Beretta.net

I've had an amp for a while and haven't hooked it up yet (putting an amp in a broken car seemed dumb). It's 50x4 and 200x1. I'm just wondering what other people are running their systems with. Also, I know 200 is a bit less than ideal (it's actually at the end of my sub's range) and am wondering if any one else is running their sub a bit "underpowered" and if they still like the sound.

400 watts to my 6x9s
200 watts to my 6.5s and tweeters
1,000 to 1,500 (roughly) to my subs

but all that is fixing to change dramatically to this

100 watts to tweeters
400 watts to 6.5s (for midrange and some highs)
200-300 watts to 6.5" (for midbass)
3,000+ watts to subs (gotta figure out what subs before I figure out power for them)
No 6x9s

And I have underpowered subs before. It'll still sound good.

Underpowering subs isn't a great idea. I've heard of people who cause some damage to the driver because they had it underpowered. But then again if the power rating is close to the RMS of the sub you should be fine.

We're talking max or RMS?
Boston FX4 4" in dash 80RMS 160Max (est.) w/ bass blockers
Alpine Type 's' 6x9 in rear deck 50RMS 250 Peak
2x10" Kicker Subs (150RMS Each) run by an Ultimate Amp (350 RMS?)

All numbers are rough just poor memory I'm guessing. They are somewhat low compared to other people's but the beauty about my setup is the balance. Nothing overpowers the rest. It sounds amazing. To upgrade a single part you'd have to do the whole thing.

I was thinking RMS, but you can use max if it makes you feel more adequate...

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EUnderpowering subs isn't a great idea. I've heard of people who cause some damage to the driver because they had it underpowered. But then again if the power rating is close to the RMS of the sub you should be fine.

The sub is rated for 200-500 rms, so I should be ok in that manner. And it was never really my intention to underpower it, it's just a matter of already having this amp and not having the money to buy anohter.

im running 2 kenwood DB+ 12's and 2 kenwood kac-729s (600w X 1) max.  Sounds ok but its coming out, car is dieing, and has been hit 5 times, getting to retitre it.......  really sucks, 90 gt, with a 5 speed, ran goo until about 3 months ago, just started goinmg to s*** all at once, burning oil, missing, and just overall sucking gas

max means nothing.....

gar187er is right, the max rating means complete crap

this is my current setup, as i am a car audio enthusiasts i demand quality

pioneer premier p880prs HU
boston acoustics z6 component set
kenwood 600w amp (100 rms per tweet)
soundstream rubicon 1000 for mids (250 rms per woofer)
orion 2500d (1800 rms to sub)
RE XXX 15" sub in 4.5 NET @ 27hz

all in all i have exactly 2500 watts RMS, keep in mind that continous power not max my orion is capable of over 3000 watts RMS at a .5 ohm load, since i have a stock electrical system i can't push my amp like i want to, the stock 105 amp alternator limits you to 1086.75 watts RMS... THEIR IS NO WAY YOU CAN PULL MORE THAN THAT WITH THE STOCK ELECTRICAL SYSTEM

however, i will be adding a high output 300 amp alt at 15v and a second optima yellow top in the trunk for more power... then i'll be able to run my amp how i want, also i want to say the head lights dim like crazy with my current setup as it is

Hey Decipha, have you done the Big 3 upgrade yet? That should help with the dimming problem.
The stock 105amp alternator can, barely, run a hifonics bx-1500d at 1ohm. Can't really do much more thna that without some problems. Right now I've got a 180amp alternator which is doing great for my setup.

Where you getting the 300amp from? The highest I've seen in CS-130D alternators (for the Beretta) is 250amps. Of course I haven't been checking things out lately, so I may be out of the loop on it.

300 amp @ 15v will come down to about  250 amps when at 14.4....i dont have a calculator handy...moving time...  

techsys... yep i've done the big 3 in all 3/0 gauge... i can't tell you how much it improved anything due to the fact i did the big 3 with my hifonics tx1505d a while back

as for the alt, i was looking at an irragi alt but i've heard bad things about their customer service, i was thinking about fabbing a bracket to add a second alt but the only place i'd be able to position it would be above the water pump, so i'm not too sure what im going to do just yet... how much did you find the 250amp alt for?  do you think we may have enuff interest for a group buy?

Excessive Amperage will build an alternator for our cars. As far as a big enough interest for a group buy, doubtfull.
If you didn't need the A/C, you could put the second alternator in place there, replacing the A/C unit. You could probably put a hood scoop on the car and put the alternators side by side.
Hooking up 2 alternators is not a problem, from what I understand. You'd just parallel the wiring on the plugs going to the alternators. this would still let you use the voltage gauge in the instrument cluster.

If you haven't noticed, I have thought about running a second alt, off and on, for quite a while. I really don't think it would be that hard of a thing to do. I'd want to go with a CS-144 due to it being able to have higher output and run cooler.

Hell, you could change out your factory CS-130 to a CS-144 and, if I remember right, get up to about 400amps. That may be something to look into.

I'm just pushing 140 through my head unit now, I sold my system years ago.  Back in the day I had 4x50 and 2x150 amps powering my stuff if I remember correctly. That's been so long ago I could be wrong though, I know they weren't huge though. My subs were actually considerably underpowered.