I ordered some 4x6 and 6x9 Infinity Kappa speakers and a Panasonic reciever with a regular 50Wx4 amp. I know with this setup my speakers will be underpowered, Im planning to get a multi-channel amp soon. But I am kind of confused about the impendence rating like 2ohm and 4ohm... what does it mean? the kappa speakers have an impedence of 2 ohms and I dont know what the reciever has but I thought If you have 4 speakers then you should have 4 ohms and 2 speakers with 2ohms or something... I dont know. Can someone clear this up?

 

Just wire one speaker per channel on the headunit. Headunit amps are not designed to be wired at less than 4 ohms. Just so you're aware, you're probably only getting about 15-20W RMS out of that headunit per channel, so don't get your hopes up.

 

at first i thought u meant u had a 4 channel amp. Then loads would be an issue. But with a head unit whatever you feed it it will take.

infinity kappa are good speakers for stock location speakers. Good decision.

 

Okay then Ive looked at some mulit channel amps, and Im going to have to make sure that they have 2ohms per channel?

 

What amps do you recomend I buy for my kappas?

 

Ohm is a measure of resistance to electrical flow. Voltage is like the "pressure" that is forcing electricity thru the circuit, and amperage (AKA current) is the amount of electricity flowing thru the circuit. Wattage=volts*amps.

So if u have 2ohm speaker, it has 1/2 the resistance of a 4ohm speaker. If voltage is held steady, 1/2 the resistance will mean that twice the amperage can flow. And doubling the amperage will double the wattage.

Of course, u don't get anything for free. Current flow generates heat. So running at a lower ohm rating means that the amp will have to work harder and will generate more heat. That's why the amp has to be 2ohm stable to run 2ohm speakers (most car amps are). But the extra heat (and reduced damping factor, but that's a little advanced for this conversation) will generate more distortion than if u ran at 4ohms. Also, u'll actually get a little less than double the power at 2ohms, becuz it will be hard for the amp to maintain the voltage when u start drawing more current.

The # of speakers u have doesn't necessarily correlate w/ the ohm load. However, by hooking up multiple speakers to 1 channel, u can change the ohm load that channel sees.

 

What Inifinity Kappa speaker are you talking about only has a 2 ohm load?

 

Infinity Kappa 462.7cfp 2-Way Speaker 4x6 and Infinity Kappa 693.7i 3-Way Speaker 6x9

 

That's interesting - I didn't realize that their new line was made at 2 ohms. If you hook those up to the headunit, I'd be extra careful when they distort, since most headunits don't specify 2 ohm stability. You will get much better sound if you use an external amp for those speakers, considering their power range.

 

When Im looking for an external amp... Should I look for one that specifies 2 ohms? If so which amp do you recomend for the new kappas?

 

what about the Diamond Audio D3 400.4? Its listed at 100Wx4 at 2ohm stability and cost $167 at http://store.yahoo.com/csexpo/d3diaud3carp.html

 

well your gonna want a 4 channel amp therefore youll never split the 2 ohm load into a 1 ohm load. And you can split your rear/front channel better if u decide to get an eq.

 

Or they could use a two channel amp (or the headunit) and run two sets of speakers in series to give him a 4 ohm load