450/4v2

R.I.P.S. – Regulated, Intelligent Power Supply

Summary:
The remarkable R.I.P.S. System ensures consistent power delivery over a wide range of battery voltages and load impedances.

Detailed Information:
R.I.P.S. stands for "Regulated, Intelligent Power Supply" and is a central feature of JL Audio's 'Slash' and HD amplifiers.

"Regulated" means that the power supply adjusts its operation so as to maintain the amplifier's rated power output and low distortion operation over a wide range of vehicle voltages (11V-14.5 V). This contrasts with conventional, "unregulated" power supplies, which allow rail voltages to sag in direct proportion to drops in the supply voltage. This can result in significant power losses when battery voltage decreases, even if those voltage dips are short in duration. This manifests itself audibly as increased distortion. With a JL Audio R.I.P.S.-equipped amplifier, the rail voltage and clean power output remain completely stable in real-world systems, resulting in superior fidelity and stability.

The "Intelligent" portion of the R.I.P.S. System is a circuit that actually monitors output current to optimize the amplifier's output power over a wide range of load impedances (1.5 ohm to 4 ohm per channel).

Conventional amplifiers are designed to produce optimum power at a particular impedance (2 ohms, for example). When asked to run above that impedance (say, 4 ohms), these amplifiers lose power (half their power from 2 ohms to 4 ohms). This will not happen with a JL Audio HD or 'Slash' amplifier because the R.I.P.S. System detects the actual impedance being driven and adjusts the amplifier's operation to deliver optimum output. The entire process is seamless, automatic, and results in incredible dynamics for satellite channels and consistent power output for a wide range of subwoofer configurations. It also takes into account the real impedance of the system, rather than relying on often inaccurate assumptions based on a speaker's rated impedance.

The bottom line: Optimum power, at any impedance between 1.5 ohm and 4 ohm per channel, at any vehicle voltage between 11V and 14.5V.

Advanced Rollback Protection

Summary:
JL Audio's exclusive Advanced Rollback Protection circuit monitors the amplifier's thermal condition and adjusts amplifier operation to eliminate annoying amplifier shut-down events.

Detailed Information:
Should a JL Audio amplifier equipped with Advanced Rollback Protection reach an unsafe operating temperature, a special circuit rolls back peak power output, without changing gain, until the amplifier cools down to a safe operating temperature. The red "Thermal" LED will light to indicate this condition has been reached. Once the amplifier cools down, the circuit restores full peak power output and the red "Thermal" indicator reverts to its normal state. The operation of Advanced Rollback Protection is inaudible in most cases, but it ensures that your music keeps on playing, even under the most demanding conditions.

Absolute Symmetry Class A/B Circuitry (U.S. Patent #6,294,959)

Summary:
Patented Absolute Symmetry Class A/B output stage delivers amazing fidelity with extremely low distortion over a wide range of load impedances.

Detailed Information:
At a time when many manufacturers are passing off crude Class B amplifiers as Class A/B designs, JL Audio engineers focused on taking the already excellent fidelity of true Class A/B designs to an even higher level.

Until now, the accepted approach for building high-fidelity Class A/B amplifiers has been to utilize "Complementary" output stages, which use different types of transistors to "push" the speaker and "pull' the speaker. The problem with this approach is that true "mirror-image" transistors are impossible to create, leading to asymmetrical clipping behavior. The negative side of the waveform runs out of voltage (clips) before the positive side does.

Another approach is to use the same type of transistor for both push and pull but without buffering from the load impedance. This solves the problem of asymmetrical clipping, but leads to significant increases in distortion as load impedance drops, making this design less desirable (in our opinion) than the "complementary" approach.

JL Audio's Absolute Symmetry™ amplifier design solves the entire issue once and for all with a revolutionary Class A/B circuit that employs identical N-Channel MOSFET transistors for push and pull with true buffering from the load impedance. This is accomplished via a patented circuit that reverses the operation of one of the transistors in each pair to achieve absolute power symmetry and extremely low distortion over a wide range of load impedances.

Some might call this sort of thing "a tad obsessive", or even "unnecessary". Our position is "If you can't make it better, why bother at all?"

RealSink™

Summary:
Vertical, cast alloy fins effectively dissipate heat, without resorting to noisy fan-cooling.

Detailed Information:
Most car audio amplifiers rely on big lumps of metal that do a good job of storing heat, but not such a great job of getting rid of it. RealSink™-equipped JL Audio amplifiers feature real cast-alloy heat sinks with vertically-oriented fins. This design is far more effective than the lump-of-metal approach, utilizing the physics of convection and radiation to more effectively exchange heat with the surrounding air. The design of these heat sinks was refined through extensive finite-element analysis, resulting in amplifiers that keep their cool under the most demanding conditions.