Re: amp wattage vs. cabinet wattage

adam79 <adam79@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

i was talking to a guy at guitar center. he said that underpowering a
cabinet (using an cab that has a higher watt rating than the amp) is bad
for the speakers. is this true? i thought that it was good to have a cab
that has a bit more power than the amp. comments?

thanks,
-adam
adam79@xxxxxxxxx


let's say you have a cabinet rated for 8 ohms and the cabinet
can handle 100 watts total (be it one speaker or more in the cabinet
the total wattage handling is 100 watts).

For a 6 string electric guitar and a 50 watt amp or 20 watt amp or 2 watt amp -
you can run the amp into the 100 watt rated cabinet without any problem BUT you should
really make sure your amp's speaker out can match the OHM rating of the cabinet.
If you are running a cab rated at 8 ohms or 16 ohms or whatever - then make
sure the 'speaker' out on your amp also matches the ohm rating of the cab.

Yes - you could mismatch ohm ratings but the results can sometimes
be unpredictable - sometimes it just makes a tonal difference in what
the cab or speakers will sound like - other times you can stress the amp
and things will overheat or blow.

So you can always underrun a cab's wattage rating (100 watt rated cab can
be used with a 5 watt amp if you want to) - you just want to match ohm ratings
as mismatched ohm ratings can possibly create big probs. with your power amp.
.

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