In the context that involve only the JVM410H and a typical 9 V battery-powered distortion pedal, the peak dB gain of JVM410H is 115 dB and the distortion pedal have only 36.1 dB gain.teemuk wrote: ↑Tue Oct 04, 2022 6:49 am What makes you think that peak gain of tube amplifiers is much higher? Please, don't answer that HotBluesPlate said so. Do you have a statistical on this? Isn't a solid-state Ampeg VH-140C much gainier than a tube Magnatone 260 or do I just have clot ears?
And do you think there is a difference if one amp has gain of 20 dB (10x) and clipping threshold of 10 V and one amp that has gain of 26 dB (20x) and a clipping threshold of 20V, assuming both receive input signal of same amplitude? Why might a tube amp with higher clipping threshold aim to higher gain than an effect pedal with lower threshold? It just doesn't make sense...
And continuing on your previous question, how would you make the amplifier know that it must amplify lower input with higher ratio than higher input? Would this imply some sort of dynamically variable, envelope controlled gain adjustment scheme with feedforward or feedback input? And if an amp amplifies lower amplitude input signals with higher gain than higher amplitude input signals will it mean that the output waveform can not be just an amplified replication of the input signal but has "compressed" the peak portions of waveforms, which means the waveform is actually distorted?
What makes the peak dB gain of Marshall JVM410H to be much higher than the peak dB gain of a typical 9 V battery-powered distortion pedal?
The term "gain" seems to be ambiguous. If by "gain" you mean the distorted sound from the overdrive channel, the sound from the overdrive/distortion channel of Ampeg VH140C is more distorted and harsher than the overdriven sound of Magnatone 260. But in terms of voltage gain, not sure. Maybe the Ampeg have higher peak dB gain, but I think you know more about this stuff because I believe you have more experiences in building amps and pedals.
Regarding your second remark about whether there is a difference if one amp has a gain of 20 dB and a clipping threshold of 10 V and another with 26 dB gain and a clipping threshold of 20 V. The similarity between these two amps is that the input voltage is the same, which is 1. But the output voltage/clipping threshold are not the same, so the resulting peak dB gain is also different.
"Why might a tube amp with higher clipping threshold aim to higher gain than an effect pedal with lower threshold? It just doesn't make sense..."
Sorry teemuk, but what do you mean?
"And continuing on your previous question, how would you make the amplifier know that it must amplify lower input with higher ratio than higher input? Would this imply some sort of dynamically variable, envelope controlled gain adjustment scheme with feedforward or feedback input? And if an amp amplifies lower amplitude input signals with higher gain than higher amplitude input signals will it mean that the output waveform can not be just an amplified replication of the input signal but has "compressed" the peak portions of waveforms, which means the waveform is actually distorted?"
I don't think I said the resulting output signal, which is the resulting distorted signal, is no longer the same input signal that is send into the preamp. It is actually the input signal where its amplitude become larger by the preamp and then transformed after the input signal amplitude become too large that it hit the ceiling/headroom.
