Quote Originally Posted by Brianinpdx View Post
KG how is the model# confusing? (shakes head). 500W buddy. Full power at 2 ohms. 500W. Maybe I missed something there, but its pretty straight forward.
Perhaps in this case straight forward is relative. I've replaced enough equipment to know where I want to be in the quality spectrum so when I search/spec amps my search is narrow ... jl, exile, wetsounds, alpine is about it. A quick scroll through sonix electronic, though, showed me many other brands name their amps in a similar manner to Exile.

In this scenario, an Exile 500.1 I would think is going to give me 500 watts to 1 channel (without consideration of ohm load), just the same as the JL 500/1 and the Alpine I have in my boat do. You don't have to "ohm down" to get the numer in the name of the amp.

Outside of this scenario, where it came to my attention, was when I was looking at tower speakers. Harpoon (1000.2) to 4 xm9's is 1000 watts (250x4). Let's step it up and "go big" with dual amps ... 2 Harpoons to 4 xm9's, that gives me 1200 watts (300x2 x 2 amps). The math was frustrating, I got 200 more watts coming from the tower for a perceived 1,000 watt amp added.

What I did not realize prior to my google search is others rate the same way (so my statement goes across most brands, it can be confusing when looking at amp specs, not just exile specs). I did, however, know that real cheap amps will name/rate at max power opposed to continuous power, just didn't realize there was another tier so to speak where amps are named at lowest ohm load opposed to "expected" ohm load or regardless of ohm load.

In summary, if I was quickly comparing amps I would be mislead thinking the 500.1 would give me 500 watts. That is due to what I'd compare it to.