Posted by Wayne Parham on November 26, 2001 at 16:47:52

In Reply to: Re: maximum power handling of my 4 pi's posted by Colin Fritzke on November 26, 2001 at 12:15:05:

I prefer to use (4) 10-12 watt components in series/parallel to form a resistance that can handle more current without getting hot. Even at low power levels, this is an advantage because the parts run very cool.

As for capacitors, two in parallel adds their capacitance (like series resistors) but the voltage across them remains the same. If you have two caps in parallel, one rated for 250v and the other rated for 400v, the maximum safe voltage is 250v. If you apply 300v across the caps, the one with lower voltage rating will eventually fail.