car amp power supply

**fuctup** · 11-03-2004, 01:19 AM

i was just thinking, car amps, at least good ones, will have fully regulated power supplys, which put out 12v right? and accept 10-14v or whatever, could these be used in car PCs anyway?

just thought id throw this idea out there, maybe some of you with more know-how could play with it, i could harvest some good amp power supplies cheaper then a opus, which i dont have extra $$ for at the moment

**Nic** · 11-03-2004, 01:48 AM

i dont think there is much regulation, most amps will tend to put out more power at 14v than 12v which to me indicates there isnt much regulation, the circuitry can just deal with this range of voltages

the itps can accept 10-14 volts and regulate it, car amps arent made to cope with the voltage dip at crank just like the ITPS, which is why most people use something like the opus or the carnetix INSTEAD of a crappy itps

as far as i know good car amps usally step up (rather than step down) the voltage in order to get a decent amount of power to feed the speakers (can anyone verify this i cant remember where i heard it?)

**Rob Withey** · 11-03-2004, 02:46 AM

Correct. To get more power out of an amp you can bridge it (to get a effective 2x voltage swing), or increase the driver voltage, which requires more supply voltage, hence the step up power supply.

**fuctup** · 11-03-2004, 02:52 PM

actually, high end amps have fully regualted power supplys, and are rated at 12v, cheap amps, most amps, are rated at 14.4v and usually put out less power then rated. also why unregulated amps need power caps