How many watts does a subwoofer need to not be underpowered?

Question

How many watts does a subwoofer need to not be underpowered?

Answer 1

The whole "under powering is bad" thing is a myth.

When you turn the volume down, you're actually under powering them. If this were bad, subs would have been damaged a long time ago by lowering the volume.

What people confuse this with is improper gain settings.

How the myth got started was someone had an amp that wasn't as powerful as the subs could handle so, they turned the gain up to compensate. The problem is that this caused the amp to clip sending too much power to the sub and blowing it. Hence the "under powering is bad" myth began.

All you need to worry about is setting the gain right.

The purpose of the gain is to match the signal volts RMS coming from the source (CD player, etc.) to the input of the amp to prevent clipping (damage by over powering).

Here is a guide that will help you set the gain correctly http://www.datafilehost.com/download.php...

You'll need a multi-meter (AC voltmeter), Microsoft Excel and a way to burn an audio CD from an MP3.

If you don't have Excel, use this link http://www.box.net/shared/nkkw1dhk4g

See my site for more info http://spkrbox1.spaces.live.com

PS.

maskdmarvel is completely wrong.

The rule of thumb is NEVER push more than 10% of the RMS power into a speaker.

Answer 2

Like sparky explained underpowering is OKAY!

Turning down the volume is underpowering, ya sure its getting its 500RMS or whatever, but you won't hear it until its at MAX volume.

SO, underpowering is OKAY, overpowering, dont go more than 10-15% if possible.

Answer 3

There is no such thing as underpowering a sub.

Answer 4

Like sparky said, underpowering is not bad.  You in no way will damage a sub by simply underpowering it.  

The only negative of underpowering a sub is lost output.  Your sub will not perform to it's full potential when it is underpowered.

Good Luck!!!

Answer 5

Every subwoofer has different power configurations.  You have peak power, and you have RMS power.  RMS is the constant flow of clean power from your source, im guessing a power amp.  If the sub rquires 50 watts RMS it will run efficiently with 50 RMS provided, but if your amp provides 100 watts peak power, and  ONLY  25 watts RMS you loose sound quality.  The rule of thumb in car audio is stay half way between peak power, and RMS power.   You can loose sound quality at both ends of the spectrum.