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In Reply to: Re: Help: How to set gain leve?? posted by Bill Fitzmaurice on December 15, 2004 at 15:50:19:
Hi Bill,Most pro power amps at full gain hit full power at somewhere from about 0.7 to 2 volts RMS (~ -1 dBu to +8 dBu) of input, depending on the model and the load. Most line level pro gear can put out +18 dBu or higher. If I run my power amps at full gain, I would have to reduce the signal somewhere so that the maximum levels don't exceed those lower points that would clip the amps. That would sacrifice about 10 to 20 dB of potential signal-to-noise between the point of reduction and the power amp gain control.
That may not be too terrible, depending on how much gear is operating with reduced signal levels and how good it is. If you dial back the levels on the mixer, for instance, and then run the signals through a slew of processing gear, you have a greater potential for an intrusively high noise floor than if you, say, turn down the gains on the various bands of a crossover that feeds the amps directly.
If I'm driving amps with a piece of consumer or hi-fi gear that can only put out a maximum of a volt or so, then I would probably need to turn the amps all the way up.
Syn-Aud-Con (www.synaudcon.com) has published some good procedures for optimizing gain structure.
-Bob
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Follow Ups
- Re: Help: How to set gain level?? - Bob Lee (QSC) 08:36:21 12/16/04 (0)
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