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A slightly technical question:

How does RMS Power output and Peak power output affects the Sound Quality with same set of speakers?? I have 6" front components and rear 6x9 on tray and going to change my HU. There are no amps or subwoofer and no plans to add one sometime soon.

The current one, Pioneer 7950 has RMS PO as 22 W and Peak PO as 50 W.
The new one that am aiming for, Alpine 9887 OR Blau MP57, has following specs:

Alpine 9887--
RMS - 18 W
Peak - 50 W

Blau Hamburg MP57--
RMS- 25 W
Peak- 45 W

Does this mean that due to lower Peak power output, Blau MP57 will not be able to drive the current set of speakers that well?
Or, in another case, due to lower RMS PO, Alpine 9887 will face same problem?

Can anyone show some light on importance of these factors (RMS and Peak PO) on the sound quality and how does it affects the overall audio feel (for 2 compos and 2 tray oval speakers and nothing else to drive)...

RMS power rating is basically the true measure of the continuous power delivered by the amp/head.

Peak on the other hand is just the amount of power that can be generated for a very very very short negligible time.

A simple test is to run the 50 watts peak from your head and the 50watt RMS from a cheap reliable amp. You will know. On the Head amplification the speakers will start distorting at higher volumes.:)

Hope this helps! Otherwise the guru's will clear it up for you.

RMS (Root Mean Square) power is a better indicator of the power output of the amplifier than the Peak music power. Generally, the RMS power value can be used to compare different amps. Do not use Peak music power to compare, since these values can be exaggerated by the manufacturers. You have not mentioned the ratings of the speakers. If the speakers mention 2 power ratings, then make sure that the lower of these values is equal to or greater than the RMS power output of the amp. Hope this helps !

Why only these to HU's Alpine 9887 OR Blau MP57??

Am considering these two because...Alpine 9887 is the *best*, as everyone here says (though frankly I havent listened to it). And Blau MP57, well, its giving me Bluetooth and USB along with a nice display...so it looks like a good VFM....sound quality should be quite good also as Blaupunkt ain't bad...hence shortlisted these two only...but when i checked the power outputs, my mind gave birth to some apprehensions...:)

How much are you getting them for?

Get a HU,taking into consideration your current setup n future upgrades.Listen before you buy....

The alpine will be at 1 % thd and the blau might be at 5 or 10 % thd.

LBM sir what is 1% thd and what is continuous program power?

1. we love technical questions
2. for the wattage figures RMS is what you should use. Beisdes you need to know % of distortion and freq. range over which the wattage can be delivered.

wattage figures should read as:
10W rms, , 0.1% distortion, 20-20kHz, all 4 channels driven. this would mean that the amp will deliver 10W into each of 4 channels over the entire audible spectrum at distortions low enough to be un-noticeable.

Of course even such figures wont tell you the sonic characteristic of the amp, for that you need that set of SPECIAL measuring devices God gave you (your ears AND what between them).

In few words 1 % thd is 99 % music and 1 % noise.

And in case you are wondering what the acronym stands for, THD is Total Harmonic Distortion. The one-liner by low_bass_makker explains it beautifully.

You havent mentioned what speakers you have or why you are changing your HU. I have a pio 7950 and it has USB as well as AUX input for mp3/phone.

I suggest you add a good 4 channel amp and you will see a vast difference.

Thanks LBM and Blue Thunder, and what is the difference between continuous program power and RMS?

I would consider them as same.