W4S ST-1000, How Loud Should It Play?

Interesting points, Magfan. I note, though, that the FTC power rating shown at the link you provided for the Icepower module is based on the assumption of no external heat-sinking. I'd imagine the rating would be significantly higher if the module were in a well-designed amplifier housing. And anyway, if he were exceeding whatever the amplifier's limit is I would think he would be hearing obvious clipping distortion.

In this case, along the lines of my earlier comment I think the OP may simply be expecting too much of the speaker, in terms of maximum volume. I suspect that the root cause of the problem is simply that it is a small speaker having low sensitivity. And adding more power and/or more gain would just add to the risk that it will be damaged, especially given that it is a 2-way speaker having a first order crossover.

I should add that the calculation I presented earlier for maximum continuously attainable volume is overly optimistic, because it doesn't take into account a phenomenon called "dynamic compression," which (among other things) causes sensitivity to decrease when voicecoils reach high temperatures, as a result of having to handle excessively high power levels.

Regards,
-- Al

Al,
Right you are. And from a personal standpoint, I simply NEVER play my panels loud enough to get 'slap', what panels do when they bottom out.

You also bring up one of the really big differences between commerial sound gear and home audio. Professional sound reinforcment speakers can take the kind of pounding which reduces home speakers to junk.

My ICE amp never gets more than warm to the touch. More a tribute to my moderate habits than any inherent high efficiency. A couple kilos of heat sink would probably really help the FTC power.

Perhaps the DAC has some sort of safety volume limiting feature enabled.

I'm sure the 5V output rating for the DAC-2 is the sum of the balanced legs. I suspect the 2.9V sensitivity for the amp is per leg as well when using the balanced connections. (Kudos to W4S for the sensible sensitivity rating.) Still, I'd expect 2.6V/leg into that amp to drive those speakers way beyond their power handling capability.

when i first acquired my ice power amps, and listened for the first time, i was totally disoriented compared to my prior well reviewed amp, a mf a3cr. i turned up the volume and little seemed to happen other than the music seemed to expand but only seemed slightly louder, similar to what is often described with better tube amps. icepower seems similar to tube amps in regards to how they go louder. its a very good thing actually. i doubt i could find many amps out there capable of driving my ohm 5s to the max like ymy 500w/ch icepower amps do. granted the bc's have a beefed up power supply compared to wyred but most reviews i have read leave me to believe the 2 sound more alike than not.

Are you running balanced or single ended cables?