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How important is the efficiency of a speaker to you?

I went to an audio meeting recently and heard a couple of good sounding speakers. These speakers were not inexpensive and were well built. Problem is that they also require a very large ss amp upstream to drive them. Something that can push a lot of current, which pretty much rules out most low-mid ( maybe even high) powered tube amps. When I mentioned this to the person doing the demo, i was basically belittled, as he felt that the efficiency of a speaker is pretty much irrelevant ( well he would, as he is trying to sell these speakers). The speaker line is fairly well known to drop down to a very low impedance level in the bass regions. This requires an amp that is going to be $$$, as it has to not be bothered by the lowest impedances.

Personally, if I cannot make a speaker work with most tube amps on the market, or am forced to dig deeply into the pocketbook to own a huge ss amp upstream, this is a MAJOR negative to me with regards to the speaker in question ( whichever speaker that may be). So much so, that I will not entertain this design, regardless of SQ.

Your thoughts?

128x128daveyf
toddalin's avatar
toddalin
247 posts
 

"an amp operating withing it’s specifications that is producing 100 W RMS at a given frequency will reach peak power in the same amount of time as a 1 W RMS amp will."

 

You missed the point. I said ALL OTHER THINGS BEING EQUAL. So the same amp, be it 1 watt or 100 watts, is used with both speakers.

Obviously a 100 watt amp will produce 1 watt (0.278 times the voltage) quicker than it will produce the full 100 watts.

Even a perfect square wave has a "rise time" and obviously it passes through 1 watt on the way to 100 watts.

herman
2,259 posts
 

"an amp operating withing it’s specifications that is producing 100 W RMS at a given frequency will reach peak power in the same amount of time as a 1 W RMS amp will."

 

You missed the point. I said ALL OTHER THINGS BEING EQUAL. So the same amp, be it 1 watt or 100 watts, is used with both speakers.

Obviously a 100 watt amp will produce 1 watt (0.278 times the voltage) quicker than it will produce the full 100 watts.

I’m sorry, but your understanding of slew rate and how it applies to how an amp operates is simply incorrect. Slew rate describes how fast an amplifier is capable of changing, not how fast it is changing. It describes the maximum rate of change, not how how fast it is changing for a given input

The point is, slew rate has absolutely nothing to do with efficiency or how dynamic a speaker is or anything being discussed here. Your concept of slew rate is wrong. Sorry if you don’t get that.

 

@herman Would that be in Denver or NYC?

I have absolutely no idea what you are talking about

toddalin's avatar
toddalin
247 posts
 

"I’m sorry, but your understanding of slew rate and how it applies to how an amp operates is simply incorrect. Slew rate describes how fast an amplifier is capable of changing, not how fast it is changing. It describes the maximum rate of change, not how how fast it is changing for a given input."

 

I understand this.

 

So then, you are saying that slew rate has NO IMPACT on how a speaker sounds??? So then why do the "better amps" try to achieve higher slew rates, resulting in "squarer" square waves?  In fact, by your terms, why bother to even measure it?

herman
2,259 posts
 

https://www.audioholics.com/audio-amplifier/amplifier-slew-rate

 

toddalin's avatar
toddalin
247 posts
 

The whole article flawed because it is based solely on the use of sine waves.  I don't know about you, but I listen to more than sine waves (and possibly flutes).

But square waves, sawtooth waves, and complex waves have "verticle" (i.e., instantaneous) rise times and this is where slew rate would come into play.

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