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Can too low of a frequency damage my speakers?
I recently upgraded to a Marantz 1501 surround sound receiver and on the specs it says frequency range 8 - 20khz. When I put the movie Rango in theres a part during his first encounter with the snake, right after when the snake says "but we know differently don't we" it hits a super low note..and I'm just wondering if it's close to wrecking my speakers. I don't know how low it it but it's damn low.
Edit: never mind I was looking at the analog inputs. It says 20 - 20khz on the output. It still shakes the house harder than any other movie track I have though. :)
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Re: Can too low of a frequency damage my speakers?
If you are driving a ported speaker at high power below its box tuning frequency it becomes "unloaded" and you can quite easily exceed mechanical limits and potentially damage the woofer.
Your avatar shows a 604E. Is this what you are using? If so, what is your box alignment/tuning frequency?
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Re: Can too low of a frequency damage my speakers?
No expert here but my understanding is that in basis neither frequency or waveforms alone damage speakers. It's the product of frequency or waveform and input power that exceeds mechanical(excursion) and/or thermal(input power) limits that are by far the most common failure modes for most speakers.
As Dave's post above suggests, in a vented alignment power handling goes down, and excursion increases sharply below tuning.
It's actually possible to break some woofers with a good bit less than their rated input power if they're in a goofy alignment.
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Re: Can too low of a frequency damage my speakers?
i would say that square signals are really hard on speakers, and notes that low require alot of power. ive often seen recievers claim 20- 20,00hz but with what authority at the lower octives? also, while the speaker might do it, for how long? i can tell...your thinking about subs now
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Re: Can too low of a frequency damage my speakers?
Distortion,distortion,distortion ! Common sense will go along way here.Overdriving and overdriving to distortion levels with any speaker is a crap shoot with it's voice coil.
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Re: Can too low of a frequency damage my speakers?
Yes they're 604's and the receiver is rated 50 watts per channel but it's in Marantz watts...which is like Mopar horsepower not Chevy Horsepower. : D
BTW I just payed Jennifer Whitewolf for her 604 C she had listed in the marketplace Now I'll have a matched pair of C's ....maybe I'll slip the E into one of the old AS-101's and make it a center channel. :)
No subs Vallhallax, the house is about to fall down just from these 604's severe shaking.
Bowtie I would totally describe my design as a goofy alignment. Not sure what the frequency tuning is of them.
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Re: Can too low of a frequency damage my speakers?
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Originally Posted by
Altec Best
Distortion,distortion,distortion ! Common sense will go along way here.Overdriving and overdriving to distortion levels with any speaker is a crap shoot with it's voice coil.
Best advice ever but try explaining it to someone. Telling them "its when the sound starts to distort" does not always sink in and especially with younger people and their music. Most of them seem to strive for it with their booming car audio systems. :rolleyes2:
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Re: Can too low of a frequency damage my speakers?
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Originally Posted by
Nipper
Best advice ever but try explaining it to someone. Telling them "its when the sound starts to distort" does not always sink in and especially with younger people and their music. Most of them seem to strive for it with their booming car audio systems. :rolleyes2:
My ears are super sensitive to Distortion ! That's why I like Altecs so much ! I start to cringe when speakers distort.I can stand about 1 second of distortion.
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Re: Can too low of a frequency damage my speakers?
There's a difference between distortion and deep bass notes. I have never heard distortion from these speakers in any amount of way.
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Re: Can too low of a frequency damage my speakers?
Bear in mind 50 watts is not steady state. Average radiated power is likely a watt or two most of the time...but a 20 DB peak is 100 times power....so at a watt average you could well be hitting over 100 watt peaks....
Not a problem with any good amp...many can put out several times rated power for a brief burst...
But crank it to 3 watts average and you are hitting 300 watt peaks...when the amp gets in trouble most think it's the speakers, most of the time it's amp distortion.
Any chain is only as strong as it's weakest link, so I would bet on either bad tuning, as said, or the 50 watt amp just running out of air.
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Re: Can too low of a frequency damage my speakers?
VOTT's used in the home have built in distortion protection. Crank a set and IT HURTS. :biggrin2:
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Re: Can too low of a frequency damage my speakers?
You said it Nipster, these things are so efficient you don't even come close to hitting a distortion level with them before they are just too damn loud.
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Re: Can too low of a frequency damage my speakers?
I tried listening to a movie through my A8 clones and the noise coming out of the Magnavox DVD player/recorder was unbearable. Not to mention that I couldn't hear the dialog or music because the sound effects were so damned loud (I know, I have bitched about this before). You definitely don't need any tone boost in the high or low registers for movies. I did almost blow them up clicking on a You Tube video and all of a sudden a commercial came blaring out at least 10 times the volume of the last song, it took me a few seconds to find the volume knob and luckily nothing was exploded, but boy, that was the loudest thing I have ever heard. I am in the process of adding inline speaker fuses as we speak. I can’t remember how to size them, but I think that I will start out with 1.5 amp fast blow fuses first and see how that works.
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Re: Can too low of a frequency damage my speakers?
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Originally Posted by
VolvoHeretic
.....You definitely don't need any tone boost in the high or low registers for movies.
Stereo, or some kind of surround? I beleive surround is basically pre-EQ'd. Even if you're running two channel, are you sure you don't have some sort of effects or surround turned on? I used to run an eq with a "smile" and was always baffled why I had to turn up the volume to hear voices. I finally wised up. I do my best to run flat, now.
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Re: Can too low of a frequency damage my speakers?
This is a 5.1 amp, and I'm not sure if it kicks into simulated surround and maybe EQ when it is set to TV mode. I have the EQ set almost like a smile, more like a flat smirk with the corners turned up. :] I read somewhere long ago, maybe in the Soundcraftsman EQ manual that it was always better to add than subtract the EQ settings, something like that a bunch of bumps were better than a bunch of dips.
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Re: Can too low of a frequency damage my speakers?
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Originally Posted by
cradeldorf
these things are so efficient you don't even come close to hitting a distortion level with them before they are just too damn loud.
I don't know about that.I have been known to irk a few neighbors or two with some volume ! :biggrin2:
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Re: Can too low of a frequency damage my speakers?
ive heard several folks ask to have it turned up..im running 210 cabs and large format horns..i really think people dont think its loud till they hear distortion. f$@K the neighbors
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Re: Can too low of a frequency damage my speakers?
I can use the 604 E as a center speaker....right??? I mean center speakers aren't anything special are they? Of course I'll have to use an original crossover network because I can't afford another GPA crossover...I really couldn't afford the 604 C...but I couldn't let it get away either. ;)
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Re: Can too low of a frequency damage my speakers?
Who would have ever thought of this connection? VictorySiren.com? - The Internet home of the Chrysler Air Raid Siren It is an unusual association between Chrysler (mopar) and Bell Telephone Labs?
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Re: Can too low of a frequency damage my speakers?
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Originally Posted by
cradeldorf
I can use the 604 E as a center speaker....right??? I mean center speakers aren't anything special are they? Of course I'll have to use an original crossover network because I can't afford another GPA crossover...I really couldn't afford the 604 C...but I couldn't let it get away either. ;)
Congrats on the 2nd 604C! I just went to the classifieds and viewed the photos again and it looks like a real beauty! Sounds like a killer setup--matched 604C's for left and right channel and a 604E for the center channel. Now that you've found a tuning/porting that you like for your 604's it might be worth experimenting with porting the center Heathkit cab--maybe install a new back to that center cab with similar slotted ports (but save the original back of course in case you sell those cabs someday)?
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Re: Can too low of a frequency damage my speakers?
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Originally Posted by
voice of the theater
Congrats on the 2nd 604C! I just went to the classifieds and viewed the photos again and it looks like a real beauty! Sounds like a killer setup--matched 604C's for left and right channel and a 604E for the center channel. Now that you've found a tuning/porting that you like for your 604's it might be worth experimenting with porting the center Heathkit cab--maybe install a new back to that center cab with similar slotted ports (but save the original back of course in case you sell those cabs someday)?
You read me well. ; ) that's exactly what I am planning.... if you ever get a chance to try it you should...it sounds so open that way. : )
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Re: Can too low of a frequency damage my speakers?
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Originally Posted by
VolvoHeretic
....I have the EQ set almost like a smile, more like a flat smirk with the corners turned up.
Run it flat and see if speech improves. The human voice is mid-range, and if you're setting your volume with the treble and bass boosted, you'll be too low in the middle and loose speech.
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Re: Can too low of a frequency damage my speakers?
EQ's will drive you crazy.
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Re: Can too low of a frequency damage my speakers?
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Originally Posted by
Audio_by_Goodwill
Run it flat and see if speech improves. The human voice is mid-range, and if you're setting your volume with the treble and bass boosted, you'll be too low in the middle and loose speech.
I only have it EQ'd like that for older LP formated CD's. New stuff my kids listen to is pretty much flat, and watching that movie was also flat. I guess I will have to try a frown :( EQ shape. :)
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Re: Can too low of a frequency damage my speakers?
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Originally Posted by
Nipper
" does not always sink in and especially with younger people and their music.
Most of them seem to strive for it with their booming car audio systems.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=my6vhMvTNrw
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here are two low fz songs as such to see just how low your speakers go.
both with sub 10 cycle notes.
the woofer cooker -
Woofer Cooker Mp3 Download
and
bass, i love you -
http://www.realmofexcursion.com/audi...ssiloveyou.mp3
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Re: Can too low of a frequency damage my speakers?
Being a Dub owner and lover....why would you ever do that to your Dub....: / I'm not running that through my 50 year old Altecs to see if they'll survive. I love them too much to put them through that. Awesome video though. :)
I like my bass too, If it's clean.
BTW a tin can makes for the worst speaker cabinet.
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Re: Can too low of a frequency damage my speakers?
well now,
you don't have to turn it All The Way Up.
(and the person that made this vid knows better)
woofer cooker workin the furniture -
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PBS-aOJ48FI
bass i love you woofer excursion -
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MHAIS_zGNUs
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Re: Can too low of a frequency damage my speakers?
Don't remember the exact year or place, but it could have been in 67 or 68 that one of the bigger HiFi shops between Boston & Cambridge had a display of what had to be an acoustic suspension woofer of about the 12" variety. This was connected to an amp of sufficient power and of such a frequency that the woofer went about its business going to near maximum excursion all day long. It appeared to me moving somewhere about 3/4 to 1 inch total. Didn't make a sound, but looked to be in the 2 to 3 hz range. Also don't know if the voice coil was beefed up to handle that duty. It was interesting to watch. Didn't laugh about it, unlike Howard Stern's speaker "test" in "Private Parts."
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Re: Can too low of a frequency damage my speakers?
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Re: Can too low of a frequency damage my speakers?
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Re: Can too low of a frequency damage my speakers?
Feeling pretty stupid. I just figured why the stereo sounds so bad and noisy playing DVDs. I had the stereo hooked up to the TV audio outputs instead of out of the DVD player and the TV's tone controls, volume, and it's general terrible noisy circuitry was ruining the sound. Switched it to the DVD player and all is well.
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Re: Can too low of a frequency damage my speakers?
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Originally Posted by
VolvoHeretic
Feeling pretty stupid. I just figured why the stereo sounds so bad and noisy playing DVDs. I had the stereo hooked up to the TV audio outputs instead of out of the DVD player and the TV's tone controls, volume, and it's general terrible noisy circuitry was ruining the sound. Switched it to the DVD player and all is well.
I bet that made a major improvement. :)
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Re: Can too low of a frequency damage my speakers?
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Re: Can too low of a frequency damage my speakers?
Quote:
Originally Posted by
David Yost
If you are driving a ported speaker at high power below its box tuning frequency it becomes "unloaded" and you can quite easily exceed mechanical limits and potentially damage the woofer.
Your avatar shows a 604E. Is this what you are using? If so, what is your box alignment/tuning frequency?
Does this apply to a 614 cab? Because I could not find a spec sheet on the frequency range for it.. The tuning for the enclosure.
It seemed to indicate..to go with the speaker's specs...That is, if using a 414 go by its range...417 etc...
Being a heathen and mainly a MI guy, I am more than ignorant on the physics of sound and spl etc... ... I know by reading JBL lit, that their enclosures, purportedly can attenuate or vice versa, the low end of a specific driver...of course, they have over, under hung Voice Coil drivers etc..
http://www.voiceofthetheatre.com/images/614D.1.jpg
http://www.voiceofthetheatre.com/images/614D.2.jpg
http://www.voiceofthetheatre.com/utility.cabs.2.jpg
