Ignoramus30876 wrote:
100 honest, real, continuous, watts of sound are outrageously loud and
are apt to damage anyone's hearing.

Note how many sound devices advertise "300 watts" of sound, and yet have
fuses that are to blow under much lower power consumption.

TEL me about it! :-)

Some comments on power amplifiers for audio use.

Ratings:
I am not designing for the market place and therefore have
absolutely no interest in inflating power ratings. I rate my
amplifiers in terms of peak power before clipping since:
a) Unlike average power, it is independent of waveform. "RMS
power" is a meaningless concept.
b) all my designs have been capable of maintaining their peak
output indefinitely at any frequency from DC up to 50 or 100KHz.
Clipping level is determined by regulated power supplies and current
limiting for protection.

Back in the mid-60s, a technician working for me was in a band with
his brother. Bro' played bass guitar and wanted an amp. I had
designed a 50 Watt peak per channel stereo amplifier for my students
to build as a lab exercise. (Really got their attention!) I
suggested they use this design for the bass guitar. My tech said
there was no way 50 w was enough so I made a deal: You buy the parts
and build it. If it isn't enough, I will design a more powerfull one
and pay for the parts. This was too good to resist. They bought
special speakers claimed to be suitable for bass guitar use and rated
at 150 W and built suitable enclosures for them and built the amp. At
the first gig, they blew a speaker. They returned it to the shop who
gave them another under warranty. When they blew a second one, the
shop insisted they send it back to the manufacturer before they would
do anything. The manufacturer's response (and I quote) was "What
makes you think you can put 50 real watts into a 150 w rated speaker?"
When they eventually got a speaker system that could take it, they
were quite happy with the amplifier.