Polk Audio DB 212-2

nawarkk · June 2009

Hey everyone,

I was just wondering what would be a good amplifier to power these subs. Bridged they come out to about 1440 watts rms and 2880 watts max at 2 ohms.

Also I have power these subs before and have smelled a sort of sour burning smell coming from them. They play fine and everything, I just turned it down and don't want to turn them on until I figure the problem. I have them hooked up to a Boss 2600 watt amplifier that is soon going to be sold. Any idea what the problem might be?

Oh yea, I have 0-gauge wiring kit, along with high output RCA's and I thick speaker wire.

joshua.anderson · June 2009

yea.
you apre probably running too much power.
if that amp is a 2600 RMS and the sub is 2880 MAX then your over powering it and i suggest removing that amp and putting in a mono or bridged 2 channel amp that is (if mono 1400WattX1 RMS) and (if bridged 2 channel 800X2 or 1400X1 RMS bridged).
i would go mono.
pretty easy.
also, what are you lookin at selling your current Amp for?
i have a nice 10" Soundstream that would love that amp.
lol.

Greg Peters · June 2009

nawarkk wrote: »

Hey everyone,

I was just wondering what would be a good amplifier to power these subs. Bridged they come out to about 1440 watts rms and 2880 watts max at 2 ohms.

Also I have power these subs before and have smelled a sort of sour burning smell coming from them. They play fine and everything, I just turned it down and don't want to turn them on until I figure the problem. I have them hooked up to a Boss 2600 watt amplifier that is soon going to be sold. Any idea what the problem might be?

Oh yea, I have 0-gauge wiring kit, along with high output RCA's and I thick speaker wire.

You don't bridge subwoofers- you wire them in either series or parallel (neither of which constitute "bridging"

). Forget about any specification given as peak or max power, and instead look at amps that match the RMS rating of the subwoofers- in your case you'll want one that does around 720 genuine watts RMS @ 2 ohms. More power (for headroom) is a plus, provided you set things up correctly and exercise self control with the volume knob...800-900 watts RMS of clean power would be nice, but you won't need that much to get good performance out of the db212-2 setup as it's pretty loud.

Boss amps are crappy, so you'll be doing yourself a favor by getting rid of that one- it won't really put out 2600 watts, but if you were to actually push it into clipping it is likely to put out enough dirty power to warm up the voice coils on the Polk subs and potentially cause thermal damage. The smell you commented on is likely the beginnings of burning voice coils. To see if you've caused any damage, take a digital multimeter and measure across the terminals on the enclosure- anything drastically less than 2 ohms is a sign damage has occurred.

Whatever amp you use, set the gains properly and listen for any signs of distortion or mechanical stress. Turn it down if something isn't right, or you'll clip the amp's output and get up to double the rated power from the amp in the form of a dirty clipped waveform.

What is your budget for a replacement (hopefully non-Boss) amplifier?

nawarkk · June 2009

Well the boss amp was not 2600 rms. That's crazy lol. It's 2600 max so it's not really overpowering the subs. I'm looking to sell it for $150 since it's not even a couple weeks old and still has 1-year warranty on it.

If I sell this amplifier, I will have roughly $200 to play with. I'm looking into name brand amps. I have tried the Autotek 2000 watt super sport amp mono block and it didn't produce nearly as strong a hit as the boss, but I still don't want to keep the boss. Any suggestions to what is a good amp? So I really only need 1500-2000 watt amp to power them fully? And the subs are wired to one terminal is what I meant to say instead of bridged. That's how they come.

arun1963 · June 2009

1. Your Db 212-2 are two 12" subs wired together in parallel. These would present a 2 ohm load to the amp. The 212-2 has a rms rating of 720 watts. So you need an amp which is 2 ohm stable and puts out about 6-700 watts at 2 ohm.

2. The mono amp has only one channel. You can bridge 2 channels, you cant bridge 1 channel. A mono block can have 2 sets of terminals, which allow you to hook up two subs. If you hooked the sub to the first + and the last -, it doesnt mean you have bridged the mono block.

3. At $200 look at sites like woofer / crutchfield etc. Look at amps like:

1. Kicker 08ZX750.1 750watts @ 2ohm, $ 289
2. RF prime 500.1, 500watts rms @ 2ohm, $ 200. Both at crutchfield.

Do some research and shortlist. Post that list here and then we can help you in deciding. Stay away from the cheaper brans that promise more watts for less money eg sony.

nawarkk · June 2009

Wow am I the biggest idiot? I thought EACH sub was 720 rms and 1440 peak.... Here I am trying to give these subs twice the power they can handle.... Just goes to show how much I know...:o

I'll have to go and do more research on some amps that would suit my needs....

Wow good thing I consulted you guys lol

nawarkk · June 2009

So somebody offered me a mtx 6500d amplifier and I took it + 25 cash. This amplifier is pretty small and pretty loud lol. A lot better then my boss amp. Do you guys think this was a good trade? or should I look into other amps?

chu · June 2009

nawarkk wrote: »

So somebody offered me a mtx 6500d amplifier and I took it + 25 cash. This amplifier is pretty small and pretty loud lol. A lot better then my boss amp. Do you guys think this was a good trade? or should I look into other amps?

I've heard good things about mtx amps.

cadenceclipse · June 2009

might b worth $25 and b better than the boss but is that really saying much? uve obviously went the cheapo garbagio route which has gotten u how far? for $250 u can get superb amps and b set for yrs. or beat up mtxs and boss sounding like trash cans and lasting months, if ure lucky

nawarkk · June 2009

cadenceclipse wrote: »

might b worth $25 and b better than the boss but is that really saying much? uve obviously went the cheapo garbagio route which has gotten u how far? for $250 u can get superb amps and b set for yrs. or beat up mtxs and boss sounding like trash cans and lasting months, if ure lucky

Well cadenceclipse, The only reason I bought the Boss amp is because I thought I needed 2600 watts to my speakers (mind you I knew the amp wasn't capable of this). Turned out I only needed about 1400. The amp I have now that I traded for that garbage Boss amp is smaller and capable of more power. I wouldn't say it's really that bad of an amplifier. Plus I wasn't really looking to spend $250+ on an amplifier since this is just my first system. It's ok I learn from the past mistakes now...

Oh btw lol, I bought the Boss amp for $135 new and traded it to that guy and got the MTX 6500d and $25 from him. So I really only paid $110 for the MTX Amp, which is straight.

cadenceclipse · June 2009

actually u only need about 400 for them. eh man i ran plenty of MTXs, nothing wrong w/MTX, specially for newbie, aint nockin that. "i learn from the past" no, actually your obviously still learning. u know how old that mtx is? 250 really ain't much 1st system or not doesn't get much cheaper. i think that amp went for 110 new like 10 yrs ago..

nawarkk · June 2009

Well specs sheet on Polks website rated the DB 212-2 at 720 rms and 1440 max, so I don't know where that 400 is coming from...
Plus I don't really have crazy cash to spend since I go college/have bills so yea...
Anyways I'm pretty happy with my system and like the way it sounds, and if I like it that's all that matters. I'm straight with what I have.

Polk Audio DB 212-2

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