PROBLEM*** X200.4

deathcloud · Post by **deathcloud** » Thu Oct 09, 2008 6:38 pm

So I had my music loud and was rocking out... everything was fine... it was clear and loud and not even distorted. I went for a 2 hr drive and at the end of the drive all of a sudden my speakers started wailing like a siren and then i looked at the x200.4 amp and the light on top its a blue one is blinking... the manual doesn't have a trouble shoot so I have no clue. thought i would ask here. Does anyone know what this means? Do not tell me i fried the amp... theres no way...I hope maybe it means a fuse blew? Or something let me know.

thedeal7235 · Post by **thedeal7235** » Thu Oct 09, 2008 6:50 pm

i wish i could help yeah, i have no xperience with those amps, ask bfowler, he knows them really well; if i hadnt lost my job, i was gonna buy that same amp towards end of month(10/30), thats my b-day-

Mackenzie · Post by **Mackenzie** » Thu Oct 09, 2008 6:56 pm

Hmm... Maybe its possible you got a first batch xenon that had that problem.. figured they would be all fixed by now..

dedlyjedly · Post by **dedlyjedly** » Thu Oct 09, 2008 7:02 pm

the flashing blue led indicates a protection circuit has been tripped. I would start throubleshooting the issue by disconnecting the speaker wires at the amp and trying to power it up to see if it comes out of protection. While you have that rubber "end cap" off make sure that there are no loose copper wire strands floating around on the circuit board or shorting out the speaker terminals.

dako · Post by **dako** » Thu Oct 09, 2008 7:53 pm

Didn't you just get that amp the other day? I hate it when the new-gear boogie monster comes out and rears his ugly head. I've had it happen in the past on a couple of frustrating occasions.

Post by **stipud** » Fri Oct 10, 2008 5:23 am

You got it from a store with warranty, right?

Post by **Bfowler** » Fri Oct 10, 2008 8:23 am

it sounds like the speakers took a dump to me....

try using a home receiver on an extension cord and see if they sound fine with that....

i dont really know what could have caused this. what speakers were you using again?

maka78 · Post by **maka78** » Fri Oct 10, 2008 11:44 am

Dude, I got 2 of them from the Houston place... I hope this shit doesn't happen to mine too... so good so far with mine (although I was starting to hear some white noise from one of the speakers at one point, but it's gone now).

deathcloud · Post by **deathcloud** » Fri Oct 10, 2008 12:10 pm

I bought it from a guy in maryland brand new in box. Ive had it hooked up for probably 4 days. I dunno if it comes with a warranty. Id prolly have to send it in to PG. I was running rsd65cs front and rear. I think the amp is going into protect. Just wish I knew why because i didn't change anything, move anything, but I could try it by disconnecting all the speakers and seeing if it still goes into protect. If I disconnect them all and the amp works then im assuming its a speaker that is causing it to go into protect. I will trouble shoot it hopefully today if not 2moro. This blows. It sounded so nice and I was finally in a peaceful bliss. No worries about changing anything else. Finally happy... hasdjfhkasjdfhsajasdf

deathcloud · Post by **deathcloud** » Sun Oct 12, 2008 2:22 pm

Ok so I did the trouble shooting. I took all speaker wires out cuz I thought maybe a speaker was blown causing it to go into protection mode. But with all speakers disconnected and only running power ground and remote, it still is blinking. I then disconnected ALL POWER and ground from both ends cuz its dual and thought maybe it would reset, plugged one side in and its still blinking in protection mode. I think I am roally fucked and need to send it in for repair. ITS A PITY i had the amp for a week..... im gunna give up in car audio i think... such a money pit. im in college i dont need this shit. sorry for ranting. But for real, that things a beast, shouldnt have any problems. im gunna call pg and see as well.. any suggestions?

thedeal7235 · Post by **thedeal7235** » Sun Oct 12, 2008 6:20 pm

when my zx450 did the same thing, i thought it was the speakers, at first, but then , upon putting a different amp in, it was the amp, still has to go back to pg for repair-im gonna call you-

Post by **stipud** » Mon Oct 13, 2008 5:48 am

Sounds like the typical first batch Xenon failure I'm afraid. There were some cold solder joint issues that trip the protection circuit like this. Send it to PG, and it should be rock solid (they went over every Xenon amp that came to them after the first batch). It's very disappointing that you were unlucky enough to get a bad one.

Talk to PG and see what they can do for you.

deathcloud · Post by **deathcloud** » Mon Oct 13, 2008 6:49 pm

Ok will do. Yea I am kind of unlucky but I am lucky I went with this amp. it is such a good amp and just kills all my other friends systems that they think "are loud" yea some of them are loud but they are not as "clean" sounding as mine. I will give them a call 2morrow. In the mean time i will use my Ti400.2 for just the fronts. And at least this time I can use the SLD-44 with it. Should be great. Can the Ti 400.2 handle high voltage like the xenon?

thedeal7235 · Post by **thedeal7235** » Mon Oct 13, 2008 7:07 pm

u can still use ur rear speakers, and ur fronts with this one at the same time, it would drop the impedance load down to 2 ohm stereo( which would equal 200*2, call me

deathcloud · Post by **deathcloud** » Mon Oct 13, 2008 7:20 pm

I will give a holler tomorrow as the amp is with my dad at his house and I am at my house so I have to travel there anyways 2morrow cuz i work with him. Then I can see whats going on, but yea I think i got a bad batch. This sucks though now I end up having to pay a total of 450 bux prolly for this amp because they made a bad batch? I should fight this and say its your guys fault and its like a recall, why should I have to pay for their mistake? Anyone feel me? Does this make sense? Maybe I can fight the price at least.

thedeal7235 · Post by **thedeal7235** » Mon Oct 13, 2008 7:22 pm

what year was it manufactured? did it have a date on it? on sticker? U can ask, but i dont think its gonna help, jmho-good luck

maka78 · Post by **maka78** » Mon Oct 13, 2008 7:48 pm

thedeal7235 wrote:u can still use ur rear speakers, and ur fronts with this one at the same time, it would drop the impedance load down to 2 ohm stereo( which would equal 200*2, call me

I've tried the ti400.2 in 2 ohm load for internal speakers, and it does not sound good at all imo. I def. like it on 4 ohm load when hooked up to internals. Check it out, I'd rather just keep the front two on the TI for now. It makes only half the power of the xenon (100x2 as opposed to 200x4) on 2 channels, but still sounds very good.

deathcloud · Post by **deathcloud** » Mon Oct 13, 2008 7:57 pm

Ok yea it did sound good last time I had it hooked up to the ti 400.2 but it wasn't as good as the xenon 200.4 it was like night and day. clarity and loudness. BUT the xenon 200.4 did have the SLD-44 hooked up to it and my Ti 400.2 has not yet seen the SLD-44 yet so I am wondering how much of a difference it will make on the Ti 400.2 I had to have the gain up at about 3/4 on the ti 400.2 without the line driver so hopefully i will not have to have it that high and it will sound great. I LOVE LINE DRIVERS! I wish i knew about them a long time ago.

thedeal7235 · Post by **thedeal7235** » Mon Oct 13, 2008 8:58 pm

But, did u have the LINE DRIVER last time it was hooked up???

deathcloud · Post by **deathcloud** » Mon Oct 13, 2008 9:37 pm

I got my line driver after i had the 400.2 installed. I never got to use a line driver with the 400.2 only with the xenon 200.4 so I will see what happens.

edit

was wondering if i feed my ti 400.2 10 volts will that hurt it? it says

Input Sensitivity 200 millivolts to 6 volts

does that mean max volts it should be seeing is 6 volts? or will i be fine with 10volts

Post by **stipud** » Tue Oct 14, 2008 6:45 am

It can handle 10.

maka78 · Post by **maka78** » Tue Oct 14, 2008 8:20 am

it won't damage it, but u'll probably be clipping at that voltage. I tried running my x200.4 with 10V and was clipping like crazy. I feel like a little over 8 volts to the x200 was perfect for it. I think right around 6V should be perfect for the TI.

deathcloud · Post by **deathcloud** » Tue Oct 14, 2008 10:37 am

it won't damage it, but u'll probably be clipping at that voltage. I tried running my x200.4 with 10V and was clipping like crazy. I feel like a little over 8 volts to the x200 was perfect for it. I think right around 6V should be perfect for the TI.

well thats weird cuz bfowler is running i think he said 10 volts to it fine and no problems. Why would yours be clipping then? I can't wait for it to be repaired... Calling today and will see what happens. I just wanna bring it to the F&F sale and swap it.

Post by **Rold Gold** » Tue Oct 14, 2008 11:12 am

deathcloud wrote:
I just wanna bring it to the F&F sale and swap it.

I'll bet they'd swap $$$ for a new one at F&F.......

maka78 · Post by **maka78** » Tue Oct 14, 2008 11:20 am

deathcloud wrote:well thats weird cuz bfowler is running i think he said 10 volts to it fine and no problems. Why would yours be clipping then? I can't wait for it to be repaired... Calling today and will see what happens. I just wanna bring it to the F&F sale and swap it.

The signal is not clipped at the line driver, but if you do the calculations at the amp (speaker terminals), you'll see that the amp can't handle that type of an input voltage because it's amplifying the signal too much (acts like the amp is a 400x4 or something like that). You can't lower the gain any more than it already is so you are having a clipped output voltage. This is why the line driver is designed to output anywhere from .2V to 10V - you can adjust it on the line driver itself.

What I did is measure the voltage across the amp's speaker terminal while adjust the gain at the line driver as opposed to the amp (while having the amp's gain at the lowest possible setting).

Example - the x200.4 is supposed to show 28.28V when adjusting the gain using a DMM. If you turn the line driver up to 10V, then your x200.4 is going to show maybe 40V across the speaker terminals, even though your amp gain is at minimum. The only thing you can do now is either set the volume on your HU lower until you hit 28.28V or set your line driver gain lower till you hit the 28.28V.

Either way, you have to lower something to get the amp not to clip. Since you can't lower the amp gain any more, you have to either lower the line driver or the HU volume - I say lower the line driver some and the HU to 5/8.