[BikeWNC]

I read all the time members here think the HT3 speakers "need" huge amps to work to their max.  I still can't understand why that would be so.  If I listen to most music around 80dB, why would I "need" more than 180 watts that I have?  I'm only using the first watt.  Most amps have loads of available capacitance to deliver for any needed short spikes in volume, so why more power?  I'm just trying to wrap my head around what a 600-1000 watt per channel amp would do for me vs. what I have. 

I certainly can tell the difference between a 50 watt tube amp and the 180 watt ss amp.  The tube amp runs out of steam and seems limited in headroom.  Is the comparison the same for the larger amps?  But the 180 watts is way louder than I would ever need so why more?  I've never had the chance to hear a huge amp push speakers so that is one of the reasons I'm asking. 

Andy

[DMurphy]

I read all the time members here think the HT3 speakers "need" huge amps to work to their max.  I still can't understand why that would be so.  If I listen to most music around 80dB, why would I "need" more than 180 watts that I have?  I'm only using the first watt.  Most amps have loads of available capacitance to deliver for any needed short spikes in volume, so why more power?  I'm just trying to wrap my head around what a 600-1000 watt per channel amp would do for me vs. what I have. 

I certainly can tell the difference between a 50 watt tube amp and the 180 watt ss amp.  The tube amp runs out of steam and seems limited in headroom.  Is the comparison the same for the larger amps?  But the 180 watts is way louder than I would ever need so why more?  I've never had the chance to hear a huge amp push speakers so that is one of the reasons I'm asking. 

Well, 180 watts may be enough.  It depends on whether the amp is happy with 4 ohm loads in the  midbass.  But also remember that 360 watts is only 3 dB louder than 180 watts.  So if you do start to push things, you need lots of extra watts to get not that much extra headroom. 

[Big Red Machine]

That's why some of us say 500+ watts, so you can have headroom.  I've driven them with a Moscode at 200 wpc pretty nicely.  The amp had sound issues not related to the speakers, but it worked fine wrt volume levels.

[Nuance]

To add to what the others have said, sometimes the transients will get a lot louder than the rest of the music/instrument.  In this case, headroom is a good thing to have in order to prevent the amp(s) from clipping.  You may not even notice if a transient clips your amp, but it's still better to avoid it IMO.

[jsalk]

Some DIY friends put on a very interesting demonstration a couple of years ago at the Rocky Moutnain Audiofest.  They hooked up two meters and played some music.  One was an averaging meter and the other was a peak-reading meter.  While the average meter was hovering around 5- 8 watts most of the time, the peak-reading meter was hitting 250 - 300 watts on transient peaks.  So while 180 watts is more than plenty for most reasonable listening levels, you still may have transients pushing the amp into clipping.  While these transients are extremely brief and the resulting clipping may not be all that noticeable, a higher powered amp will never clip, keeping things pristine.

Just some food for thought...

- Jim

[Wayner]

Another point is that energy can't be created or destroyed...only changed in form. That said, how could you expect a smallish amp with smallish power, drive a speaker to the levels of even an orchestra. I've heard some very dynamic classical music, un-amplified and there is tremendous "horsepower" involved here. Dynamic speakers like Jim's HT-3's, like any larger dynamic speaker, certainly have the surface area in it's driver compliment to reproduce dynamics of an orchestra in our smaller listening environments of our listening rooms. There is lots of air being moved. For those crescendos' to not clip, it takes a little juice to keep it clean.

Wayner 

[fsimms]

One point that I think is needed with the HT3 and power is that the HT3's don't have compression.   Compression is where were the speaker doesn't compress the dynamic range of the sound.   You get the full  dynamic range.   

Play the movie Master and Commander, with the DTS audio tract and with electronics that don't compress. Have the volume level where the voices are very low.  The cannon shots are still loud enough to cause you to sweat!  The Dolby tract isn't like that.  With Dolby the soft passages are much louder and the cannon blast is unimpressive.

If you have music or sound that plays very softly and also very loud then you need some watts if you want to hear the soft passages and not clip the amp on the loud passages.

Bob

PS  I have HT1's with a 12" SVS sub, but I think the HT3's will sound similar.   My SVS sub has one TC Sound 12" woofer and the HT3's have 2 10" TC Sound woofers.