ok completely new to car audio

[PunkAlex]

I know basically nothing about car audio, so im making a nice little thread of my own to ask a few questions.

Firstoff, right now in the camry i got a pioneer cd player (headunit?)...it has 45wx4 on it. I know thats 45 watts, im not a moron, but what can it support 4 of???

Secondly, the rest of my system includes 2 120 watt jensens. Thats it. They were replacements of the rear factory speakers. I cant use the front factory cause all i get is CHSSHSHGHGHGHSHHSSSS outa them. I mean i cant get that great of a sound out of 2 speakers, so im looking into getting 2 more speakers. I figure the higher the wattage the clearer the sound at higher volumes or something? So i was lookin round and i saw 220 watt speakers. If i were to get 2 220's and put the 120's in the front factory spots oculd i do it with just the factory wiring? I mean wiring in the 120s were a piece of cake so i dunno

Thirdly I listen to quite a bit of techno/trance and i want some bass support, so i will need a sub, right? well what in sam hell do i need to do to hook one of those mugs up?? what all would i need? Im clueless as to this!

And please please please dont tell me to do a search...ive been around here long enough to know to search and this is the shit i DIDNT find with a search!

[ArLouJeep]

hey dont feel bad i had to learn from scratch also, first off the head unit that you have is NOT 45 watts by 4,,,,,,,,, that is what they call peak wattage, what you are looking for is RMS,,,,,,, which is what the headunit does consistently, most head units are in the 15-20 watt RMS.

As far as the speakers go............... the front sound like u may have a short in there somewhere,,,,,,,, the rear, 120 watt Jensen are ok,,,,, they ususally come from places list wal mart. The 120 watt means that they will handles 120 watts, if an amplifer is pushing them. the higher the watts, does not necessarilly mean the beter they sound. You will get better sound from an amplifer, and a good set of speakers. I get EXCELLENT sound, from 38 watts a channel ( of course I am using high end speakers).

As far as the bass goes, you can do it fairly cheap, depending on what you want. There are self contained units that contains an amp and sub, you can get these from places from such as www.crutchfield.com.

The best advice i can give you is to find a local car audio shop in you area, and talk to them, they can do just about what ever you want, at whatever price range you want.

Just remember, you get what you play for!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Navy I.C.]

if you want to understand power ratings think if your headunit had a power meter on the front of it. if you played your music at a reasonable level then the meter would hoover around 5-10 watts for each channel. if you were to turn all of your gains all the way up (treble, bass, volume, etc...) then the neddle would hoover around its continuous rating (Rms rating). some freq. like bass notes need more power to produce, so for the split second it takes to produce that bass note your needle will jump to a higher level (max or peak power rating) then come back to its constant level. so your HU's 45x4 rating is max power handling per channel or about 5-10 watts at normal listening with 0 distortion (static). I hope this help you figure out the power ratings

as far as the watts vs sound quality question, there's a number of factors that go into determining a speakers power rating, but it basically comes down to how much heat it can take before it melts, and how much control it's motor and associated structures (cone, spider, voice coil, ect...) maintain as power increase. now thats power handling. sound quality is directly proportional to materials used and craftsmanship. high end companies built their rep on using quality parts for quality sound, while the low end companies skimp on the quality parts and end up with cheaper products. manufactures know the average consumer automatically assumes watts alone = sound quality, so they write the biggest number they can squeeze out of their components (often very misleading) on the package as big as they could to attract customers.

If your getting new speakers (your front's sound blown) shop for quality and not an exaggerated wattage claim. you can tell the better products because their manufactures focus the marketing strategy on the quality of materials used and their craftsmanship, or their R/D and engineering depts.