Is 500W the standard?

[_Sweet Willie_]

It's my impression that there seem to be quite a few mono heads competing in the ~500W RMS into 4 ohms power range. Some examples:

 

Ashdown ABM500 EVO -- 575W into 4 ohms

SWR 550x -- 550W into 4 ohms

Eden WT550 -- 550W into 4 ohms

GK 700RB -- 480W into 4 ohms

Ampeg SVT 3 Pro -- 450W into 4 ohms

SWR SM-500 -- 500W bridged into 4 ohms (really a stereo head)

Peavey MAX 700 -- 450W into 4 ohms

 

And, isn't Hartke also coming out w/ a new (or updated version of the 3500?) model -- the HA5500, which will be ~500W into 4 ohms?

 

Of course, there are probably more models that I've missed.

 

Anyway, in the past I've certainly posted about my belief (as have some others) that 350-400W into a 4x10 goes a long way in terms of being plenty of power for many, many types of gigs. (Yes, I'm generalizing and this is by no means a suggestion that this is a "law of good bass amplification.") There are probably a bunch of amps that fall in that power range, too.

 

However, SWR and Eden added the 550X and WT550 to their line-ups relatively recently, Ashdown is a relatively new company that started with the ABM500 in its line-up (flagship model?), and some of the other companies and their models have a bit more history in the market (the 700RB and the SVT 3 Pro and the SM-500). Interestingly, SWR added the 550X when it has a models w/ similar features (350X and 750X) and a model w/ similar power (SM-500).

 

I'm not entirely sure where I'm going with this, other than wondering whether manufacturers (or players?) are starting to or are continuing to view 500W into 4 ohms as a solid or basic power package for amp heads. Has there been a change in how much power cabs can handle that has made 500W a better match?

 

Is 500W into 4 ohms some kind of standard for amp heads? (BTW, I feel like this is a strange question, but I'm not sure why. ) I realize also, that for many of these amps, they're going to put about 300-350W RMS into 8 ohms, which would be another way to frame the issue.

 

Thoughts? (Or not... )

 

Peace.

[Basshappi]

I have noticed the same thing and I've kinda been wondering if we would see that up to 350watts defines combos and then 450-750 watt range amp heads. anything over that would be the realm of seperate preamp/poweramp.

 

Cool question

[Ben]

I remember reading something in Bass Player from Chuck Rainey that you need about 400 watts to get decent headroom and thus a good sound. Makes sense to me.

 

FWIW, I think my GK700 is a little weak in the knees when used with just one 8 ohm cab, I like my GK1001 a lot better for that use. Giving a little more anecdotal evidence that 250 watts (the 700 at 8 ohms) ain't quite enough, but 460 watts (the 1001 at 8 ohms) is. I know, it's only a couple of dB, but it's not so much that the volume is louder, it's that the loud sound is cleaner and "rounder".

 

PS. Peace, everyone with a 150 watt amp that works great for you and you don't see any need for more!

[prophetgtree]

I would have to agree. I haven't ever really thought about it, but you're right. And it seems that that is the range I am interested in. Actually, probably on the high side of that range (750) just in case.

[saxofunk]

Sweets, the Hartke 5500 just made its debut in the latest American Musical Supply catalog. They even market it as a souped up 3500.

 

It had a matte silver face, lives in a three space rack with a vent screen in the third space... the vent screen has HARTKE in their usual subtle style.

 

I'm anxious for reviews, because when I was a kid my local bass hero played a Hartke stack. Now that I'm playing, I see very mixed reviews that make me weary to jump onto the Hartke boat... but this discussion belongs under the Hartke thread.

 

Given the new Marshall 400 watt guitar amp and some of the competition that has follwed that, maybe it's good that the bass amp players are upping the ante as well.

[_Sweet Willie_]

My ideal rig would include an 8-ohm cab that handles 400W RMS (i.e., the AccuGroove Tri-112, which I've tried w/ various basses and heads). Because I like extra headroom and don't want a large amp head, I'd like a 2U mono head that does about 500W into 8 ohms. These are not so easy to find! The EA iAmp-800 (about $1100) does 500W into 8 ohms, as does the Merlin 600 ($1800). The GK 1001RB does something like 460W into 8 ohms, but GK heads just haven't been my cup of tea.

 

However, it seems like a player has lots of choices to get 450-600W into 4 ohms.

 

Anyway, just kind of thinking out loud.

[_Sweet Willie_]

Originally posted by Matt W:

Given the new Marshall 400 watt guitar amp and some of the competition that has follwed that, maybe it's good that the bass amp players are upping the ante as well.

Do they sell that Marshall w/ ear plugs for you and your bandmates???

 

[saxofunk]

Eh Eh Eh (Beavis chuckle)

 

Look at our number of posts:

Matt W, 274

Sweet Willie, 2774

 

OK, on with life.

[Mr M Pulsive]

Originally posted by Ben:

FWIW, I think my GK700 is a little weak in the knees when used with just one 8 ohm cab, I like my GK1001 a lot better for that use. Giving a little more anecdotal evidence that 250 watts (the 700 at 8 ohms) ain't quite enough, but 460 watts (the 1001 at 8 ohms) is. I know, it's only a couple of dB, but it's not so much that the volume is louder, it's that the loud sound is cleaner and "rounder".

Ben, I own the same two heads and agree completely. I still use the 700rb primarily for practices, and the 1001rb primarily for gigs, and the little extra oomph can do wonders. I'm confident that I could use the 700rb in a pinch to finish a gig, should my 1001 keel over & die on me.... actually, that's why I got it... but here's hoping I don't have to try it.

 

-Mike

[getz out]

Originally posted by Matt W:

Given the new Marshall 400 watt guitar amp and some of the competition that has follwed that, maybe it's good that the bass amp players are upping the ante as well.

Exactly. Brilliant point, I could not have said it better myself.

 

Originally posted by Sweet Wilbur:

My ideal rig would include an 8-ohm cab that handles 400W RMS ... I'd like a 2U mono head that does about 500W into 8 ohms. These are not so easy to find! The EA iAmp-800 (about $1100) does 500W into 8 ohms, as does the Merlin 600 ($1800). The GK 1001RB does something like 460W into 8 ohms, but GK heads just haven't been my cup of tea.

There are some options for heads that weigh in under 30 lbs. for this category.

 

Eden WT-600 (600 watts @ 8 ohms, 22 lbs.)

SWR SM-900 (650 watts @ 8 ohms, 26 lbs.)

[coyote]

400 watts, 500 watts, 700 watts.....

 

We all think our rigs are soooo powerful. As it turns out, your wife harnesses far more power just to dry her hair with that little $10 Conair handheld blowdryer. Based on a similar power-to-weight ratio, our amps should be putting out something like 220,000 watts.

 

[saxofunk]

Originally posted by getz76:

Originally posted by Matt W:

Given the new Marshall 400 watt guitar amp and some of the competition that has follwed that, maybe it's good that the bass amp players are upping the ante as well.

Exactly. Brilliant point, I could not have said it better myself.

Maury, you might have spelled "followed" correctly.

That's what I get for trying to fix my forum addiction in a spare moment at work.

 

And the stupid post counter takes a minute to catch up, so my drabble about having a number similar to Sweet's is more stupid (um, stupider ?).

 

Fooey!

 

And double fooey!!

[Tom Capasso]

Yes Willie - I noticed that. For a while it made me comfortable - I could go out and test a bunch of heads with a similar power rating and buy the one with the best sound and features. Then I started to wonder if that was enough power for me (me with the crapola Carvin guitar head with 100W @4ohms).

 

I'm guessing that the 500W level is enough headroom for small rooms or stage levels when going through a PA. After that, you're talking about a different sort of amp setup (though companies do make larger rigs). But that's just my guess....

 

Praise The Lord And Pass Out The Earplugs....

 

Tom

[coyote]

OK, I'm a proponent of "big rigs" for anyone who feels they need it to get good tone and/or enough volume. But you know what? A good 100w amp thru a 4x10 & 1x15 is enough to play with a loud, heavy drummer and a band that rocks hard. My drummer can thunder as loud as any I've ever experienced, yet my bassist is often the loudest guy in the band. And that's with clear, clean tone - and he's using a Crate BX100 with a 4x10 extension cab. (The guitarist and I both run thru Marshall stacks.)

 

500 watts? Go for it if the headroom makes a diff in your tone. Heck, go for 750w or 1100w or whatever makes you happy. But from a strict efficiency standpoint, a good 100w-200w amp will do the job.

[doc taz]

Originally posted by coyote:

500 watts? Go for it if the headroom makes a diff in your tone. Heck, go for 750w or 1100w or whatever makes you happy. But from a strict efficiency standpoint, a good 100w-200w amp will do the job.

This I agree with. I've played my TNT 115 on some loud gigs, and even though it runs at 160 watts at 4 ohms, people say it gets too damned loud! It hardly distorts, even with my five string. Honest.

 

I'd still like to get a 2x10 cab and a 100 watt power amp for that, so I can run in biamped mode. That'll clean up the headroom for the low end, and tighten up the tone more than it is now. Also, the preamp out of my 115 doubles as a DI when hooked directly to a mixer. For now, I just use my MicroBass amp to achieve the biamped mode.

 

Before that, though, I gotta get some casters for my 115. It's a heavy monster of a combo, thanks to the wood used for the cabinet, and the speaker's magnet.

[a boy named sue]

is everyone talking RMS here?

[alexclaber]

Originally posted by coyote:

A good 100w amp thru a 4x10 & 1x15 is enough to play with a loud, heavy drummer and a band that rocks hard.

But if you use a 500W head with the 4x10" then you can leave the 1x15" behind.

 

Watts are cheap and light nowadays so you might as well get as many as you can afford. I bet in 5 years' time 1000W will be the standard.

 

Alex

[coyote]

I prefer having the extra speaker (actually it's nice to have both ). The full stack gives you both a cab on the floor AND a cab up close to your ears. Guitar and bass both depend tonally on having a cab on the ground, so you want one there - but you also want one higher up so you can hear it clearly. Every guitarist & bassist I've played with who uses a full stack actually plays at lower volume because they can now hear themselves clearly. Small PA systems with the speakers up on poles provide similar clarity benefits.

 

Originally posted by C.Alexander Claber:

But if you use a 500W head with the 4x10" then you can leave the 1x15" behind.

Alex

[_Sweet Willie_]

Basically there are two main ways to increase a rig's volume -- more speakers or more wattage. 100W with enough drivers (like coyote's and taz's examples) would be great. 500W w/ fewer drivers would be great (e.g., an efficient 2x10 or a less efficient 3-way cab like an Acme B2). It's up to the player to decide what works best for him/her.

 

If we think that more manufacturers are producing heads in the 450W-550W RMS range into 4 ohms (I'm assuming, tom rivet, that we're all talking RMS here), it might be related to a belief that many gigging players are probably trying not to lug more than 1 cab around. There are definitely players who want two reasonably sized cabs (e.g., 4x10 and 1x15) or an 8x10, and there are both tone and loudness benefits to that. However, I think we've seen manufacturers trying to reduce rig size w/ smaller, lighter, and more efficient cabs that also have large tone, and I'm guessing that is in response to what they see as a market opportunity, i.e., there are players who still want big sound but don't want to carry around mucho gear.

 

Anyway, my intent in starting this thread wasn't really to advocate for 500W heads as much as to report an observation that I had made, inquire as to whether others observed a similar characteristic in the amp marketplace, and wonder why we may be seeing this.

 

Peace.

[Griffinator]

The Mesa Boogie Bass 400+ has been 500 watts for many, many years. Frankly, I'm surprised it took the rest of the industry this long to catch up.

[_Sweet Willie_]

Originally posted by Griffinator:

The Mesa Boogie Bass 400+ has been 500 watts for many, many years. Frankly, I'm surprised it took the rest of the industry this long to catch up.

No doubt!

 

That's also 500W of all-tube power, which often sounds louder than solid state (although I don't think actual dB measurements would show a difference -- Maybe one of the more tech-minded folks can confirm that? I know there are past threads about tube vs. solid state power) -- yikes!

 

Doesn't that head weigh something like 80 lbs.?!

[Griffinator]

Originally posted by Sweet Willie:

Originally posted by Griffinator:

The Mesa Boogie Bass 400+ has been 500 watts for many, many years. Frankly, I'm surprised it took the rest of the industry this long to catch up.

No doubt!

 

That's also 500W of all-tube power, which often sounds louder than solid state (although I don't think actual dB measurements would show a difference -- Maybe one of the more tech-minded folks can confirm that? I know there are past threads about tube vs. solid state power) -- yikes!

 

Doesn't that head weigh something like 80 lbs.?!

Easily. And yeah, it's all-tube - typically, all-tube amplifiers are far more efficient at the same wattage rating as solid-state units. This is why you see top-shelf tube hifi amps topping out at around 25-30 watts, rather than the hundreds upon hundreds you see in solid state.

 

I'm actually trying to move a RoadReady 2x15 with one of these monsters (in a matching SUS rack)for a friend on Ebay right now - I doubt we'll get any bids outside of the local region, on account of the sheer enormity of this system.

[Sylver]

I was just going to tease you all for lusting after all that wattage. I was going to make a point that certain manufacturers don't even make heads that powerful, but go for tone, like, say Trace-Elliot. In doing a little research, I realized that Trace no longer makes bass amps(at the momement, at least)!

 

I take great pity on anyone that doesn't have one.

[alexclaber]

Originally posted by Griffinator:

The Mesa Boogie Bass 400+ has been 500 watts for many, many years. Frankly, I'm surprised it took the rest of the industry this long to catch up.

That's what Mesa Boogie claim. In reality it's the same power as an Ampeg SVT - i.e. 300W RMS and that's being optimistic.

 

Alex

[alexclaber]

Originally posted by Griffinator:

And yeah, it's all-tube - typically, all-tube amplifiers are far more efficient at the same wattage rating as solid-state units.

Don't you mean far less efficient - look at the amount of heat an SVT puts out compared to any solidstate amp.

 

Originally posted by Griffinator:

This is why you see top-shelf tube hifi amps topping out at around 25-30 watts, rather than the hundreds upon hundreds you see in solid state.

No, that's because they're designed to be paired up with very sensitive, often horn, loudspeakers as part of a hifi system that focuses on low volume dynamics and midrange resolution as opposed to a powerful solidstate amp driving big multiway speakers with flat response from way down low to way up high.

 

Tube watts sound louder because they're more midrangey, there's compression going on and they can be driven further into distortion before they sound nasty. The difference is far larger with guitar amps than with bass amps. Valves can give great tone but they're not the easiest route to massive lows at high volume.

 

Alex

[73 P Bass]

I only need enough to sound good over the guitar and drums, and at that volume I need ear plugs! The biggest amp I've ever played out with was 300w into a 4 x 10(plenty loud for any club in CT). When ever I've played a bigger venue, they have had a large PA, and my amp was only for stage sound.

Watts are like penis size; some people are never satisfied!

[rumpelstiltskin.]

Originally posted by Griffinator:

typically, all-tube amplifiers are far more efficient at the same wattage rating as solid-state units. This is why you see top-shelf tube hifi amps topping out at around 25-30 watts, rather than the hundreds upon hundreds you see in solid state.

like AC said, tube amps are typically less efficient that solid state amps, but that isn't necessarily because of topology. it's because tubes have a heater that is always on and always drawing current. without the heater, the tube wouldn't work. but AC is a little off pointing to the amount of heat being produced by a tube head -- at constant 1/3 power, a solid state amp will often create more heat than a tube amp.

 

as for his assertion that:

...they're designed to be paired up with very sensitive, often horn, loudspeakers as part of a hifi system that focuses on low volume dynamics and midrange resolution as opposed to a powerful solidstate amp driving big multiway speakers with flat response from way down low to way up high.

hi-fi systems for the home aren't just as multi-way and full-range flat response as a bass or PA system -- they're more so. maybe a really bad home stereo is designed for midrange resolution and low volume (cough, bose), but anything using a 25W tube monoblock is not.

 

as for tube watts being more midrangey -- no. a watt is still a watt. tube watts sound louder for various reasons, and because of the limitations of output transformers, often extreme frequency response is not feasible for 300W at reasonable cost. if anyone really wants to know, do a search. we've talked this one to death already.

 

robb.

[alexclaber]

Originally posted by robb.:

like AC said, tube amps are typically less efficient that solid state amps, but that isn't necessarily because of topology. it's because tubes have a heater that is always on and always drawing current. without the heater, the tube wouldn't work. but AC is a little off pointing to the amount of heat being produced by a tube head -- at constant 1/3 power, a solid state amp will often create more heat than a tube amp.

Thanks for clarifying that. On the flip side there are more and more solidstate amps that use more efficient topologies such as class G (switching rail voltage), class H (variable rail voltage), class D (switching output transistors) etc.

 

Originally posted by robb.:

]hi-fi systems for the home aren't just as multi-way and full-range flat response as a bass or PA system -- they're more so. maybe a really bad home stereo is designed for midrange resolution and low volume (cough, bose), but anything using a 25W tube monoblock is not.

I wasn't comparing hifi systems to bass or PA systems, I was comparing different types of hifi systems. There are some very nice single driver speakers which have fantastic resolution, timing and dynamics but are lacking in extreme frequency response and power handling - most of these designs are horn speakers and are thus incredibly efficient and driven by as little as 10 watts can reach massive volumes. There are also awesome monster cabs like the B&W Nautilus that are 4-way, rather inefficient and like to be driven by four powerful monobloc amps each, have flat frequency response from 20Hz to 20kHz but are not as quick sounding or microdynamic as a single driver speaker.

 

There is no ultimate hifi system - if you want one that can reproduce the nuances of a string quartet or small jazz group a single-ended valve amp allied to a pair of big horn speakers would be best, whilst if you want to feel like you've got a rock band or opera hall in your living room the multi-way speakers driven by big solidstate amps would be the best approach.

 

Originally posted by robb.:

as for tube watts being more midrangey -- no. a watt is still a watt. tube watts sound louder for various reasons, and because of the limitations of output transformers, often extreme frequency response is not feasible for 300W at reasonable cost.

I phrased that badly - what I meant was that the common tube bass amps are voiced to sound more midrangey than most solidstate amps, like the SVT which thrives on midrange fur, and they can't got as seriously low because of the output transformer.

 

The main reason 'tube watts' can sound significantly louder than 'solidstate watts' is that anyone willing to lug a big heavy tube amp is probably willing to lug a big (and thus probably efficient) cabinet. In the end most of it comes down to speaker sensitivity.

 

Alex