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Experiences moving from high-power to lower-power system

Dear all,

For years I have been pursing a track of higher and higher power solid-state amplification with medium-to-low efficiency floorstanding speakers. I don't wish to start another tube vs. solid state thread. And we all know the benefits of more, often Class A, power: better headroom, transient response, imaging, soundstage, low-end control. Rather, I want to ask about the experiences of folks who have traded in higher-power for lower-power setups.  What were the tradeoffs? What got better? What got worse? Was it a question of fit with the space? Answers can be from folks with super-high-efficiency speakers and flea-watt amps, tube or solid state, or transitions to setups that are less extreme. 

Thank you,

Paul

paulburnett

Showing 3 responses by atmasphere

atmasphere's avatar
atmasphere
11,574 posts
 
B&W801 driven by Jadis 500 gave most powerful bass in my room.

High efficiency full range speaker driven by 300B gave beautiful human voice.
I get the best of both worlds- I run Classic Audio Loudspeakers which go down to 20Hz but are also 98db 1 watt/1 meter.

I run them with tube amps that have full power bandwidth to 2Hz, and unmeasurable distortion and lower power levels. I get the best bass I've ever had in my room, along with the most realistic voices (and other instruments too). The amp makes about 45 watts into the 16 ohms of the speakers.

If you really want this to happen, the higher impedance of the speaker is really helpful to the performance of the amplifier!
atmasphere's avatar
atmasphere
11,574 posts
 
how would your speakers sound with 800 watts of tube power ? Or it would just be a waist of electricity and tubes ?
An output transformer that could manage 800 watts would not be full bandwidth. So, probably not as good. Another issue would be the noise floor, which would be higher. In most cases, its likely that distortion would be higher too, since my speakers require so little power, an 800 watt amp would be operating in a region where its distortion is actually nearly that of full power. So I think it would be a waste- with that kind of power, at the very least a speaker of less efficiency would be good for the amp.

We do make an OTL that makes a little over 500 watts. That one seems to run fine on those speakers. I never need the power though...
atmasphere's avatar
atmasphere
11,574 posts
 
One thing I can tell you is that you don't have to sacrifice anything by getting more efficient and easier to drive speakers! I've yet to hear anything with more resolution and my speakers go down flat to 20Hz. The are 98 db, so I don't need a lot of power. I usually run them with 60 watt tube amps, which allow me nearly unlimited volume levels. I am very used to going over to friend's houses and hearing systems with 800 watts and realizing that by comparison, their systems are smaller and less capable because they lack the dynamic range and resolution.
That old adage about smaller amps sounding better may apply;  certainly if you are careful you won't miss the more powerful/less able amplifiers! The trick is the speaker...
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