Benefits from 150WPC to 300WPC Power Amp, better sound quality or more volume?

[RickyG512]

Hi All,

Just wondering what the benefits will be if I was to upgrade from a 150 watts per channel power amp to a 300 watts per channel?

From what I can gather, double the watts gives you just a measly 3db of more volume, which seems like nothing whatsoever, but let's say that extra 3db of volume is at the top end of the volume control that I never use, will I still get an improvement on sound quality while listening at the same volume levels as before with half as many watts on the power amp?

If it makes any difference the speaker power rating sticker on the back of it says 15-300 watts, and when listening I just feel the sound feels a bit thin and lacking punch and depth, and yes, I'm running dual subs lol, there is plenty of bass when there's bass, just talking about vocals and so on when there's not much happening on the LFE channel.

Apologies if the question has been asked many times before, I'm still new to the forum

 

[ryanosaur]

If operated within their comfort zone, most amp should sound the same and not color the sound. Some will say that there are audible differences.
Are you shopping for Amps, or considering an upgrade to existing Amp? What's your gear and Listening distance?
Also, have you checked out the SPL calculator?

 

[lovinthehd]

Could help in your situation, hard to know from your description, could help clean things up a bit at high volumes (that you may or may not use), as well as how far from your speakers you are, how sensitive they are, etc. Might try playing around with an spl calculator to get an idea of what the power translates to in your particular case. https://myhometheater.homestead.com/splcalculator.html

The speaker power rating max figure is more a melting point than anything particularly useful for sound quality. Probably better to spend the money on better speakers rather than a slightly more powerful amp in the bigger picture for sound quality issues.

 

[WaynePflughaupt]

I think a better way to put it would be 3 dB more headroom.

How much it helps largely depends on your speakers. If they have a low sensitivity rating, an extra 3 dB headroom could likely be beneficial. If your speakers’ sensitive rating is in the high 90s or over 100, then you don’t even need the 150 watts you started with.

Regards,
Wayne A. Pflughaupt

 

[AcuDefTechGuy]

the speaker power rating sticker on the back of it says 15-300 watts

I say if your amp is somewhere between 15 watts and 300 watts, then you're probably good to go.

If you are like so many people who are concerned that you have to crank up the master volume knob, then just manually increase the Speaker Channel Levels by 3-6 dB. It's unnecessary, but it makes a lot of people feel much better knowing they don't have to crank up the volume knob anymore.