well, its kind of a long story but anyway i ended up with one sub and an amp that i plan on putting in my car. the sub is rated at 120 watts rms and the amp is rated at 380 watts bridged to a 4 ohm load which is probably how i would have it hooked up. would having it hooked up this way be hazardous to the sub? also, how would it effect the sound compared to an amp that matched the sub? im not trying to have anything that hits real hard or anything....just something that gives me some bass for rock music.

 

That 380 watts on the sub is max output.. what is it's rated RMS? since you listed the Subs's RMS rating.. compare those two.. It would only be hazardous if you cranked it.

 

having a lower power rating on any one specific component more or less just means it's only going to get as loud as that particular component is capable of handling/producing. As long as you're below that power limit, the sound quality will be fine.

For whatever reason, there seems to be a big myth that big amps sound better than small amps, which just isn't the case. As long as you aren't approaching the maximum capabilities of the amp, and you're keeping its output in the linear region, it'll sound fine. A 50 watt amp producing a 20 watt output sounds just as good as a 500 watt amp producing a 20 watt output.

 

A bigger amp (electronically not physically) will put out a cleaner amout of signal! What i am trying to say is that a bigger amp will sound cleaner at a lower gain level, than a smaller amp at a higher gain level.

 

the level of noise reduction acquired from keeping the gain a tad lower on a larger amp is inaudible in virtually all cases. Most amps have a noise floor that's FAR lower than that of the signal it's amplifying.

Noise reduction is the only area in which there is even any arguement to make. The actual signal out of a lower powered amp is no different than that of a higher powered amp when both amps are operating in the FET's linear range. Actually, if I wanted to split hairs, I could talk about how THD is actually higher at low power levels, typically up to around 1 watt on typical amps, but on higher power amps, the THD can stay high beyond 1 watt. Since the majority of your music is reproduced with less than 2 or 3 watts of power, it wouldn't be out of the question to claim that a lower powered amp will actually sound BETTER during most listening conditions. But that would be stupid to make that arguement, because it's unrealistic and not likely to ever be audible during normal conditions. Just like a slightly lower noise floor from turning down your gains.

 

just clarifying the amp would be at 380 watts RMS how id have it hooked up, and the sub's RMS rating is 120 watts. anyway, thanks for the help. im going to try to figure out where to mount this thing and then hook it up.