No Distortion with Gain at full tilt...

[meade916]

And you're sure it wasn't the songs you were playing that were clipped? Gains could be set clean as a whistle but if you start with a dirty song that clipping just gets amplified.

And I really don't see the problem with him making sure his signal is clean from his deck with a 0db tone at 25 volume

Then setting his amp gain when the deck is set to 25 volume and set it with a -5 dB tone.

If someone can tell me how this would lead to distortion I would love to learn because I've set my friends system like this since his stock speakers couldn't handle >30 volume out of 38. And I definitely don't want him to blow his shit and blame me.

if your deck goes up to 47 out of 50 (for example) and you think its good to have your reference point "25".....then sure, you can do that. The thing is, now you have go turn the gains on the amps up higher to make up for that loss of voltage. More gain = more noise. I would rather feed my amps as much clean voltage as possible, and have my gains barely notched up a hair, then have them up 3/4 of the way (or more) to make up for it.

also, you setting someones system at a reference of 25, out of 50, will work fine (a bit noisy possibly), but what is going to happen as soon as your boy decides a song isn't bumpin hard enough for him one night while riding with the lady's? he is gonna turn that shit up to 35. Well instead of 35 being well within the limits, now it is full blown distortion. Not good. Make sense yet?

Steve, I set his amp with the DD-1 with the volume at 25 on track 7, which is the -15db 40hz tone. After about 30 minutes of listening at 23, the amp was so hot I could've cooked an egg on it, but it never went into protect or anything. His ground is super solid, and zero gauge throughout the car even though it's only a 1300 watt amp. I'm pretty sure the gain up 3/4 or more was causing this, plus whatever song we were playing. The thing was SLAMMING and was crystal clear, louder than I had ever heard it, but the amp was taking a beating.

go back and re-do it. don't use that -15 track. Let him get that same BASS he is looking for with the volume knob and not the gain screw.

[scooter99]

Floor noise can be bad for amps too correct? Not just irritating to hear.

[Pro7]

Yeah now we are on the same page, I know exactly what you mean and if there was noticeable noise through the system I would redo it. Thank you for the clarification on why it was frowned upon

Edit: this is a very informative thread

Edited August 30, 2013 by Pro7

[scooter99]

Well let's not take this there. No need.

I'm very much enjoying this. I'm learning alot.

[b0r]

And you're sure it wasn't the songs you were playing that were clipped? Gains could be set clean as a whistle but if you start with a dirty song that clipping just gets amplified.

And I really don't see the problem with him making sure his signal is clean from his deck with a 0db tone at 25 volume

Then setting his amp gain when the deck is set to 25 volume and set it with a -5 dB tone.

If someone can tell me how this would lead to distortion I would love to learn because I've set my friends system like this since his stock speakers couldn't handle >30 volume out of 38. And I definitely don't want him to blow his shit and blame me.

if your deck goes up to 47 out of 50 (for example) and you think its good to have your reference point "25".....then sure, you can do that. The thing is, now you have go turn the gains on the amps up higher to make up for that loss of voltage. More gain = more noise. I would rather feed my amps as much clean voltage as possible, and have my gains barely notched up a hair, then have them up 3/4 of the way (or more) to make up for it.

also, you setting someones system at a reference of 25, out of 50, will work fine (a bit noisy possibly), but what is going to happen as soon as your boy decides a song isn't bumpin hard enough for him one night while riding with the lady's? he is gonna turn that shit up to 35. Well instead of 35 being well within the limits, now it is full blown distortion. Not good. Make sense yet?

Steve, I set his amp with the DD-1 with the volume at 25 on track 7, which is the -15db 40hz tone. After about 30 minutes of listening at 23, the amp was so hot I could've cooked an egg on it, but it never went into protect or anything. His ground is super solid, and zero gauge throughout the car even though it's only a 1300 watt amp. I'm pretty sure the gain up 3/4 or more was causing this, plus whatever song we were playing. The thing was SLAMMING and was crystal clear, louder than I had ever heard it, but the amp was taking a beating.

go back and re-do it. don't use that -15 track. Let him get that same BASS he is looking for with the volume knob and not the gain screw.

Roger that. Would you recommend the -10DB track for the sub? Thanks again man. Hope some people learned a little from this as it could've cost us a sub and/or an amp. Always follow the instructions and don't go rogue like I did!

[meade916]

it was actually a good question. I am glad you asked. Gave me an excuse to explain why

[Kyblack76]

I use the -10

not sure what everyone else is using..

[bbeljefe]

To bring some clarity to this discussion, we have to assume that electrical is adequate and that the amplifier manufacturer didn't lie about the abilities of the amp.

That out of the way...

An amplifier can produce full power at its lowest preamp setting or its highest preamp setting. On the gain knob, that equates to all the way up as opposed to all the way down.

I'll assume a head unit that can produce 4 volts of clean preamp output and you can assume that number is 25 of 35, 47 of 52 or whatever you like... because it really doesn't matter. What matters is that you set the amplifier's gain so that it produces its max power at 4 volts of preamp input. Once that is done, for each amplifier in they system, the volume of the mids/highs and subs will increase or decrease in a linear fashion as the volume is raised or lowered and, nothing will be taxed too hard unless the media is recorded dirty or the max undistorted head unit volume is exceeded.

Now... change the above to a head unit that only produces 2 volts of preamp output, match the amp to it and you will have the same results.

Where preference comes into play is that if you want louder bass... you gain set at a lower dB level. And if you want louder mids/highs, you set those amps with -dB tracks and set the sub amps at zero dB.

In the real world though, we have to deal with the acoustics of vehicle cabins, along with the limitations of our equipment and that's why one set of tones don't always work for every system. But as Steve said, always check the head unit on a flat (0dB) track and always set amp gains with the head unit at max undistorted volume level.

[scooter99]

I like to think I'll be able to understand all that at some point, maybe after re reading it a couple times. But it's a little over my head at the moment.

Tuning frankly scares the shit out of me!! But I still want to, and need to, learn how to do it for my own good as well as my system components.

[b0r]

I like to think I'll be able to understand all that at some point, maybe after re reading it a couple times. But it's a little over my head at the moment.

Tuning frankly scares the shit out of me!! But I still want to, and need to, learn how to do it for my own good as well as my system components.

Definitely! My new sub/amp/box cost me $1,100, and while that's a far cry from the tens of thousands in Steve's truck, I appreciate my setup as much as he appreciates his own, and I worked hard for my $2k total setup. Money isn't a problem, I'd just rather buy my kids something instead of a new Sub because I didn't understand something. The information I gained in this thread alone will stick with me forever and we all need to pay it forward to those that don't understand because I am CERTAIN I am not the only one that has attempted this.