AMPLIFIERS – REQUIREMENTS AND OPTIONS

A particularly misunderstood part of the selection of audio equipment is the category of audio amplifiers, as we encounter many cases where the interested party has purchased speakers with particularly high-quality characteristics, giving little importance to the capabilities of the amplifier, resulting in receiving the minimum of the capabilities of the audio equipment. Other times we choose amplifiers ignoring their environmental and operating conditions, resulting in us constantly facing issues of malfunctions, and having to either temporarily replace them in order to proceed with their repair actions, or replace them with the appropriate material, spending extra money, for no reason.

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  • Therefore, when purchasing amplifiers, we should give importance to both their quality of construction and technical characteristics such as their power (RMS power rating), which should possibly reach twice the value indicated as the nominal or average power of the speakers it is called upon to drive (more detailed information in the technical brochures of our website). Furthermore, we should know the type of speakers it is called upon to drive, that is, whether they are speakers that belong to the Commercial category and therefore have a transformer and require an amplifier that works at 100V, or belong to one of the other categories of simple ohmic speakers. Finally, an important factor is the degree of what is called Headroom, which marks the difference between the maximum power that our amplifier can deliver without distorting, and the average nominal power of the device. The higher this degree, the less likely the amplifier will exhibit distortion in the output signal produced and consequently overheat and be destroyed, dragging our speakers along with it.

• • It is worth mentioning at this point that in many cases of sound coverage of a multi-venue, we encounter the need to install an amplifier with multiple audio outputs, in order to avoid the bulk of multiple machines but also to reduce the related expense when purchasing them. In this case, we should give particular importance both to the technical characteristics and to the adequacy of outputs and consequently separate sound control zones in the individual spaces.

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  • Finally, when designing the system, we should take into account that we can use amplifiers of either analog or digital technology, the latter of which work with lower power consumption, heat up less, and are largely lighter than the former.