ERR Sound Commander, not that loud

@gunrunnerjohn posted:

I personally wouldn't push the amplifier on the RS Commander that hard.  While they have it running a 4 ohm load, the power dissipation goes WAY up, over twice what it is for an 8 ohm load.  That tiny chip can't really dissipate well over a watt without significant heatsinking, and it has none.  You're playing with fire running this with a 4 ohm load.

John,

It appears that this thread focus' on speaker ohm's.  The new ERR railsounds I am installing has a 8 ohm 1 watt speaker.  The Atlas Dash 8 (2005) I am installing it in has a 8 ohm 2 watt speaker in the belly fuel tank.  What is the effect of the 2 watt speaker compared to the 1 watt supplied with the kit on the sound board?  Will it drive the sound board harder, maybe causing it to over heat or will it be easier on it?  Thanks.

Frank

No.  There is no change in loading.

Power is not drawn.  That is, it's not pulled from the audio amplifier.

Instead it's delivered (pushed) by the amplifier.

Therefore a 2 watt speaker can accept more power than a 1 watt speaker can but it will not automatically draw it.

Mike

The thing you want to look at is the efficiency of the speaker if you're worried about volume.   In an interesting twist, with the Lionel Legacy H10, we discovered that the RS-Lite board has a thermal limiter on it's outputs, if you drive it too hard, it cuts the audio.

@Mellow Hudson Mike posted:

No.  There is no change in loading.

Power is not drawn.  That is, it's not pulled from the audio amplifier.

Instead it's delivered (pushed) by the amplifier.

Therefore a 2 watt speaker can accept more power than a 1 watt speaker can but it will not automatically draw it.

Mike

Mike,

Thanks. I guess my choice of terms was incorrect. I get that the amp pushes, I just don't want to have the sound card work too hard. The 2 watt value is what I didn't understand. Now that I understand it's the max amount that the speaker should take, I am good.

And as John indicated, it's about the efficiency of the speaker to use the power. I am not concerned about loudness as that is fine. I just did not want to overwork and fry anything.

Thanks to you both...