I know what clipping of the waveform is. It's where the peaks of the AC signal wave are chopped off and creates a DC current at that point. And to add to my understanding of it, I read Swez's article on it. It's a good guide to avoid clipping and to explain the waveform part of it, but it didn't tell me what I wanted to know exactly. What I want to know is where ALL the points in a system this can occur at are.
For instance, volume control on a HU being way too high. Would this clip the signal before the HU's preamp could send it to the amp? I think it would. If not, then what could do that?
And the amp's gain being set to not allow the full amount of voltage that the HU sends to the amplifier(ex. HU puts out 4 volts, amp's gain set to receive 2 volts). This to me seems that it would clip the signal coming from the HU. Is this true? Does the gain setting on an amplifier have anything to do with it?? The forum moderator of "the12volt.com" said that it does not. But it seems to me that it would.----This is a long story but sumarized, I asked about clipping there and he gave me two "layman's terms answers" and I still didn't get it fully, so he just said that I must be playing a game trying to be funny and wasting his time cause he couldn't believe I didn't get it since my other postings were so well worded, and basically said that someone else must be logging in under my name asking stupid questions like that. He's the main reason I came back here and left there. I percieve that an amp's gain is like a "gate" for lack of a better word(cause he compared it to a valve on a garden hose). Anyway, this gate lets in only what it was set to recieve voltage wise and no more. It took me forever to get it in my head that turning up a gain was actually turning down the voltage level. That's why I'm having so much trouble understanding this.
Anyway, back to business.
Can the amp receive an unclipped signal from the HU, and still manage to clip it before it puts it out to the speakers(assuming of course that the signal made it by the gain setting of the amp unclipped)?? If so, how? I think I understand how a HU's volume control would do this, but an amp doesn't have a volume control.
Also, how can EQ settings being boosted affect it, or can they at all? It seems to me that they could.
I've tried to ask the questions that I need answers to, and then immediately follow with some idea of my own understanding at this point so that you may see what's going on in my head about this. How incorrect am I on my comprehension of it?
One thing I wish to check up on is that the forum moderator on 12volt said that turning a gain control clockwise is reducing the incoming voltage, and counterclockwise is increasing it. Is this true? That is the one thing he said that seems to make sense to me. But it is also what makes me think(along with his example of how it worked) that it can be responsible for clipping as well as other things.
Please help as I am not trying to be funny in any way. I'm serious.
Replies (9)
uochronos on 02/1/2005 18:48:06
ok clipping normaly happens when gain is not properly set on the amp... if your RCA preouts are 2volts then the amp should be set at 2volts.
lets say your gain is set at 1volt and you have 2 volt RCA's well that means at 50% volume your HU is puting out 1volt to the amp and the amp is set so that at 1volt its puting out 100% volume... so once your HU is past 50% and is puting out say 1.5volts the amp can only put out the signal up to 1volt after that the single is cliped off and you get major distortion.
the way i set my amps up and hu is turn the HU to 100% then set the gain to where there is no clipping usualy if i have 2volt preouts i set the amp to just over 2volts say 2-2.3volts somehwre in there... and that keeps me from ever clipping.. then i can play it at any volume wihtout getting a clipped signal..
Chronos
PS
once you add active crossovers, Eq's, and line drivers you haev to set them properly for no clipping too.
audeogod on 02/1/2005 19:04:39
OK, the way I set mine is what Crutchfield said to do. Turn all EQ devices, loud, ect. off. Then turn gain all the way down. Turn up volume until you hear distortion, and then back off a tad until it's gone. Then turn up gain until you hear distorion again, and then also back off until it's clean.
I've never had a problem with this method. I just wanted to know all the ways clipping could occur, and it seemed to me that the gain could play a major roll in it. That moderator first described a scenario similar to yours, but then later said that the gain had nothing to do with it and confused me all over again just when I thought I was about to get it.
So you mean a deck does not output the whole 2 volts until the volume is way up?? That makes sense. So I'm not getting the whole 2 volts to my amp. My volume maxes out at 30, but I never go passed 12 - 13. I might not be getting even 1 volt. Would a line driver be a help to me?
And can clipping occur internally in the amp even if the signal that the amp gets is clean and the gain is set right?
uochronos on 02/1/2005 19:08:59
well the voltage comeing from the RCA's tells the amp how loud and what frequency etc to play at... hence causeing differnt nots and loudness in the song. if it just gave a constant 2 volts that didnt fluctuate you would just get a solid tone that never changed..
there is a bit more to it then that but thats the basics of it... swez does good at explaining this in depth.
Chronos
uochronos on 02/1/2005 19:11:59
the amp does not change the signal is just amplifies it too btw... so no if the amp gets a clean signal and is working properly then it puts out a clean signal. the amp doesnt clip the signal it only knows what ist given...
also you dont want to get the whole 2 volts once you hit 2 votls it playing at max but you risk clipping... like i said i set mine to 2volts and then never play it past 75% volume and never clip... no need to change the gain if your only playing at 12 and want it louder turn the volume to 20.
Chronos
audeogod on 02/1/2005 19:19:23
Well, I would, but it's thunderously loud in my truck cab at 12. I don't think the speakers could handle anymore. I have the dash speakers faded back so the fader says: R - 4. Turn the fader to 0(zero) and the 4" speakers distort badly. The 6.5's can take a bit more, but not much. That's why I was thinking of amping all of my interior speakers a while back. To get passed that distortion thing. I didn't though cause I figured that at 12 the deck probably wasn't distorting the signal it puts out on the speaker leads. Probably the speakers just can't take it.
uochronos on 02/1/2005 19:25:06
well the HU isnt going to clip its amps that get into bad clipping when gain is set wrong... unless its not loud enough for you then no reason to adjust gain..
CHronos
audeogod on 02/1/2005 20:51:55
OK, so when you say the HU isn't going to clip, do you mean that it will never clip....ever.....or just in my particular case with the volume at 12? I would think that it possibly could clip the signal if volume was turned up nearly to max. I heard a few years ago when I was first learning, that about 1/2 to 3/4 was all the volume you could expect from any deck before distortion. In this case, I'm using distortion to describe clipping.
You know how you hear something when you are a newbie, and you think, "oh, I gotta remember that", but you never really comprehend it until years later when you learn a little bit more, and then you think back and say, "that's what that must have been talking about."? Well, that's what I mean when I say 1/2 to 3/4 volume from a deck. I think that must have been talking about distortion due to clipping. I never thought about it until recently, and now it's driving me nuts cause I can't fully comprehend it. That's why I'm asking about it now.
Also, I just saw where you posted about the unchanging continuous tone at a certain voltage. OK, that should have been common sense to me too since the education I had in electronics taught me about the frequency of waves and amplification of them. I could see how a constant voltage would be kinda dull, but the frequency information could still be there. You just wouldn't get SLAMMING BASS!! You'd just get bass. A 40 Hz frequency with no punch cause it wasn't punched up. Is that the way to comprehend that?
I get caught up thinking about the signal and forget to think about it actually being a waveform. I keep thinking that at a certain volume you have a certain voltage put out and it stays at that voltage constantly. But that's just not true is it? Until now, I just thought that the signal was output to the amp at 2 volts only. No more, no less. Don't know why. Just never thought any harder than that on it.
So when you turn up volume, what is it that you are actually doing? Are you just widening the threshold of the voltage output so that it can put out more voltage, maybe even the 2 volts that is it's max instead of just stopping at 1 or 1.5 volts?
gearhead on 02/1/2005 21:23:26
I always thought clipping was an illegal block where a player hits an opponent from behind, usually at leg level.
uochronos on 02/2/2005 02:43:23
a good aftermarkey HU shouldnt clip at least not badly... at least i dont belive so.. i can turn my HU volume to 95% of volume with no distortion.... not that i listen to it that loud hehe but i have turned it that loud without distortion.
i really think i should let swez or someone else explain it better this isnt my place of expertise..
when your turn up the volume it alows a louder signal(higher voltage) to be sent to the amp. at say 50% volume a 2volt preout is putting out 1volt max but the actual voltage varies. giving you the wave and differnt volumes, frequencies, and notes... i dont know how to better explain it.
Chronos
For instance, volume control on a HU being way too high. Would this clip the signal before the HU's preamp could send it to the amp? I think it would. If not, then what could do that?
And the amp's gain being set to not allow the full amount of voltage that the HU sends to the amplifier(ex. HU puts out 4 volts, amp's gain set to receive 2 volts). This to me seems that it would clip the signal coming from the HU. Is this true? Does the gain setting on an amplifier have anything to do with it?? The forum moderator of "the12volt.com" said that it does not. But it seems to me that it would.----This is a long story but sumarized, I asked about clipping there and he gave me two "layman's terms answers" and I still didn't get it fully, so he just said that I must be playing a game trying to be funny and wasting his time cause he couldn't believe I didn't get it since my other postings were so well worded, and basically said that someone else must be logging in under my name asking stupid questions like that. He's the main reason I came back here and left there. I percieve that an amp's gain is like a "gate" for lack of a better word(cause he compared it to a valve on a garden hose). Anyway, this gate lets in only what it was set to recieve voltage wise and no more. It took me forever to get it in my head that turning up a gain was actually turning down the voltage level. That's why I'm having so much trouble understanding this.
Anyway, back to business.
Can the amp receive an unclipped signal from the HU, and still manage to clip it before it puts it out to the speakers(assuming of course that the signal made it by the gain setting of the amp unclipped)?? If so, how? I think I understand how a HU's volume control would do this, but an amp doesn't have a volume control.
Also, how can EQ settings being boosted affect it, or can they at all? It seems to me that they could.
I've tried to ask the questions that I need answers to, and then immediately follow with some idea of my own understanding at this point so that you may see what's going on in my head about this. How incorrect am I on my comprehension of it?
One thing I wish to check up on is that the forum moderator on 12volt said that turning a gain control clockwise is reducing the incoming voltage, and counterclockwise is increasing it. Is this true? That is the one thing he said that seems to make sense to me. But it is also what makes me think(along with his example of how it worked) that it can be responsible for clipping as well as other things.
Please help as I am not trying to be funny in any way. I'm serious.
Replies (9)
uochronos on 02/1/2005 18:48:06
ok clipping normaly happens when gain is not properly set on the amp... if your RCA preouts are 2volts then the amp should be set at 2volts.
lets say your gain is set at 1volt and you have 2 volt RCA's well that means at 50% volume your HU is puting out 1volt to the amp and the amp is set so that at 1volt its puting out 100% volume... so once your HU is past 50% and is puting out say 1.5volts the amp can only put out the signal up to 1volt after that the single is cliped off and you get major distortion.
the way i set my amps up and hu is turn the HU to 100% then set the gain to where there is no clipping usualy if i have 2volt preouts i set the amp to just over 2volts say 2-2.3volts somehwre in there... and that keeps me from ever clipping.. then i can play it at any volume wihtout getting a clipped signal..
Chronos
PS
once you add active crossovers, Eq's, and line drivers you haev to set them properly for no clipping too.
audeogod on 02/1/2005 19:04:39
OK, the way I set mine is what Crutchfield said to do. Turn all EQ devices, loud, ect. off. Then turn gain all the way down. Turn up volume until you hear distortion, and then back off a tad until it's gone. Then turn up gain until you hear distorion again, and then also back off until it's clean.
I've never had a problem with this method. I just wanted to know all the ways clipping could occur, and it seemed to me that the gain could play a major roll in it. That moderator first described a scenario similar to yours, but then later said that the gain had nothing to do with it and confused me all over again just when I thought I was about to get it.
So you mean a deck does not output the whole 2 volts until the volume is way up?? That makes sense. So I'm not getting the whole 2 volts to my amp. My volume maxes out at 30, but I never go passed 12 - 13. I might not be getting even 1 volt. Would a line driver be a help to me?
And can clipping occur internally in the amp even if the signal that the amp gets is clean and the gain is set right?
uochronos on 02/1/2005 19:08:59
well the voltage comeing from the RCA's tells the amp how loud and what frequency etc to play at... hence causeing differnt nots and loudness in the song. if it just gave a constant 2 volts that didnt fluctuate you would just get a solid tone that never changed..
there is a bit more to it then that but thats the basics of it... swez does good at explaining this in depth.
Chronos
uochronos on 02/1/2005 19:11:59
the amp does not change the signal is just amplifies it too btw... so no if the amp gets a clean signal and is working properly then it puts out a clean signal. the amp doesnt clip the signal it only knows what ist given...
also you dont want to get the whole 2 volts once you hit 2 votls it playing at max but you risk clipping... like i said i set mine to 2volts and then never play it past 75% volume and never clip... no need to change the gain if your only playing at 12 and want it louder turn the volume to 20.
Chronos
audeogod on 02/1/2005 19:19:23
Well, I would, but it's thunderously loud in my truck cab at 12. I don't think the speakers could handle anymore. I have the dash speakers faded back so the fader says: R - 4. Turn the fader to 0(zero) and the 4" speakers distort badly. The 6.5's can take a bit more, but not much. That's why I was thinking of amping all of my interior speakers a while back. To get passed that distortion thing. I didn't though cause I figured that at 12 the deck probably wasn't distorting the signal it puts out on the speaker leads. Probably the speakers just can't take it.
uochronos on 02/1/2005 19:25:06
well the HU isnt going to clip its amps that get into bad clipping when gain is set wrong... unless its not loud enough for you then no reason to adjust gain..
CHronos
audeogod on 02/1/2005 20:51:55
OK, so when you say the HU isn't going to clip, do you mean that it will never clip....ever.....or just in my particular case with the volume at 12? I would think that it possibly could clip the signal if volume was turned up nearly to max. I heard a few years ago when I was first learning, that about 1/2 to 3/4 was all the volume you could expect from any deck before distortion. In this case, I'm using distortion to describe clipping.
You know how you hear something when you are a newbie, and you think, "oh, I gotta remember that", but you never really comprehend it until years later when you learn a little bit more, and then you think back and say, "that's what that must have been talking about."? Well, that's what I mean when I say 1/2 to 3/4 volume from a deck. I think that must have been talking about distortion due to clipping. I never thought about it until recently, and now it's driving me nuts cause I can't fully comprehend it. That's why I'm asking about it now.
Also, I just saw where you posted about the unchanging continuous tone at a certain voltage. OK, that should have been common sense to me too since the education I had in electronics taught me about the frequency of waves and amplification of them. I could see how a constant voltage would be kinda dull, but the frequency information could still be there. You just wouldn't get SLAMMING BASS!! You'd just get bass. A 40 Hz frequency with no punch cause it wasn't punched up. Is that the way to comprehend that?
I get caught up thinking about the signal and forget to think about it actually being a waveform. I keep thinking that at a certain volume you have a certain voltage put out and it stays at that voltage constantly. But that's just not true is it? Until now, I just thought that the signal was output to the amp at 2 volts only. No more, no less. Don't know why. Just never thought any harder than that on it.
So when you turn up volume, what is it that you are actually doing? Are you just widening the threshold of the voltage output so that it can put out more voltage, maybe even the 2 volts that is it's max instead of just stopping at 1 or 1.5 volts?
gearhead on 02/1/2005 21:23:26
I always thought clipping was an illegal block where a player hits an opponent from behind, usually at leg level.
uochronos on 02/2/2005 02:43:23
a good aftermarkey HU shouldnt clip at least not badly... at least i dont belive so.. i can turn my HU volume to 95% of volume with no distortion.... not that i listen to it that loud hehe but i have turned it that loud without distortion.
i really think i should let swez or someone else explain it better this isnt my place of expertise..
when your turn up the volume it alows a louder signal(higher voltage) to be sent to the amp. at say 50% volume a 2volt preout is putting out 1volt max but the actual voltage varies. giving you the wave and differnt volumes, frequencies, and notes... i dont know how to better explain it.
Chronos
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