as of now my gains are set to the max preout voltage of my headunit (just got a dmm the other day), so pretty conservatively. but now that I am going to set them more aggressively with the dmm, i want to make sure not to send a clipped signal to either my mids or subs, but for both, i'm going to be using the full rated RMS of my amps. so my question is: is there any way to know if my amps will be able to do rated without clipping?

if you just have to guess based on the amps, the amps are: a TMA 320.4 (4-channel from JL's entry level brand) and a Massive P1000.1 (at 4 ohms)

no, i don't have an O-scope

You can't see clipping without an Oscilloscope

Scope works great and is the only visible way to see it. For me though i trust me ears and my nose more than anything

Scope works great and is the only visible way to see it. For me though i trust me ears and my nose more than anything

Well I don't know that I'd say that, I doubt your (or my) ears are more sensitive to clipping than an o-scope. But in the absence of the scope I trust my ears pretty well. Maybe not for clipping specifically, bust just that something is amiss. Whether it be clipping, straight overpowering, or distortion of one kind or another.

ok, thats what i thought. and i think those amps should do rated, so i should be ok. I wouldn't be too worried, except that my brother uses the car a fair amount, and he probably won't notice clipping if i set the gains too high.

guess i will need to find someone with an o-scope