Power,loudness,sound quality

[rs1026]

From reading various threads in this forum I came to know that one of the factors that affects ouput power of a amp is based on the rating of the transformer used. This is somewhat clear to me.

But there were few questions that was not very clear.

1>I could not differentiate between Power and loudness. Does more power mean more loud the amp will sound?? Or will more power mean the sound quality will increase.

2>I plan to build chip amps using lm3886 and lm4780. I dont need more jarring or loud music.But I want clear music with necessary punch from woofers/sub woofers. Basically the sound should be discernible to the ears.
Is it possible to achieve this objective from the above chip amps.

3>Can these chips be used for home theatre systems, to drive sub woofers ??

The room size that I want use these amps is not more than 15feetx15feet.

Thanks in advance for answering these questions!

[peranders]

1 Volume out = electrical power * speaker efficiency. 30-50 watt out in normal speaker is pretty high.

2 They are pretty good


3 Yes, but a bit little maybe for a sub, especially if you use only one IC but if you use bridge and/or parallel connection it will work

[thomas997]

Two LM3886 should be good for a standard subwoofer.

You might find the stereo chip easier to work with (LM4780 - 120W bridged).


"Loudness" can be set by the gain of the amplifier. While power is determined by the chip, voltage of supply, and load.

I guess loudness is limited by supply voltage as well, as the output cant exceed the +/- rails.


Maybe someone else can describe it better.

[lulu]

you might also want to try the opa548 or opa549