M44 owners or Phoenix Gold experts...

[Lowcountrypsulion]

Hey everyone.

When I bought my M44 and first installed it in 2009, I noticed that I was getting signal out of all four output channels - front and rear - with only the front channel RCA inputs connected.

In other words, I did NOT have to have the rear channel RCA inputs connected to get sound out of the rear channels.

Is this normal for the M44? Or does this indicate that there was a modification done to it?

Thanks!

[Eric D]

I think that is normal. My M44s always worked this way.

I think PG used some resistors between the front and rear RCAs, so if you don't connect rears the rear section still gets a signal. If you do connect a rear signal, the power of its input will sort of "override" the signal it was getting from the front.

There is an issue with this though, I would guess. If you are not putting the same signal into the front as the rear (different in actual response, not just level), I would assume the front signal and rear would bleed together badly.

One potential problem could be if you sent a high pass to the rear and a low pass to the front, my fear is the rear could play full range.

[valeks1]

It's normal. PG used switching RCA jack on rear. When you connect RCA cable to the rear RCA jack, middle pin will disconnect front source from rear channels.

[stipud]

It's normal. PG used switching RCA jack on rear. When you connect RCA cable to the rear RCA jack, middle pin will disconnect front source from rear channels.

Wow, that's pretty sweet! I wonder why nobody else does that...

[zeropoint0.5]

http://download.phoenixphorum.com/Manua ... ps/m44.pdf

the M44 manual.....

[ttocs]

I had never heard of that before on those amps or any others. A switchable rca, interesting and cool.

[Lowcountrypsulion]

Thank you for the answers, gentlemen. I feel honored to have received technical responses from both Valeks1 and Eric D as well as Stipud and ttoccs, probably the foremost authorities on all things Phoenix Gold here on the forum. I really appreciate it.

Zeropoint0.5 also inspired me to revisit the M44 manual and, sure enough, there was the explanation of the Internal/External crossover function in item 15 on page six. I thought I only had to toggle that switch depending on whether I was using the internal crossover or an external crossover. Item 15 clearly explains that it acts two different ways, whether or not I had rear RCA inputs connected. That's pretty fucking awesome! Three years later and that amp is still surprising me.

[ttocs]

I appreciate the kind words but I would not put myself in the same class as eric and valeks and this is stipuds site so he has a couple steps up on me as well. Hell I learned something new in this post just like you.

[zeropoint0.5]

I quess the only reason this was made, if you want to have the ability of using the fader on the headunit,

or if you want to use the m44 in a full active system,for example front on tweeters and rear on midrange.

i believe in the outlaw it is the same situation. should check that for sure.

what i do like about the m44(have 2 of them) is when you use them as two channel amp.

front on left, rear on right channel....i love to enjoy the result of that, at 4 ohms.....nice sound !!!!

just for that last reason i refuse to sell them......

[ttocs]

most 4 channel amps have the ability to run off a single input but more often then not there is a switch you need to select to have it sample the first input and use that as the other input. This just saved them the problem of putting a switch in the amp which would have probably been easier, cheaper but not look as nice and clean.