subwoofer electrical power draw / what's a watt?
starsky
Posts: 5
Somewhat esoteric question, not really specific to subwoofers, but anyway:
My PSW250 is described as providing "50 watts continuous average output" with a "dynamic power output" of 100 watts:
http://www.polkaudio.com/homeaudio/specs/psw250/
Are those watts the same as the ones that come out of the wall socket?
I plugged the PSW250 into a Kill-A-Watt to measure the electrical draw in watts. Playing back some low-end-heavy material at moderately loud volume, the sub was drawing about 8 watts of electrical power.
If I maxed out my entire system, would the Kill-A-Watt measure 50 for the sub? or 100?
No, I'm not going to turn everything all the way up to find out.
My PSW250 is described as providing "50 watts continuous average output" with a "dynamic power output" of 100 watts:
http://www.polkaudio.com/homeaudio/specs/psw250/
Are those watts the same as the ones that come out of the wall socket?
I plugged the PSW250 into a Kill-A-Watt to measure the electrical draw in watts. Playing back some low-end-heavy material at moderately loud volume, the sub was drawing about 8 watts of electrical power.
If I maxed out my entire system, would the Kill-A-Watt measure 50 for the sub? or 100?
No, I'm not going to turn everything all the way up to find out.
Post edited by starsky on
Comments
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Ok you have to apply ohms law. P=I X R your showing 8 watts on a kill-oh-what ? 120 volts comming in and the amperage that is being drawn maximum 15 amps . 50 watts contiuous is not much and 100 watts dynamic simply means for shorts bursts, thats the dynamic headroom of the amplifier. 1800watts usage thru a normal house outlet is all your gonna get.:cool: " He who dies with the most equipment wins Right ? "
Denon 3300 Adcom 535 BBe w/sub out 1 pr 4.6s 2 pr of 4 jrs Recent additions Samsung Lns-4095D LCD, Samsung hd-960 DVD, Monster HT-5000 Power center,HPSA-1000 18" sealed DiY home sub.:D
Black Laquer 1.2tl's w/ upgraded x-overs and Tweets BI-Amped with 2 Carver tfm-35's Knukonceptz 10ga cables -
Starsky, sure the watts have to be the same, but the sub amplifier rating applies to the maximum that it would be capable of supplying continuously(50)or the number(100)that it could supply for a brief peak(the most common standard used for dynamic power rating is the IHF measurement using a 20 millisecond burst repeated every 500 milliseconds). As you've seen, the actual power typically used by your sub is far less than the maximum, and it's common to greatly overestimate the power needed by speakers in general. Also, turning "everything all the way up" won't necessarily use maximum power; that would depend on the level of the incoming signal. Setting the volume control at the max doesn't mean full power is being used; in a fairly low level section of music maybe 1 watt would be used at max volume.
