A question

[aznchco]

Im really dumb when it comes to audio stuff, so i need a little help. what does rms stand for, i just bought two ATB12Q subs from audiobahn it says 400 watts RMS power handling. also what amp do you think would be good to power it. another thing I want to know about is the ohm thing. I sometimes see 2ohm or 4ohm at certain wattages, what are they and what do they mean? thanks.

[a96710]

RMS basically means what it handles (or puts out for amps) continuously. Ohm is the impedance.

[sc0rch]

yeah he knows what impedence is.....


The different ohm rating of a sub basically determines how flexible the wiring is going to be....and it helps when choosing an amp


say you have a 4 ohm sub.....but your amp does more watts at 1ohm......you will not get full power from that amp because you cant wire the sub down to anything other than 4 ohms.......

but if you have dual 2 ohm voice coils on the sub you can wire it down to 1 ohm.......


it's all a about wiring....

it helps when you have more than 1 sub also......say you have 2 single voicecoil 4ohm subs....you can wire the subs down to 2ohms and get more power from the amp....usualy a normal non 1ohm stable amp will do more RMS @ 2ohms than 4ohms RMS

but more than likely it will rate at a higher power at 4ohms bridged

so say you have an amp that odes 175x2 @4ohms RMS
and 250x2 @2ohm RMS
and 525x1@4ohms bridged