Look, there's absolutely no reason to be freaked out if your amp lists that it puts out more rms power than the speakers' rms power rating. A general rule of thumb is that you can have more rms power than the speakers rms rating as long as you don't go past the midpoint of the rms to max power rating zone. (unless you're experienced and absolutely know how to use that much headroom) Think of the RMS rating on the speaker/sub as a general area you want to be in. It is not a limit by any means. If your amp falls a little short, that's fine, but it'll work harder to put out the power. (ie. gains will have to be turned up higher, creating more heat in the amp) If you have a little more, that's better, because you can tune the gains down and let the amp produce it's power more efficiently.
How good it will sound, will be totally dependant on your taste and tuning. Some people are bass heads, & some people want perfectly ballanced output. Everyone is different.
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Originally Posted by ExodusFX
It doesn't matter what kind of icecream you get in Mochi. Why? Because Mochi is icecream wrapped in awesome.
ExodusFX: I don't know about you, but IF you want your speakers to last you for more than a year, you buy an amp that doesn't overpower your speakers. Especially when you buy an under rated amp. My Phoenix Gold ZX475ti for example, supposed to put out 4 x 75w right? Ends up the test sheet says approx 4 x 83w at 12.4v. Now, consider that my (and all of our cars) run at around 14.2v, so you up that rating. We'll say it's linear, and that means it's putting out around 95w per channel. If my speakers weren't rated to ~120w RMS I'd be worried about blowing them. It's the same case here, if you're going with an under rated amp (almost ALL good brand D class amps) and you're going to max out the RMS power handling, you're just asking to replace your speakers within 6 mo - 1 yr as they won't handle the power well enough that they can continually take the pounding. As how do you know when you're over powering them? You really don't, esp with subs as SQ is generally low anyway.
ryuryu: It's up to you if you want to power your system that way. But if you don't want to be replacing parts every year or two, don't max them out and either buy higher power handling subs or a lower power amp. Turning the gains down to the bottom may help a little bit, but if the amp is over rated you may be overpowering them regardless lowing their operating life. It's your choice if you're willing to shell out the $$ again later down the road.
Isn't it possible to create an analogy of Watts out from a Subs as a HP from an Engine?
If that is so, then we all know HP maximizes at relatively high RPM's... in our case 6800RPM / 7500 total. So watts coming from the subs is when everything is skewed towards the maximum (amp -> max, vol -> max, eq bass gain -> max)....
I think we all can feel and hear when the wattage coming from the subs.... it pounds when theres high power (wattage) coming from the subs. So if I'm not a person that annoyling max's out and booms for all the geezer's and bird's (the streets) so they I'm not lightweight..... rather I enjoy my music with suttle solid base, thereby I will set the gains on the amp to assure I never can venture into the ~too much region.
anyway I really would like to get the IDQ's but could settle for Infinity Perfect 10.1d which handles 350watts RMS... which fits the equation for BX1000D.
Or I can go with the Hifonics ZX6000 which can be set to 300x2 @ 2ohms. then i can definitely buy the IDQ's.
option a or b, and i'm leaning towards the option b.
TimeRacer- You have an great knack for making people paranoid about their potential car audio purchases. If I didn't work with/install/sell the stuff myself I might be paranoid because of your advice too. Car audio is a lot more flexible than figures on paper. You can try to paper-jockey it, but you need to understand applications also. You can tune the system accordingly if you have more power than the sub's rms rating. (unless it's grossly excessive) He's not going to be pushing his system to the limits of xmax 24/7, and it doesn't sound like he's wants to get into a pissing match with other guys for "who's system hits hardest." You really don't know when you're overpowering a sub?! It's pretty obvious actually.
ryuryu- If you think you can use the extra power responsibly then go for it. If you want to really play it safe, then just go with 2 of the 4ohm dvc 10's (wired to 4ohm final load) and have them underpowered by the bx1000d. As far as your new options that you're considering, I'd go with B also. (IDQ10 4ohm dvc's wired to 2ohm each sub) If you want a better visual of what I mean by rms being a "zone," then check out this link to Elemental Designs' power chart for their subs. HERE
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ExodusFX
It doesn't matter what kind of icecream you get in Mochi. Why? Because Mochi is icecream wrapped in awesome.
If you can't agree that over powering a set of speakers does not decrease their life, then yes I do agree that you sell speakers. Keep in mind that the effects of over powering a set of speakers does not show up immediately. It is not obvious as you say when you over power speakers. As you can start a small tear in the surround, small tear in the VC, that only makes audible difference possibly a long time down the road when you play the speakers enough to slowly increase the problem. Again, I only stated that on the basis of reliability, as most of us don't want to buy more speakers. You can attempt to use the amp gains to compensate, but for an every day system you WANT headroom. This is especially the case if you accidently get the amp/hu to clip. That wreaks havoc with speaker internals. If I wanted the hardest pounding system then headroom doesn't mean much as if I blow them I'm prepared to buy a new system. But in the case for most people, headroom is a good thing. This is regardless of the fact that IDQ's sound great even with only ~150w going into them.
TimeRacer- I can agree that you don't know what headroom is, or what the difference between overpowering & headroom is. I will agree that overpowering and applying excessive power will shorten the lifespan of a speaker. If you've tuned systems with subwoofers before, I don't know how you cannot tell when the sub is being overpowered. It's obvious and blatant. (And tuning is more than just turning down the gains.) With a subwoofer, you can visually see the mechanical stress being applied by the excessive power being applied. I'll agree that it is not as obvious to see overpowering on full range speakers. This whole thread has been about subwoofers. Yes I sell speakers, among other things. But scaring people with information that is semi-related to the application, as you have done, is how many salespeople sell warranties.
Anyways, this is veering off topic.
ryuryu- Good choice! Be sure to post a new thread and let us know how you like your new system.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by ExodusFX
It doesn't matter what kind of icecream you get in Mochi. Why? Because Mochi is icecream wrapped in awesome.
Just FYI: Any quality speaker will not sound like it's bottoming (short of an aluminum or other metal speaker) when it's being slightly overpowered, though that does not mean no damage is being done. If you want to talk about junk speakers, you are correct. But for anything of quality, you are severely incorrect as you will not be able to audibly tell that they're flat or bottoming. I can tell you'll have a lot of repeat customers using your ideals. Far too many people on audio boards have blown their speakers and subs by over powering them just as you recommended. Either in testing phases for competitions (sin waves) or just blasting it a little too long or clipping their HU/amp or even something as small as their sealed box wasn't sealed enough to control the speaker. All of these are HIGHLY possible in any system and you don't want that one time to start the irreversable damage. I won't bother posting in this thread about this particular topic again as you're adimate to use the minimal (read: none) "safety margin" and just wait for the customer to come back. You seem to know very little about the situations that can kill speakers. Warranties mean nothing, as the speakers will generally not audibly blow out in a year.
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This is regardless of the fact that IDQ's sound great even with only ~150w going into them.
Far too many people on audio boards have blown their speakers and subs by over powering them just as you recommended. Either in testing phases for competitions (sin waves) or just blasting it a little too long or clipping their HU/amp or even something as small as their sealed box wasn't sealed enough to control the speaker. All of these are HIGHLY possible in any system and you don't want that one time to start the irreversable damage. I won't bother posting in this thread about this particular topic again as you're adimate to use the minimal (read: none) "safety margin" and just wait for the customer to come back. 
You seem to know very little about the situations that can kill speakers. Warranties mean nothing, as the speakers will generally not audibly blow out in a year.
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