Looking at some of the technical specs of today's wireless speakers, one cannot help but be at a loss in trying to compare different models. I am going to explain the term "speaker wattage" a bit more in this article. "Wattage" is one of the most fundamental terms describing speaker performance. However, it is often misunderstood. Some manufacturers also in the past have used this term in a confusing manner to hide the real performance.
Speaker specifications are sometimes hard to interpret since they are not fully standardized. As such it may be difficult to figure out the true performance of the speaker simply by looking at the specs. One good method though is to do a listening test before purchasing your speaker. During this test you ideally want to set up the speakers in a similar environment as your application. Let me now go ahead and explain the wattage rating of loudspeakers.
"Wattage" shows how loud your speaker can sound. Depending on your application, you can go with a small speaker tolerating only a few watts or a larger one tolerating several hundred watts. Many smaller home speakers only can be driven with a few watts power which usually is enough for a small room. If you plan to shake your walls then you obviously want to opt for a speaker that has up to several hundred watts. Please note that many speakers will start distorting the audio once the audio reaches higher wattage. If you want to enjoy low-distortion audio then you may want to pick a speaker which will give you more wattage than you will actually need.
There are two common ways to display speaker wattage. These are "peak power" and "rms power". "Peak power" describes how much power the speaker can tolerate for a short burst. On the other hand, "rms power" describes how much power the speaker can tolerate for a prolonged amount of time without being damaged. In the past, vendors have usually preferred listing the "peak power". This number is higher than the average or "rms" power. However, "peak power" can often be misleading since there is no standard showing the amount of time that the speaker has to be able to tolerate this amount of power.
Nonetheless, while the rms rating will tell you more about the speaker's actual performance, be sure though that the speaker has a peak power rating which is substantially higher than the rms rating. This is because most likely you will be using the speaker to reproduce music or voice. Music and voice signals by nature always fluctuate in terms of their power, i.e. the power envelope of the signal will vary over time. The main reason is that music signals will have short bursts of high power which the speaker has to handle. Rms power is measured with a constant sine signal which hardly compares with a music signal in terms of the power envelope.
Please note that often the peak power that your amp can deliver to your speakers depends on the impedance of your speakers which is typically between 4 and 8 Ohms. An audio amplifier which has a fixed internal supply voltage will have a maximum output signal swing that is limited by that supply voltage. If you are driving an 8-Ohm speaker then your amplifier must deliver twice the output voltage than when driving a 4-Ohm speaker in order to deliver the same amount of power to your speaker. Usually maximum power is specified for a 4-Ohm speaker impedance. However, ideally the manufacturer of your amplifier will tell which speaker impedance the amplifier can drive. Please note that some amplifiers cannot drive speakers with very low speaker impedance.
Speaker specifications are sometimes hard to interpret since they are not fully standardized. As such it may be difficult to figure out the true performance of the speaker simply by looking at the specs. One good method though is to do a listening test before purchasing your speaker. During this test you ideally want to set up the speakers in a similar environment as your application. Let me now go ahead and explain the wattage rating of loudspeakers.
"Wattage" shows how loud your speaker can sound. Depending on your application, you can go with a small speaker tolerating only a few watts or a larger one tolerating several hundred watts. Many smaller home speakers only can be driven with a few watts power which usually is enough for a small room. If you plan to shake your walls then you obviously want to opt for a speaker that has up to several hundred watts. Please note that many speakers will start distorting the audio once the audio reaches higher wattage. If you want to enjoy low-distortion audio then you may want to pick a speaker which will give you more wattage than you will actually need.
There are two common ways to display speaker wattage. These are "peak power" and "rms power". "Peak power" describes how much power the speaker can tolerate for a short burst. On the other hand, "rms power" describes how much power the speaker can tolerate for a prolonged amount of time without being damaged. In the past, vendors have usually preferred listing the "peak power". This number is higher than the average or "rms" power. However, "peak power" can often be misleading since there is no standard showing the amount of time that the speaker has to be able to tolerate this amount of power.
Nonetheless, while the rms rating will tell you more about the speaker's actual performance, be sure though that the speaker has a peak power rating which is substantially higher than the rms rating. This is because most likely you will be using the speaker to reproduce music or voice. Music and voice signals by nature always fluctuate in terms of their power, i.e. the power envelope of the signal will vary over time. The main reason is that music signals will have short bursts of high power which the speaker has to handle. Rms power is measured with a constant sine signal which hardly compares with a music signal in terms of the power envelope.
Please note that often the peak power that your amp can deliver to your speakers depends on the impedance of your speakers which is typically between 4 and 8 Ohms. An audio amplifier which has a fixed internal supply voltage will have a maximum output signal swing that is limited by that supply voltage. If you are driving an 8-Ohm speaker then your amplifier must deliver twice the output voltage than when driving a 4-Ohm speaker in order to deliver the same amount of power to your speaker. Usually maximum power is specified for a 4-Ohm speaker impedance. However, ideally the manufacturer of your amplifier will tell which speaker impedance the amplifier can drive. Please note that some amplifiers cannot drive speakers with very low speaker impedance.
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