brands to buy or not to buy?

[Swonder67]

I really like my Kenwood head unit

2 JL audio 12" subs, which I also loved

MTX Blue thunder 10" sub, which I liked

and an Alpine V12 Amp which I LOVED!!!!!!

[SPLThunder]

I have a sony head unit which isnt to bad but i dont like the 2v preouts.
it was on sale
I Own 2 power acoustik 12" 2000w woofers and they are powered by a 1800W power acoustik amp. All of it is the farenheit models. They sounded real nice in a sealed box but i blew the seals open. I am almost done with a new ported box with more reinforcements than necessary. I dont know if it will win competitions but it will blow everyone on my block away. I really want a 12" MOFO but i have no room for it
It looks as if the gothic series amp is what they replaced my farenheit with. and they didnt have class d amps when i bought my stuff.

[Gusto222]

Originally posted by ACCSlvCivic
Ok, for those of you who are wise.. tell us how good the: head unit, subs, speakers, and amps are for each of these companies. this is for newbies and for people who are just not sure.

whats up w/ tha enclosure in yoru sig-- taht some off tha hook equipment--- ORION - Eclipse -- Great COMBO!!

[AudioHead]

Dam out of all your posts no mention of ALPINE!!!


Good stuff


Also Try this new Co. called Memphis Their Amps or DOPE!!


oh and of course Kicker's new solobarics

[GSteg]

Originally posted by AudioHead
[B
Also Try this new Co. called Memphis Their Amps or DOPE!!

[/b]

Memphis isn't exactly a new company

[AudioHead]

yeah yeah true...but when you've been out of the buisness for 4 years they're new.

[eag36]

Originally posted by ACCSlvCivic


Also, someone give a quick rundown on THD.. what good and bad numbers are. OHMs.. what good OHM numbers are to run at.. (ex 4x80w @4 (RMS) ohms vs. 4x100w @ 2 Ohms (RMS) etc..)

Also maybe explain RMS vs. Max output?

i would explain it all but i am still learning a lot.. i have a long way to go..

thanks for replys

Ok,

I've been away from the details of audio stuff for a while, but this is what i remember.

RMS stands for "Root Mean Squared" wich i never fully understood but it is basically the power that the amp could run at all day. It's also called continous power rating. This is the number you should be concerned with when buying an amp. The peak watts is what the amp will put out for a very brief period... like a bass "thud" without frying all of its circuit, but it will overheat if it puts out the "peak" watts for very long.

THD... Total Harmonic Distortion... is a measure of the ammount that the amp will alter the signal when it's working at it's "RMS" wattage. In other words, For a THD rating of 0.01%, if you were to measure with an oscilliscope or "draw" on a graph the audio signal going into the amp from the deck and comming out of the amp to the speakers... there would only be a 0.01% change in the two signals. Basically anything below 0.05% is inaudible. And you won't find many amps that have THD ratings higher than this.

Along the same lines as THD is the Signal to Noise Ratio. If you're ever listening to a CD and between tracks you have that backround noise... especially noticeable if the car is off. This is where the signal to noise ration comes in. It's measured in dB (decibles) and the higher it is, the better. For example... for an amp with a rating of 105 dB... you can listen to music up to 105 dB without haveing any of the backround static noise in there. This number isn't so important for everyday music listening because if your music is above 105 dB you aren't going to be able to hear the backround static noise anyway. But general rule of thumb... the higher the rating, the higher the quality of amp.

Just some other facts for amps... If you can find out what voltage the RMS and Peak power output were tested at, you will know better how it will perform in your car. Some brands such as U.S. Acoustics test their amps at 12.9 volts. Your car generally runs somewhere between 13.6 and 14.4 volts. Therefore you can assume that when you put the amp in your car you will actually be getting a little higher power ratings at the higer voltage. Kicker and Blaupunkt test at 13.8 volts. Brands such as Rockford Fosgate, MTX, Alpine, Pioneer, Profile, Sony, Visonik, Kenwood, Bazooka, Audiobahn or Jensen actually test their amps at 14.4 volts. So unless the alternator in your car is actually charging at 14.4 volts, you won't be getting the power that they say they can produce. Normally if you find that an amp is rating their amp for a lower voltage then they aren't trying to sell it based just on the power, meaning it might.... might be better quality... not necesarily.

In terms of Ohms and impedance, this is just saying what your amp can power in terms of number of speakers hooked up or how you wire them. Ohms are a measure of resistance. The higher the Ohm rating, the more resistance there is. Most car speakers are 4 ohms. You can get subs that are DVC 4 ohm and therefore you can wire them either in parallel to create a 2 ohm speaker or in series to get a 8 ohm speaker. Most amps when not bridged are 2 ohm stable, and 4 ohm stable when bridged. This means if you have a 2 channel amp that you wanted to dive a subwoofer system, you could either buy a single voice coil, 4 ohm sub and bridge the amp, or you could buy two Dual Voice Coil (DVC) subs that are 4 ohm, and wire them in parallel to make each one 2 ohms and then put each sub on it's own channel. This can get very complicated wen doing multiple sub systems especially off of one amp. If you care to know the formula for determining what the total load seen (impedance) by the amp is for multiple subs or DVC subs, here it is:

If your speakers are wired in series... all you do is add them

so for 3 - 4 ohm speakers wired in series:
4 + 4 + 4 = 12
Therefore your impedance is 12 Ohms.

For 3 - 4 ohm speakers wired in parallel:

( 1/4 ) + ( 1/4 ) + ( 1/4 ) = ( 1/X ) where X is your Impedance or total ohm load. In this case it turns out to be 1.333.

I hope this made sense.

[zippeay]

Ok anyone like Polk? Didn't see anything on them, I have 2 coaxle front speakers and 2 in the back with 2 Polk tweets. I'm not all the into stereo stuff but I know they were way too damn expensive.

[eag36]

yeah, i like em, but i wouldn't pay for em

[Ace$nyper]

I'm not a big audio head (only got the front 2 speakers) but i want the back i have polks up front really happy with them and a JVC mp3 player 200watt 50x4 that i just love i know it's not the best but it's good for me i was thinking 2 more polks for the rear i heard JVC dies after like a year is this true?

[Audiobahn45]

in your guys opinion what company has the best OVERALL products?

[Audiobahn45]

I like Audiobahns subs and amps but I like the panasonic head units.

[audi&benz]

In my experience:

Alpine and Pioneer head units are good

PPI and JL subs are good too

Boston Acoustics component sets are good

PPI and Fosgate amps are good.

This is just what I have owned and know is good stuff. My

[Modus Operandi]

I've heard alot of good stuff about Eclipse but no personal experience.

Oh yeah I definitly like my Panasonic Head, but i'd like to know how the touch screen panasonic head's hold up?

[mjshort18]

go for kicker i have had great experience with them. they have great subs great amps and great everything. kicker all the way.