What's the point of 100 watt amps?

[Eric***]

Besides the volume difference, there is a huge difference in bottom end between a 100 watt amp and a, say 18 watt amp. It doesn't matter so much for cleaner sounds, but for more of a rock tone, it makes a big difference. That is one reason you seldom see big acts (with more of a rock tone) with 18 or 25 watt amps. It's just a very distinct difference in thump and low end punch from a 100 watt amp than a smaller amp. Even between a 50 and a 100 watt Marshall, this is clearly distinguishable.

Interesting. I know deeaa touched on that earlier, but that seems to be the most concise answer yet. I was wondering how much of the sound difference might be due to the cabinet you use with it, but since you mentioned the 50/100 difference, I gather that it's an actual amp difference, eh? Thanks for the input.

[Robert****]

Interesting. I know deeaa touched on that earlier, but that seems to be the most concise answer yet. I was wondering how much of the sound difference might be due to the cabinet you use with it, but since you mentioned the 50/100 difference, I gather that it's an actual amp difference, eh? Thanks for the input.

I'm no electronics wizard, but I wonder if it may have to do with the output transformer being beefier? There is an interesting article here http://www.legendarytones.com/guitouttrans.html

[Ch0jin]

I'm no electronics wizard, but I wonder if it may have to do with the output transformer being beefier? There is an interesting article here http://www.legendarytones.com/guitouttrans.html

Funny thing is Robert, being an electronics wizard only gives part of the picture. You'd also need some pretty specific anatomy skills too.

I vaguely recall posting about this here before so apologies if I'm repeating myself, but I'll try to keep it simple.

As our four stringed friends know all too well, the lower the frequency you want to amplify, the more power you need. This applies bass, guitars, home stereo, anything like that. Most people are happy to just accept that as fact (and it is) but the reason behind it has to do with our ears, not electronics.

Our ears are not linear, not by a long way.

If you wan't to prove it, swap an audio taper pot used as volume in something, anything really, and replace it with a linear one. Now sweep the volume through it's range whilst you have some kind of audio signal and you'll very obviously notice that all the volume control seems to be "bunched up" at one end of the control.

How can that be if we use a linear control though?

Simple, our ears, as I mention, are not linear in their response. Not linear in terms of perceived volume; it takes exponentially more and more sound pressure to result in a seemingly linear increase in volume (part of the reason 100W heads are only a little louder than 50W heads, not double. In fact, in terms of perceived loudness, a 100W amp is actually double a 10W amp) and not linear across the Audio Frequency (AF) range from 20Hz to 20KHz.

This last fact is what really causes this whole "more power for bass frequencies" scenario.

If you want loads of technical info, go have a read HERE about Equal Loudness Contours.

The guts of it is that our ears are not so good with low frequency (and if you are my age or older, high frequencies).You need to throw far more sound pressure at them to hear bass guitar frequencies at the same perceived level as guitar frequencies.

So all that proves what we all already know, more power = better bass. Whilst we love to use words like "bottom end" and "thump" and "grunt" and so on, ALL of that is just ways of saying "lower frequencies".

To bring it all back to the specific topic, a 100W amp, with it's ability to generate more sound pressure, will sound "phatter, bassier, ballsier, thicker" because our ears translate that extra low frequency pressure into volume.

I could now dive into the electronic theory as well, but I'm guessing eyes are already glazing over........

[Eric***]

I could now dive into the electronic theory as well, but I'm guessing eyes are already glazing over........

Just about a sentence or two away from doing that, so good timing! Thanks for the info -- I knew the bit about logarithmic power in amps, but not the thing about frequencies.

[NWBasser]

Funny thing is Robert, being an electronics wizard only gives part of the picture. You'd also need some pretty specific anatomy skills too.

I vaguely recall posting about this here before so apologies if I'm repeating myself, but I'll try to keep it simple.

As our four stringed friends know all too well, the lower the frequency you want to amplify, the more power you need. This applies bass, guitars, home stereo, anything like that. Most people are happy to just accept that as fact (and it is) but the reason behind it has to do with our ears, not electronics.

Our ears are not linear, not by a long way.

If you wan't to prove it, swap an audio taper pot used as volume in something, anything really, and replace it with a linear one. Now sweep the volume through it's range whilst you have some kind of audio signal and you'll very obviously notice that all the volume control seems to be "bunched up" at one end of the control.

How can that be if we use a linear control though?

Simple, our ears, as I mention, are not linear in their response. Not linear in terms of perceived volume; it takes exponentially more and more sound pressure to result in a seemingly linear increase in volume (part of the reason 100W heads are only a little louder than 50W heads, not double. In fact, in terms of perceived loudness, a 100W amp is actually double a 10W amp) and not linear across the Audio Frequency (AF) range from 20Hz to 20KHz.

This last fact is what really causes this whole "more power for bass frequencies" scenario.

If you want loads of technical info, go have a read HERE about Equal Loudness Contours.

The guts of it is that our ears are not so good with low frequency (and if you are my age or older, high frequencies).You need to throw far more sound pressure at them to hear bass guitar frequencies at the same perceived level as guitar frequencies.

So all that proves what we all already know, more power = better bass. Whilst we love to use words like "bottom end" and "thump" and "grunt" and so on, ALL of that is just ways of saying "lower frequencies".

To bring it all back to the specific topic, a 100W amp, with it's ability to generate more sound pressure, will sound "phatter, bassier, ballsier, thicker" because our ears translate that extra low frequency pressure into volume.

I could now dive into the electronic theory as well, but I'm guessing eyes are already glazing over........

This is entirely in line with my understanding of these things.

That was an excellent expanation!