This is really bothering me, cause I really don't have a clue. I have a friend who has 2 memphis 12s in a vented box and an old school MMATS amp.. it's only 400 watts.. It pushes those 2 12s so hard you can not only feel it in your chest but it hurts. I jus can't understand why tha old school amps push so much harder than amps today? Btw, this amp was HUGE. I don understand how it could be so big and put out so much power and still only be a 400 watt amp?
The last time I bought anything new for car audio was around 1998 so I dont know much about todays gear. I can tell you however that by looking at some of the specs from todays amps, they just dont make em like they used too. Alot of old school gear was made right here in the U.S of A., unlike most of todays stuff that is made cheaply from overseas. Old school amps from back in the day were VERY underrated. In your case your friends amp says "400 watts" but its prolly pushing way more then that, maybe even twice that amount!!
Yeah another old school brand that straight SLAMS was U.S. Amps.. When they were still made in Florida.. A 200 watt amp could weigh 20 pounds Lol How could they be so underrated? Did they do it on purpose or what?
Not sure if all manufactures underrated their amps, but I know most did. It was done because it allowed competitors to enter theirs systems in lower wattage classes during competitons. These were better known as "cheater amps".
I was gonna say something about cheater amps in my last post, but wasn't sure if I was talkin about tha same thing.. if they did use a cheater amp, how could they be sure they weren't gonna blow the sub? I mean did the people that use them know how many watts they actually were?
short answer....yes. i know my old school PG amps are underrated for sure. how else could my 4ch 40 x4 amp power my mids and highs just as loud as my 100 x4 nine.5 amp. when looking at amp specs for "new" amps make sure they are 2006 compliant and never trust or go by the max wattage. always go by the RMS, and i also look at the amps THD rating( at least i do) the lower the % the better and less distortion you will hear, but knowing how to set a gain helps too.
I had a old school Rockford Fosgate Punch 200 that I use to run at .5 ohm...boy that amp would get hot enough to light a smoke off it, but it slammed my 2 15" Fosgate DVC's. I miss those days, thats when its was fun...
