Are low wattage guitar amps BETTER than high watt amps?
A common misunderstanding is that if one is playing at “bedroom” levels than a low watt amp is better for their purposes since a 20w amp is half as loud as a 40w amp, right? Actually, well… no. We’ll discuss this a bit along with other reasons that contribute to how loud a guitar amp is as well as which one could be best for your needs.
#wattage #guitar #amps #high #watt #amps
Originally posted by UCdVrg4Wl3vjIxonABn6RfWw at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3JAzuBAWqzc
Which do you prefer – Low watt amps, high watt amps?
Hey man. Quick question. Would a small 8 inch pa speaker with 350W be loud enough to jam with a drummer? I could plug my processor into the speaker through a di box.
It would be great to hear your opinion.
Watt is a unit of power not energy. It's energy per seconds
Thanks good video
The main thing is that most times you aren’t pushing maximum wattage out of the amp anyway. That’s what volume controls are for. I can adjust my mesa mark v on 90 watts and adjust the volume so it’s quite quiet, or I can vibrate the windows in my neighbors house over a hundred yards away.
count on your fingers 2, 4, 8, 16 ( doubling up from 2 ) , call a fifteen watt amp 4 fingers then… Pluss one for a tube amp…..five fingers, 5 x 3 db = +15 db ( pure coincidence )
Anyway:
then take your guitar Speaker 1w/1m sensitivity … say it's 97db for one speaker, add 3db for a second, and 6db for a fourth…..say two, 100db, add your ^ amp = 115db
115db Average, that's dimed , that's generally good for gig.
like put a Weber 15A100A on a 5 watt tube head. ( if that 's the sound someone is going for, they have it made )
one is probably about as loud as a 4X12 loaded with 96db 1w/1m speakers….just guessing.
Id say my preference is low watt amps and mic them. I can always get louder that way but much cheaper. 2 or 3 smaller amps and a smaller at home pa is cheaper than a massive full stack with essentially only one tone. It allows you to buy new amps cheap all the time. 20 watt and below are the best for me. If im gigging id say 50watt and micd up bc im not going to giant venues
I'm used to 50 watts but I've got a 20 watt silver jubilee and a mark v35 both are loud enough for me. I think there's a sweet spot that you can't put a wattage label on, and that spot is the point where the is compressed enough to push some air and give sustain. Pre amp and speaker/cab will give the flavoring. I'm happy in the lower wattage range. I feel like 100 is overkill for my needs but the attenuator is a wonderful solution even to a lower wattage amp that gets loud
No. They are not-next
5:30 What amp at home for quietness.
8:00 Two Notes Captor/ Attenuator.
More useable, yes. Better, no.
Decibel increase is exponential,
For example, every increase of 10 dB on the decibel scale is equal to a 10-fold increase in sound pressure level (SPL). Near silence is expressed as 0 dB but a sound measured at 10 dB is actually 10 times louder. If a sound is 20 dB, that's 100 times louder than near silence.
It’s my understanding that you need to power the amp down to properly reduce the power. No supposed to just flip the switches willy nilly.
Don’t like the TS9…
I got a 6W amp for home practice. Still fucking loud to me. But it's tolerable. Good cleans for jazz which I play I lot. If I'm gigging, I'll probably get a 15-20W head only.
Gimme something 30 to 50 watts. Just loud enough to make the girl that just came to hang with her friends complain about how loud it is but not too loud that I can't crank it.
As always in life, bigger is better !!!!
For my experience, low wattage amps get overdriven much earlier without being extremely loud, so they're good if you're looking for a natural tube distortion but being smaller they tend to lose bottom end and get fizzy the moment you gig outdoor without walls around it that reinforce the resonance of it, so they're good in small venues, but in large venues more watts with a 4×12 cab would come handy, or a 2×12 at least as they preserve the bass response you need whereas a small amp would lose it and would just beam trebles forward.
Low POWER amps is good for hearing the sound, high POWER amps is good for FEELING the sound .
Uhh,, it,s about moving the air. A 15 to 20watt amp has trouble driving two or more speakers. A 40 to 50 watt amp can drive say up to four 12,s . Moves more air,, bigger sonic foot print.
Watts is energy consume , not dB.
Good subject matter. If you look at guitar history. The way guitarists run their rig makes a difference as well. I’ve run twin reverbs cranked, but my guitar volume was barely cracked. So the amp was still cooking, but it was clean and reasonable volume. Also, the amount and type of distortion can change a listeners perception of volume. There are loads of factors to take into account when talking about perceived volume.
In my experience a 100w amp has an extended frequency range compared to the same amp in 50w. Most 100w amps use 4 output tubes compared to most 50w amps that utilize 2 output tubes. Makes a pretty big difference to my ears. Get fluxtone speakers if you can afford them and a 100w amp. Loudness is no longer a big issue, you avoid tonesuck from the attenuator AND you get the full sound of 4 output tubes. BUT my Vox AC30 TB with no master volume is still loud as hell with that permanently cranked output section..what kind of monster did Vox build there? One day i will go past 12 o'clock on the gain there and reduce the house to ashes.
Between a 50 Watt amp and a 100 watt amp. The 100 has more headroom. I love my 50 watt Lee Jackson and I love my 100 watt Mesa Boogie Stiletto. The stilleto has the 50 watt/100 watt switch. Sponge switch. I know my gear as well every musician should Unfortunately, most musicians didn't do to well in physics class.
Another channel gave a quick explanation explanation. Phionic audio said the wattage rating of an p is the maximum wattage before distortion is introduced. Not audible distortion but measurable. He was referring to tube vs solid state watts i prefer bigger amps kinda like i like a 12 instead of an 8
3 dB IS TWICE as loud… simple math…do your homework
Love your channel almost as much as I love your pedals! My wife loved the post with you and your wife talking shop????
Hi Brian and Community.
I recently watched a YouTube video where it was implied that a 100 watt amp at volume “4 power” would be proper power handling for a cabinet with four 75 watt speakers. Or, said another way, that a 100 watt amp at volume 4 produces 300 watts. Understanding that gain and effects pedals can impact the load output, I’m hoping to learn and understand this arithmetic; because, presumably, I can do the same math to make sure I don’t blow anything up if I purchase a new wattage amp and replace its speaker(s), or if I replace the speaker on what I already have.
How does the volume knob boost wattage? How much wattage is too much wattage (or not enough) wattage to get the best sound in a bedroom?
I’ve been rediscovering my electric guitar, but doing it in a small apartment with 2 kids. I have dusted off my Gibson SG Standard with humbucker pickups, and a 20-year-old Crate V Series 5112 VFX 50 watt tube amp. Most of the time nowadays I practice with a Torpedo Captor X (8 ohm) through headphones and the virtual cabinets… which is AWESOME and allows me to “hear” other amps and speakers. But using the Captor X attenuator on this amp still doesn’t cut volume enough.
I’m either looking to change out its stock speaker (a Celestion Seventy 80), or to replace with a new lower wattage combo amp or head/cabinet. I’m in the market because I’d like to have the occasional ability to hear my amp and speakers either attenuated with the Captor X, or even unattenuated.
I know this may not be realistic. But open to feedback. Thanks.
If youre in a band get the 50 or 100 if you home record w no plans to play out get the 20 or less imo.
Careful, Brian, you're edging dangerously close to having to explain voltage drops and Ohm's law.
I set up a stereo rig two years ago – to Oranges OR15, each with PPC112. Never been happier with tone and mobility. I still have my Rockerverb 50 and PPC212, though!
If I had discovered kit building many years ago, I would have never purchased another amp or effect
Try an artist tweettone 20r
Q: Why are they called "watts"…A: Whattt?…Waaatt? Whaaat?
So my wife and I went "deep end" and bought a fat Mesa head from a "friend" on Facebook. 150 watts of Marshall-ized Tri-Rec known as the Stiletto Trident (Stage II!) Truthfully, it was like piloting the Space Shuttle to turn it on, wondering why I had no signal THIS time. And the volumes had SUCH a fine line between loud and quiet. It was meant to be blasted. Now I have 20w worth of EL84 over a cab that will handle 200. In my apartment, I still can't dime the master, but at least it's engineered to operate at lower volumes TOO. But that's an extreme example, and I still found this video quite educational.
Great video Brian!
IMHO, I like low wattage amps better, as you can dime them easily to get that great power tube distortion. And if you want to take your low wattage amp to gig with, you can always mic it to get your sound, without blowing the rest of the band (and listeners) away and keeping “your” sound…
Best! ✌????
2 things about dB and volume. first, we suck at estimating dB. we can't. too many things involved. 80 dB can seem comfortable and 75 dB can hurt.
second, 3 dB is A LOT louder once you get up to those volumes as it scales logarithmically. 60 dB is half as loud as 70 dB. but 90 dB is 4x louder than 70 dB. 100 dB 8x, 110 dB 16x, 120 dB 32x..
I purchased a 2 watt Hayden Petite Blonde thinking that it would be quieter than my Marshall JTM30 for playing at my flat at home. Maybe a touch quieter but you wouldn't notice if it was.
@wampler Actually every +10db after 20db is a doubling of perceived loudness. So going from 25db to 50db is 4 times as loud not just double.
I always thought that a 50 watt Marshall could achieve tube saturation at a lower volume than a 100 watter. I’ve been blow drying my hair for years with Marshalls. I have never used a 50 watt amp before. (And speak up for your answer! Lol)
Never seen anyone get rid of their 100watt for a 20………..unless you play bullshit coffee shops or something.
Your intro music sound so much like Van Halen “spanked”
Decibels are logarithmic so 3db is actually quite a bit.
It is twice as load. The decibel scale is not linear, it's exponential.
But until that amp is cranked all the way up, you’re nowhere near 50 or 100 watts, are you?
Done a lot of experimenting with low wattage and high wattage and I’ve basically determined that high wattage amps almost always are better for me. They tend to just sound a lot fuller. Also, anytime I go to local shows, it’s the guys who crank up that have the best sound. One of my favorite local blues rock players plays a 100 watt fender showman on 10 with a plexi glass in front and it still sounds perfectly balanced with the band and vocals. But the guitar is so dynamic and alive compared to guys I see playing little fender combos
I have a weber attenuator but changes the tone of my amp in a bad way and sucks !