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[Josh Weitkamp]

Looking at a pair of speakers for a good deal, ratings are 500w "continuous"/1000w "program"/2000w peak.  I understand the 2000w peak means they can handle a momentary peak of 2000w of power.....but continuous and program have always seemed like janky terms to me.  Just wondering what amp wattage you guys would recommend??  I'm thinking of running an amp rated for 1200w to these (per speaker).

[Corey Scogin]

The most common recommendation is to use an amp rated at 1.5x to 2x of the speakers continuous power rating.  In your case, a 750-1000W amp will do fine.  1200W will also work fine and is not significantly different than 1000W.

Can you still damage your speakers?  Yes.  You may want to look into getting a limiter to help protect against accidents and ignorant operators.

[Robert Weston]

It depends on how the speakers are going to be used.  If they are going to be run full range for live music, the 1200 watts should be good (to cover musical spikes - i.e provide some headroom).  However, if the speakers are going to be used as a mid/hi cabinet, the 500 watt continuous rating should be considered the most the cabinets can take.

[Bob Leonard]

It depends on how the speakers are going to be used.  If they are going to be run full range for live music, the 1200 watts should be good (to cover musical spikes - i.e provide some headroom).  However, if the speakers are going to be used as a mid/hi cabinet, the 500 watt continuous rating should be considered the most the cabinets can take.

No, negative. The continuous power rating is the long term rating of the cabinet, all components combined. If you wish to bi amp a cabinet then the rule of thumb still applies but to the long term rating of each driver.
All cabinets will withstand momentary spikes in output. Musical content pretty much guarantees there will be spikes, but how they are handled is the correct answer to the question. If you purchase an amplifier that is only capable of providing the long term power of the rated cabinet, and you never clip the amp, you're fine, your speakers will last forever.
 
If you purchase an amplifier capable of providing twice the long term power the cabinet or driver can handle, you have assured yourself that even those momentary peaks won't drive the amp to clipping and you now have the ability to run the cabinets at full rated output, but not more. Clipping an amp can cause it to develop more than two times the amps rated output, and that's what burns up speakers, not controlled power. And the key word here is control, and control is knowing how much of the available power the cabinet(s) will handle before you destroy them by applying more than the long term rating.
 

[Brian Jojade]

Continuous power rating: The amount of power that a speaker can handle for a long period of time.  Essentially, the speaker can dissipate all of the heat generated as fast as its generated and not burn up.  If you match an amp RMS rating to the speaker's continuous rating, you're relatively safe in saying you can't blow up the speaker, unless you drive the amp into really heavy clipping. ie, a DJ WILL find a way to blow it up.

Program power rating: Typically represented as twice continuous rating. Since music is dynamic, the total RMS power delivered to the speaker is going to be less than the total power.  ie, if you have 1 second at 100 watts, and then one second at 300 watts, the total average power works out to 200 watts of heat that the speaker has to dissipate. By powering the speaker at its program rating, you can effectively get 3dB more out of the speaker, as long as your music has an average dynamic range of at least 6dB.  Unfortunately, a lot of recorded music has a dynamic range even less than that, so setting up a DJ with this setup often results in inexplicably blown up speakers.

Peak power rating: Typically is represented as 2X program power, or 4X RMS.  This is a theoretical maximum amount of power a speaker can handle for a very short duration without damage. Think something like a kick drum. If you had an amp matching the continuous power rating and replaced it with an amp with the peak power rating, you could in theory get the kick drum to be 6dB louder in the mix, as long as you didn't increase the rest of the volume.  Now, peak power rating is never truly defined by manufacturers as to how long, or how often it can handle that amount of power.  Some speakers are far more robust than others, so this has to be used with extreme caution.  You also have to remember that the total average power being dissipated increases with those spikes.  This allows you to squeeze the absolute most out of your system, but any mis-step will result in speaker damage.  If you have an amp matching the peak power rating, and a DJ so much as looks at it, it will blow up immediately.  Use with caution.

[Brian Jojade]

You may want to look into getting a limiter to help protect against accidents and ignorant operators.

A limiter is helpful to protect against accidents, as it will limit the peak power.  However, an ignorant operator can do just as much damage, if not MORE by having a limiter on the system that's set anywhere above the continuous power rating of the smallest driver.  Unless you have an RMS limiter, a normal limiter will end up decreasing the dynamic range of the music, thus increasing the average power delivered to the speaker.  Now the system doesn't get as loud of peaks, and at the same time, more power is getting pumped into the speaker.  The result is faster damage.

[Robert Weston]

No, negative. The continuous power rating is the long term rating of the cabinet, all components combined. If you wish to bi amp a cabinet then the rule of thumb still applies but to the long term rating of each driver.
All cabinets will withstand momentary spikes in output. Musical content pretty much guarantees there will be spikes, but how they are handled is the correct answer to the question. If you purchase an amplifier that is only capable of providing the long term power of the rated cabinet, and you never clip the amp, you're fine, your speakers will last forever.
 
If you purchase an amplifier capable of providing twice the long term power the cabinet or driver can handle, you have assured yourself that even those momentary peaks won't drive the amp to clipping and you now have the ability to run the cabinets at full rated output, but not more. Clipping an amp can cause it to develop more than two times the amps rated output, and that's what burns up speakers, not controlled power. And the key word here is control, and control is knowing how much of the available power the cabinet(s) will handle before you destroy them by applying more than the long term rating.

You are absolutely correct.  The keyword is "control".  Many people don't know how to establish and maintain control of their systems; usually results in burning raw speakers. 

Also, my reference to running the cabinet as a mid/hi was to imply the cabinet was going to be running full-range (using the internal xover), but with a frequency range absent of any bass; not has a direct bi-amped cabinet.

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