ESP Logo  Elliott Sound Products Project 23   Power Amplifier
Clipping Indicator Design By Rod Elliott - ESP Updated 05 May
2005  Share |   At some stage, we will all find ourselves
pushing hi-fi equipment just a little too hard, and if lucky,
will just find that the sound has become "dirty". If this
happens too often or is too severe, tweeters are the first to go
- they are damaged by the excessive power generated by a
combination of "power compression" and the harmonics created
when an amplifier clips. The same may well happen to one's ears,
but the effect is much more subtle (and cannot be fixed !).  One
of the problems is that short duration clipping is very hard to
detect by listening alone, but is still capable of causing
damage - especially to tweeters, and it does nothing for the
sound quality.  What is needed is a simple and reliable way of
detecting that the amplifier is clipping (or so close that we
have no margin for error). Well, search no more, because here it
is.  Design Considerations  Many cl