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Originally Posted by tkv00
underpowering is what kill speakers, underpowering causes distortion, which is harder to hear from a subwoofer, so your looking to kill it if its underpowered
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most of what you mention here is good advice, but this underpowering myth is crap that, for some reason, gets quoted like the bible:
a brief excursion in electrical engineering, hopefully without too mnay equations or EE-speak:
an amp takes a waveform (music), makes it bigger but proportionately identical, and sends it to the speakers. problems occur if the "speaker level" version of the waveform is clipped (a form of distortion, but not the only type). this can occur if the output waveform (a) exceeds the amp's voltage rails or (b) the amp can't source enough current to the speaker, causing the voltage to "sag". a speaker's displacement is proportional to the voltage waveform it gets from the amp, so when a waveform is clipped, full power (P=VI) is pumped into the speaker, but the speaker is fully extended and immobile. this stresses the speakers structurally and doesn't displace the heat cause by the high power level. generally, this situation is what kills a sub.
if "underpowering" damages speakers, then we all would destroy speakers simply by turning the volume knob counterclockwise.