Run bass head through power amp to boost signal to cab.

D

Drmr to Bass

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Nov 10, 2016
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#1
Well searching craigslist I ended acquiring some cheap gear. I got a peavey headliner 600 for $30 because it didn't work. Found it had a bad power supply which only set me back about $40 since my brother is an electronic tech. Also acquired an peavey 4x10 cab for $100.

I noticed the peavey head runs 200 watts at 8 ohm and 300 watts at 4 ohms which the specs were misleading about 600 watts. But hey my bass cost more than the whole setup. My cab can handle 700 watts at 8 ohms. I would like to use this setup as its lighter than my current setup. To boost my output power could I run this head through a power amp to the cab to boost my signal to the cab?
 
#3
Noooooo!!!!

Okay, what I mean is, you can’t run the Peavey head’s speaker output directly into a power amp.

However, you can take the XLR out to a power amp and drive the power amp that way.
 
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#4
Sure, run the preamp's output into a power amp. That would work just fine. DO NOT run the speaker output into the power amp's input unless you like breaking things.

The difference between 200 watts and 700 watts is only around 5.5 dB if you ignore losses, so you'll have to decide if it's worth it.
 
#5
Your Peavey 4x10 will not be able to handle 700W of bass frequencies. I’d be surprised if it handled half that. This is not a knock against Peavey in any way, it’s just a fact of a bass player’s life.

Another fact is that, as previously mentioned, boosting power by 500W will not be all that much louder. To get twice as loud you would need to increase power by ten times.

To drive a power amp properly you need a dedicated pre-amp. If your particular amp has an XLR on the back it’s for sending your signal to a PA. The level of the signal will be insufficient for a power amp.
 
#6
Did you have an argument with your electronics tech brother?
Otherwise get him to help you.

600 is a model number. If you automatically believed that meant any form of usable output power then REEEEEALY get your brothers help on all of this. No one is misleading you. You quoted published specs right? I have a Rumble 200 combo. All by itself it is only capable of 160 watts. Fender could call it a Rumble 2000, it still is only is capable of 160 watts

Don't depend on your understanding of advice you get here, no matter how sound the advice.
 
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#9
Using a higher watt external power amp will possibly get you higher clean headroom and a boost in volume. How much those speakers can actually handle, just depends on how you set the eq. With a decent power amp, you can definitely blow the speakers in the cab if you push too much lows. With just the head itself, its still possible to blow the speakers but less likely.

If yoy get a power amp, I suggest finding one with a built in HPF, and setting it for 50Hz.
 
#12
Phe said:
Arise, zombie thread!
I recently bought a Peavey M-3000 monaural power amp. The previous owner had ran his amp's speaker output to it for years, magically it still works. He also encouraged me to do the same, "just use a short guitar cable when you do it". Yikes.
Click to expand...
Don't do it, he just got very lucky.

Just because somebody does it doesn't mean that it's a good idea, he just got away with it.
 
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