An Amplifier Tutorial Part 2: What Everyone Should Know About Amplifier Power
You don’t need to know how an amplifier works to enjoy the benefits of one in your car.
All you need to know is that the music goes in one end comes out LOUDER from the other end and it uses your car battery to make that happen. There are a few factors to consider such as speaker placement, speaker efficiency, road and engine noise but mostly, it just comes down to your own preference and how loud you like your music.
In the amplifier tutorial part one, you learned all about the power of amplifiers. Now let us tell you more about what everyone should know about amplifiers including gain, crossover, and subsonic filter.
Gain
That little knob is the source of much confusion when it comes to what it does and is the cause of countless blown subwoofers since the beginning of time. We hope you have a warranty because this is NOT a volume control in any way. The gain control allows the installer to match the output of the head unit to the amplifier’s ideal input level.
Once the level is set by the installer, it should be left alone. It is NOT a volume control. Turning it up will not increase the volume of your subwoofers. It will only unbalance the system and make the subs get louder faster than the rest of the system, then with the added distortion from the unneeded input gain, it’ll blow your speakers. Don’t touch the gain knob after it has been set. It is NOT a volume control. If you want louder speakers, you’ll need more power.
Crossover
Also known as high-pass and low-pass filters, crossovers make sure the right signals go the right speakers. High frequencies such as cymbals are sent to the tweeters. Vocals, keyboards, guitars go to the midrange speakers while bass lines and kick drums go to the subwoofers.
Subsonic Filter
The subsonic filter does exactly what it sounds like. It keeps ultra low frequencies (usually below 35 HZ) from damaging your subwoofers (remember to always maintain your audio system).
That’s really all you need to know to make your car audio sound better! Proper gain, crossover, and subsonic filter settings will make sure that your speakers and subs will play as loudly as possible while not damaging clipped signals or distortion to blow them.
