the less powerful amp would clip where the more powerful amp would not. Even then, a small amount of transient clipping often goes by unnoticed.

Let me put it this way: If you had two Bryston Amps, one being 100 watts and the other 500 watts, if you are using only 10 watts of power will the one Bryston sound different than the other? An amplifier is only supposed to do one thing AMPLIFY. If it is doing anything else to the sound, it is not a good amp

 

[PENG]

Let me put it this way: If you had two Bryston Amps, one being 100 watts and the other 500 watts, if you are using only 10 watts of power will the one Bryston sound different than the other? An amplifier is only supposed to do one thing AMPLIFY. If it is doing anything else to the sound, it is not a good amp

Now that you narrow things down this way, then okay if you are using 10 W peak, you will have hard time telling the two amps apart. Power not used is not going to make a difference, all else being equal.

The only caveat here is the peak, as ski2xblack pointed out, there are music that has high crest factor and high dynamic swings. So if the 10 watts used you used as example is the average power drawn from the Bryston, the 100 W rated Bryston may clip if the music used has say even just 15 dB peaks that will draw 320 W momentarily.

My 300 W Bryston cruised typically at below 0.25 W, and I could not tell a difference between it and my 5 WPC amp when listening to music that don't have much dynamic swings, say around 6-10 dB but that's probably an extreme case.

 

[ski2xblack]

Let me put it this way: If you had two Bryston Amps, one being 100 watts and the other 500 watts, if you are using only 10 watts of power will the one Bryston sound different than the other? An amplifier is only supposed to do one thing AMPLIFY. If it is doing anything else to the sound, it is not a good amp

I agree.

I also feel that folks underestimate the dynamic power demands of music, and that clipping happens more than most realize.

 

[PENG]

Under that philosophy we should just buy the cheapest because all are the same.

Now you are over simplifying..

 

[JerryLove]

If all else is the same (ie: speakers, distance and volume) will more output in watts make the sound better or worse?

More output will make it sound louder.

Can I assume you mean "more capability"?

Well. Amps come in two varieties. Sufficient for the load and insufficient for the load. Which is which can be complex in my experience; but once you are "sufficient"; no amount of "more amp" will make anything better.

I've put a lot of speakers through both a Yamaha P4500 and a McIntosh 2120 (and a few through a Krell KVA150). With one excpetion (A pair of B&W 801Ns with a nasty 2ohm- dip), I've been unable to tell the output apart.

I think there's two lessons there. One lesson is that it *can* be more complex than simple wattage when the loads become unusual. The other is that, well, a sufficient amp is as good a sound as you will get. There's no audible difference between two properly built amps that are not being run into clipping or voltage drops (I think that's the right term for what was happening with the 801s).

Another way to ask is do more watts, say 110W vs 150 or 200W, drive the speakers to produce better sound or is volume the only difference?

The difference between 100W and 200W is 3db of volume.

The tyranny of chasing wattage is that it takes 4x the power for 2x the apparent volume.

 

[JerryLove]

I also feel that folks underestimate the dynamic power demands of music, and that clipping happens more than most realize.

I think those people should perhaps get a mic and check.

Or use an amp that shows the load.

I once spent a long afternoon listening to a pair of McIntosh XRT2k's powered by a pair of McIntosh MC2KW Monoblocks. The dial spent most of its time <1w with spikes below (IIRC) 50W. This is on an 89db speaker in a large room. My math puts that at ~106db (@1m, not sure volume at my location). A rock concert is 110db.

Actually: The math is a good way to attack this I think. Room adds gain, yes? What peak volumes are you thinking about?

 

[ski2xblack]

Or use an amp that shows the load.
I think those people should perhaps get a mic and check.

Or use an amp that shows the load.

I once spent a long afternoon listening to a pair of McIntosh XRT2k's powered by a pair of McIntosh MC2KW Monoblocks. The dial spent most of its time <1w with spikes below (IIRC) 50W. This is on an 89db speaker in a large room. My math puts that at ~106db (@1m, not sure volume at my location). A rock concert is 110db.

Actually: The math is a good way to attack this I think. Room adds gain, yes? What peak volumes are you thinking about?

Hi JL. You might be interested in THIS little demo. Peng gave another example when asking for clearer definitions of wattage in the comparison of a 100w vs 500w Bryston amps in handling a signal with a high crest factor a few posts back. And for sure, yes, the math is a good way to attack this (Was your pun intended? It's the "attack" of notes that demands those huge power spikes), and will clearly indicate what sort of power a dynamic signal may require.

 

[JerryLove]

Hi JL. You might be interested in THIS little demo. Peng gave another example when asking for clearer definitions of wattage in the comparison of a 100w vs 500w Bryston amps in handling a signal with a high crest factor a few posts back. And for sure, yes, the math is a good way to attack this (Was your pun intended? It's the "attack" of notes that demands those huge power spikes), and will clearly indicate what sort of power a dynamic signal may require.

Great link... but it also shows the difficulty of chasing power:

"This demonstration was a real "Wow" for the attendees. The Rickie Lee Jones (RLJ) cut was played at realistic, but certainly not unpleasant, levels in the relatively small hotel exhibit room on speakers with an estimated sensitivity of about 89 dB. The average power typically read 1-2 Watts, while the power on peaks often topped 250 Watts (the power display monitored only one channel, so these numbers should be interpreted as Watts per channel). On this cut, most peaks occurred with an aggressive thwack to a snare drum positioned dead center."

That's a 10-14db distance from average to peak (depending on 1-vs-2 watt average). Let's cut the difference and assume it's 12db to get to the mentioned 250w.

This sure seems like a reason to get a 300w amp rather than a 100w amp... until we consider how narrow a case this is.

Run 86db speakers and your max load moves to ~500w. Move the peaks 3db and you are ~1000w. Can the speakers even handle that?

OTOH: move to 95db speakers and your peaks become 62w. Do that on other CDs (let's imagine 10w peaks rather than 12w peaks) and we are <50w.

So I don't dispute the link. That's a test I think everyone should run if they can. I do miss everything having meters on it. I don't dispute the idea that we are clipping our amps more often than we think (esp with HDR sources); but since the "cheap amps" are 100w; moving to even 500w (the most most speakers can handle) is about 7db.

That might be *the* 7db that matters. It might not.