First things first, Im new to this audio stuff so I just had a few questions about what to get and what ill need.

What im looking into is getting new speakers, an amp, and eventually a sub or two. I got the Sony L410X reciever...http://www.radiomancaraudio.com/deta...UCT_ID=SYCA400
. Now my questions are, I was looking online at some speakers and I was wondering whats the difference between 3-way and 4-way speakers? what does 3/4-way mean?

After searching around id figure id get 4 new speakers(2 front and 2 back) dont know what brand I should go with. Im gonna get an amp around the 500-600watt range. But also dont know what brand I should get.

Eventually I plan on getting subs but not quite yet. But I want to plan ahead of time so what kind of amp would I need to run 4 speakers and 2 subs? BTW i want this system to pump lol.

So any help would be greatly apreciated. Or a site that has some of the basics about car audio would be good. I read the tech articles on this site and they helped a lot. Sorry for all the questions lol . Thanks

 

the12volt is a good site to poke around for basic ideas. http://www.icixsound.com is a good car sereo form as is the sounddomain forum.

The difference between 3/4 way speakers is the number of drivers a speaker has. A 3 way will have 3 drivers (woofer, midrange, tweeter or woofer, tweeter, super tweeter) and a 4 way will have 4 drivers (woofer, midrange, tweeter, super tweeter). I wouldn't obsess over it very much. Most 4 way speakers out there (and even some 3 ways) use a passive tweeter (meaning it doesn't have anything driving it - the vibrations from the rest of the speaker push it along) or a pretty poorly constructed one. Most sound quality competitors usually run 2 way or 3 way speakers along with subs.

Before you buy any speakers on the net, go out and listen to them. I did this when I was shopping and it was defiantly worth the time. It is true that you generally get what you pay for with the higher end stuff ($500+), but the stuff in the $100-$300 price range can be surprising (a $150 pair of speakers can sound better than a $250 pair). The way something sounds is pretty subjective, so your opinion might differ from all the reviewers raving over a speaker on the net.

As for the amp, decide on that once you know what kind of speakers you want. You're probably best off picking up a two or 4 channel amp to run your main speakers off (depending on whether or not you’re willing to bridge them and lose the ability to adjust the front/rear fade) and another amp for your subs. There are amps out there that are 4+1 (four channels plus a sub channel), but they're generally not as good as buying two seperate amps.

 

Ok ive done some more researcha nd this is what I have found. Will this work for what im looking for? Are these good quality components?

-Pair of 6x9's - Kenwood KFC-6989ie 3 way speakers
http://www.cardomain.com/item/KENKFC6989IE

-Pair of 4x6's- Kenwood KFC-4675 2 way speakers
http://www.cardomain.com/item/KENKFC4675

-Wire kit? have no idea wich one to get, plan on putting all new speaker wire in. Any suggestions wouold be great

-Amp- Kicker KX650.4 (Possibly a renewed one?)
http://www.cardomain.com/item/KIC04KX65042

Will this amp allow me to eventually bridge it onto another amp? Im planning 4 speakers on this amp then eventually 2 subs on another amp.

 

Cool, thanks for the info. I went to best buy the other day and I liked the sound of the kenwoods. and they dont seem to be overly expensive or anything

 

If the speakers sound good to you then that's all that really matters

As for the wiring, you can get a harness for your headunit at best buy. Just walk around to their install bay and ask for one. They're around $10. You're going to need to install new speaker wire because of the amp. I prefer monster cable (mainly because I can buy it locally when I need it). It costs $40 for a 50' spool of 16 gauge. You can run whatever speaker you feel like and it shouldn't impact sound that much.

As for the amp, it should work fine for you but you're going to have to use filters on the headunit side for high/low pass.

 

my headunit is already installed, it was installed when i got the car so i dont need an adapter. but do i still need that filter? and where can i find these? thanks for the help gummie

 

The filter is something your headunit should be able to do (without checking up on your sony). Most amps have a high pass/low pass filter on them, meaning that they can filter out all sound above or below a certain frequency. Because you want your subs to only play your low frequencies and the main speakers to only play the higher frequencies, you can't use the amp's filter (I'm pretty sure kicker only has one filter on this amp for all four channels, but I could be wrong. I know that JL has two filters on their four channel amp).

If your headunit doesn't have the filters built in, you can buy an external unit.

Ignore this whole rant if the kicker does have the ability to apply a different filter to channels 1/2 and channels 3/4

 

One last question. What gauge speaker wire should i get?

 

16GA is good, the thicker the better (to a point). if you are gonna spend 600 on an amp i would spring for good thick cable. and run a good THICK cable to power/ground your amp as well.

also, if you can, spend the extra time/$$$ to wire the power wire on the oposite side of the car from the speaker wire/RCA cables.

::note, if you know alot about electricity don't bother reading this next paragraph::
the RCA preouts that go from your headunit to your amplifier are a low voltage wire. they just contain the signal. the power wire is also kinda low in the grand scheme, but contains alot more amps. which means more current ingeneral. this current creates an electromagnetic field. if you have a signal wire close to it that electromagnetic interfearnce will seap onto your audio signal wire, it's slight backround hum will be amplified along with the rest of the audio by your amp and you will be able to hear your engine (alternator actualy) through your speakers. this can be very detrimantal to your "bumping sound". the only other option is a shilded audio cable. but that would be realy expensive. also i am not sure if they are made.

have you thought about where you are going to mount your amplifier?

also, if your amp does indeed only have one filter for all four channels you may want to consider getting a seperate amp for your subs. this is a good way to go i think because it makes the entire system more flexible and scalable. my current deck has HPF and LPF. the HPF is only for the deck amped outs. the LPF is for the preout only. it's prety sweet. now if only it still worked......

 

I was planning on mounting the amp in the back, by the spare tire. And Im using one amp for my speakers, and in the future im going to buy a sub or two with another amp for those.

 

Best Buy sells an entire amp kit with everything you'd need... if you're planning on having subwoofers later on I'd recommend getting the "dual amp kit" which contains power and ground wires, remote wire, 2 sets of dual-twist RCA cables, fuse holder w/fuse and plenty of speaker wire to run to all 4 of your speakers in the car. The only other thing you'd need would eventually be another set of RCA cables to run to a 2-channel amp for the subwoofers. The reason you need 2 sets of RCA cables would be so you can fade forward and backward and balance left and right. If you're not worried about that you can just use 1 set of RCA cables and put a Y-splitter on each RCA before they go into the amp.

 

I'm not even going to begin correcting the rest of your post for basic errors, but this one specifically is not true. Even the cheapest cables from Radio Shack are shielded which basically ends your statement above.

 

Ok, thanks for all the help guys, think i got everything i need now