Need some help deciding on speakers

[performance]

Last year I picked up a set of 4 kicker 6 1/2 for another car that I had for about $120 shipped off of ebay. I do NOT recommend ebay for anything. Search google and see who is trustworthy by reviews. Polk and kickers are my choice for a full range of acoustics.You get a better deal if it is last years model vs. the revised edition.

 

[White_knight]

Go with Memphis speakers those r the ones I have on an their great
Bought all 4 for $160

 

[r-rracing]

Get a set of kickers from walmart paid about $80 for all four

 

[dewoof01]

Something I would like to add, after installing my front speakers today in the 99 RS: Your factory speakers are 15w RMS each for the door speakers, and I assume for the rear speakers as well (as far as the non Infinity setup goes). Almost anything you put in will be better than that. The setup I installed today is 40w RMS per speaker, which when doing the math adds 100w to the entire system. For a daily driver, this is plenty IMHO.

Just something to consider

First off i hope you are not saying you replacing the speakers added 100w to the system.

Secondly the rms of the speaker has little if any to do with the speaker quality.

Thirdly 40w rms per channel being plenty means nothing. You could take two amps both rated at that output and one could test with 15w per channel and the other amp with 60 per channel.

Just a little help for the many many misinformed people on this thread.


1. The gain control is not for turning the volume up on the amp. Rather its for adjusting the amp for the input voltage of the signal coming in. Amps do what they should amplify a signal.

2. A 100 w amp with the gain half way up is not producing a 50 watt output. It could produce 100w signal only a third of the way up, its all about the signal coming in.

3. Bose is not a quality sound product, its a good marketing company.

4. Anyone who wants sound quality and doesnt want to use some sort of external amp should not bother trying to achieve sound quality.

5. The wattage rating on speakers means very little. 15w rms speakers could handle 40rms all day long if they were quality. Many good brands underrate their products. The system i am installing right now is rated 100w rms but i will be running almost 200 to them as they requie over 100w to really come to life.

6. Sound deadening, sealing your doors up, making large speaker baffles and sealing the speakers to the baffles will gain you much more sound quality out of a $150 component set than going out and buying a $500 component set. Proper installation is the #1 thing.

7. 200w is not twice as loud as 100w. 1000w is twice as loud as 100w.

 

[bryanwheat]

3. Bose is not a quality CAR AUDIO sound product, its a good marketing company.

I had to change something, bose actually makes some very good quality home audio stuff, but i agree, their car audio stuff is trash. The bose 301, 501, and 601's are some damn good home audio speakers.

One thing i recommend to people who want a good sound is to stay away from cheap speakers that have the tweeter mounted in the speaker. They do not really have a crossover on them, just a high pass filter. This will basically turn the tweeter off until it in it's frequency range. This is good, but there is nothing to cut the woofer off when it starts to get out of range on frequency. I would recommend a set of components with a good crossover. I don't buy off the shelf stuff, i piece mine together and make my own crossovers, so it would be hard for me to recommend you something off the shelf.

 

[dewoof01]

I had to change something, bose actually makes some very good quality home audio stuff, but i agree, their car audio stuff is trash. The bose 301, 501, and 601's are some damn good home audio speakers.

I personally am not a fan of any of their speakers. Their small home theatre speaker systems are an extreme marketing ploy. The price they charge for crappy quality components that are only designed to reproduce midrange is a huge rip off. That being said some of their larger speaker could be ok, however the prices they charge are insane. I could order kits off parts express and spend a day putting them together and for $300 have an amazing set of floor speakers that would blow away their products costing 5 times as much.

 

[llxkevinxll]

I have had great luck with Alpine head units and JL speakers/subs.

 

[bryanwheat]

I personally am not a fan of any of their speakers. Their small home theatre speaker systems are an extreme marketing ploy. The price they charge for crappy quality components that are only designed to reproduce midrange is a huge rip off. That being said some of their larger speaker could be ok, however the prices they charge are insane. I could order kits off parts express and spend a day putting them together and for $300 have an amazing set of floor speakers that would blow away their products costing 5 times as much.

I totally agree, for a few hundred dollars on parts express you could have a set of mains that would be equivalent to a 1k+ set. I also agree that those little small speaker systems are junk.

 

[fredom dsm]

stay away from those speakers! A speaker that runs 125 RMS is not 30 d0llars, like said before save some cash and buy good quality speakers. you'll thank your self later.

 

[jrs187]

if you want some good speakers search ebay for some old school eclipse speakers. They may be old but they will make you one of the happiest people ever. I have purchased some of the most expensive stereo equipment over the last 14 years and thought rockford and kicker were the best. I was wrong nothing sounded cleaner and crisper then my eclipse speakers with the eclipse deck and woofers. I sell RE audio, american bass, kicker, boss, pioneer. this list goes on. But none of that stuff is in my car. I still have the factory speakers in my 93 tsi and sound better then my pioneers in my other car. I do not recommend kicker to anybody that comes to me. I dont want to stoop to the level of walmart. Also what alot of people dont realise is you can spend 10$ on a set of sony's from walmart and if you have the right head unit they will sound just as good as 200$ rockfords. They are both made in china.

 

[DSM_prospecT]

Can anyone tell me if the 97 spyder gs-t came with factory tweeters?

 

[dewoof01]

Can anyone tell me if the 97 spyder gs-t came with factory tweeters?

I can't say exactly but I have a 95' RS that had almost no options at all and when pulled the dash grills there were I'm guessing 2" tweet/midranges in there. So my assumption would be unless the spyder dash is different and you don't have the speakers grills in it a GS-T should for sure have them if a RS does... A buddy of mine had a gst spyder years ago that was a 98 and I recall it having them, but can't say for sure.

Also the stock location in the dash is horrible as it puts the speaker pointing off axis directly at the windshield which gives you all sorts of reflection and staging issues.

 

[97spyderman20]

I can't say exactly but I have a 95' RS that had almost no options at all and when pulled the dash grills there were I'm guessing 2" tweet/midranges in there. So my assumption would be unless the spyder dash is different and you don't have the speakers grills in it a GS-T should for sure have them if a RS does... A buddy of mine had a gst spyder years ago that was a 98 and I recall it having them, but can't say for sure.

Also the stock location in the dash is horrible as it puts the speaker pointing off axis directly at the windshield which gives you all sorts of reflection and staging issues.

i would agree that the dash is not the best location for the tweeters, but there really isnt a great place for them. You can try to do a custom kick panel but thats not the best either. What i did was replace those in the dash with tweeters for my component setup (Infinity Kappa) and kept the 6.5"s in the doors. Mixed with a set of kappa 6x9"s in the back and 2 12" subs the quality is great. I would recommend a ncie 4 channel amp to dial in the interior speakers and a separate one if you do subwoofers. This way you can get all the clarity out of the interior speakers and all the lows from the trunk. No matter the genre of music you like you will love it, because you can hear more than just bass.

 

[mikej84]

I didn't see anyone say anything about power acoustics they are really good I love there products for door speakers I'd go with kicker there new door speakers are awesome not only do they produce nice bass but its also extremely clear and crisp I highly recommend them for a all around system hope I was some help

 

[dewoof01]

i would agree that the dash is not the best location for the tweeters, but there really isnt a great place for them. You can try to do a custom kick panel but thats not the best either. What i did was replace those in the dash with tweeters for my component setup (Infinity Kappa) and kept the 6.5"s in the doors. Mixed with a set of kappa 6x9"s in the back and 2 12" subs the quality is great. I would recommend a ncie 4 channel amp to dial in the interior speakers and a separate one if you do subwoofers. This way you can get all the clarity out of the interior speakers and all the lows from the trunk. No matter the genre of music you like you will love it, because you can hear more than just bass.

Or do what I did which is the best idea by far... make a pillar pods. So can you explain to me how the 6x9's in the back will improve the sounds quality please? The answer is it won't, it will ruin it. We don't have a 4 door car, and there is almost zero point to adding rear speakers to our car as cancellation and staging issues are rampant with rear speakers in a 2 passenger car. The only way you can truly make it sound better is doing like a 6.5" midbass in the rear slow and low pass it at like 400-800 or so and high pass it at like 150 or so and run off the head unit power. That will have a minimal impact on staging and cancellation but add midbass to your overall sound without actually hearing the rear speakers and being able to tell some sound is coming behind you.

For the subs I have had many different setups in 2g's and imo the best placement is sealed pointed up at the hatch glass as you cna get great reflection off the of the glass in the hatch. Ported works as well but I've never been a big fan of ported boxes myself.

 

[91-GS]

Been having some decent results using cheap walmart-brand speakers and an MP3 player wired directly into the amp ("Chopper" or something like that). After some tuning it gave me good sound (ahen turned down, like cruising around in town) and although it was getting distorted at high volume (like when driving home from town) it was not all that noticible since the distortion kinda blended in with the car's noise.
Just re-coiled a Memphis 10" sub, can't wait to put it in a box and in the car. Should be plenty of bass for that little thing.

Edit: One more thing. Some say that in proper car stereo setup sound should come from the front, not the back. If this is true, then upgrading the tiny tweeters near the windshield should bring best results since it seems like they are the ones that can be heared the most and have most clarity since they do not have driver's legs or a seat between them and ears of the driver.

 

[dewoof01]

Been having some decent results using cheap walmart-brand speakers and an MP3 player wired directly into the amp ("Chopper" or something like that). After some tuning it gave me good sound (ahen turned down, like cruising around in town) and although it was getting distorted at high volume (like when driving home from town) it was not all that noticible since the distortion kinda blended in with the car's noise.
Just re-coiled a Memphis 10" sub, can't wait to put it in a box and in the car. Should be plenty of bass for that little thing.

Edit: One more thing. Some say that in proper car stereo setup sound should come from the front, not the back. If this is true, then upgrading the tiny tweeters near the windshield should bring best results since it seems like they are the ones that can be heared the most and have most clarity since they do not have driver's legs or a seat between them and ears of the driver.

No it is not just that they are up front rather its the imaging of the speakers. Lower tones like what the midbass drivers in the doors produce is much less directional than higher times like what midrange and tweeters produce. So thats why aiming speakers like the tweets is so important when the door speakers are not near as important. Ideally for best imaging the tweeters would be a few feet outside the car and over to the side but that is obviously not possible.

 

[91-GS]

No it is not just that they are up front rather its the imaging of the speakers. Lower tones like what the midbass drivers in the doors produce is much less directional than higher times like what midrange and tweeters produce. So thats why aiming speakers like the tweets is so important when the door speakers are not near as important. Ideally for best imaging the tweeters would be a few feet outside the car and over to the side but that is obviously not possible.

I did not know about directionality (or imaging), just thought it was 'cause the glass reflects sound towards the driver. I guess that is why sub boxes can have such crazy designs with subs not even pointed towards the driver and still have nice sound.

 

[joescool2008]

i got this amp 2 weeks ago and it's rediculously awesome http://www.sonicelectronix.com/item_43779_Kenwood-KAC-7005PS.html 5 channel ftw

 

[dewoof01]

I did not know about directionality (or imaging), just thought it was 'cause the glass reflects sound towards the driver. I guess that is why sub boxes can have such crazy designs with subs not even pointed towards the driver and still have nice sound.

Sub Bass is extremely undirectional. However if for example you are pointing the sub at a wall or up at a piece of glass it will get a decibel increase of around 3-6 db by the reflection off of a surface. Try sometime listening to a sub in your car at a medium low volume, but sometimes if you are outside of the car 30 feet away you can hear it louder than it was in the car.

Still the craziest thing to my about sound is the power it takes to make sound. So many people stress about well I can get a 50w per channel amp but I can pay $50 more and get a 100w per channel amp and it will be twice as loud. This is completely false! In fact you will barely be able to notice the difference. You would need 500w per channel to be twice at loud and then that is only a 10 decibel difference. Really what the speaker requires power wise to get it moving good is what matters more when you are talking about small amounts of wattage difference volume is not a real change.

Also when someone has 2 10" subs as I have had in many of my setups in the past people are always "blown away" at how loud 10" subs can hit if they want bass. They "can't eblieve they aren't 12's". This is the stupidest statement made and is made all of the time by people that don't know what they are talking about. Bass has to do with the movement of air. 2 10" subs should blow away 1 12" any day of the week all things equal. Its the amount of surface area of the woofer and excursion of that woofer that moves the air. 2 10" subs with the same excursion as a 12" sub will pound ALOT harder as it as almost 50% more surface area as well as there is approx a 3 decibel increase for each speaker added. And the guy with a 1000w amp to his subs is not for sure goign to be louder than the guy with a 500 or 700w amp going to his subs, there are alot of factors in play that could easier make the guy with the smaller amp louder. I'll shut up now.

 

[AK Maniak]

Sub Bass is extremely undirectional. However if for example you are pointing the sub at a wall or up at a piece of glass it will get a decibel increase of around 3-6 db by the reflection off of a surface. Try sometime listening to a sub in your car at a medium low volume, but sometimes if you are outside of the car 30 feet away you can hear it louder than it was in the car.

Still the craziest thing to my about sound is the power it takes to make sound. So many people stress about well I can get a 50w per channel amp but I can pay $50 more and get a 100w per channel amp and it will be twice as loud. This is completely false! In fact you will barely be able to notice the difference. You would need 500w per channel to be twice at loud and then that is only a 10 decibel difference. Really what the speaker requires power wise to get it moving good is what matters more when you are talking about small amounts of wattage difference volume is not a real change.

Also when someone has 2 10" subs as I have had in many of my setups in the past people are always "blown away" at how loud 10" subs can hit if they want bass. They "can't eblieve they aren't 12's". This is the stupidest statement made and is made all of the time by people that don't know what they are talking about. Bass has to do with the movement of air. 2 10" subs should blow away 1 12" any day of the week all things equal. Its the amount of surface area of the woofer and excursion of that woofer that moves the air. 2 10" subs with the same excursion as a 12" sub will pound ALOT harder as it as almost 50% more surface area as well as there is approx a 3 decibel increase for each speaker added. And the guy with a 1000w amp to his subs is not for sure goign to be louder than the guy with a 500 or 700w amp going to his subs, there are alot of factors in play that could easier make the guy with the smaller amp louder. I'll shut up now.

I am by no means a pro when it comes to car audio but from my personal experience it's not that 10's don't hit as hard it's just that they don't produce as low of base as 12's do.

 

[91-GS]

Sub Bass is extremely undirectional. However if for example you are pointing the sub at a wall or up at a piece of glass it will get a decibel increase of around 3-6 db by the reflection off of a surface. Try sometime listening to a sub in your car at a medium low volume, but sometimes if you are outside of the car 30 feet away you can hear it louder than it was in the car.

Noticed that many times. Is there something to keep that from happening so people around don't get annoyed?

 

[AK Maniak]

Dynamat or any sort of sound deadening material makes a huge difference. It keeps more of the sound/noise inside the car. The same exact system can sound 10x better and louder if sound deadening material is used.

 

[dewoof01]

I am by no means a pro when it comes to car audio but from my personal experience it's not that 10's don't hit as hard it's just that they don't produce as low of base as 12's do.

Completely false. Same thing as a twelve can hit harder than 2 tens. The sub size is not the determining factor here. Box design has MUCH more to do with how low of bass you are producing than the diameter of each sub