Need some advice from the car audiophiles. Here's the set up I've got a Kenwood DDX8017, looking into upgrading stock speakers but don't have the funds to upgrade speakers and amps. Will I be able to power aftermarket speakers w/ a aftermarket speakers w/o an amp. Specifically, I'm looking at the JL audio XR series coaxials for the rear and XR series components for the front. Future amps will be be JL series as well. TIA

 

Yes. Why not?

I drove my Infinity Kappa Components with my Pioneer AVIC N2's 20 something watts for a month while waiting on the delivery of my amps. I had everything wired from the headend to the area I ended up mounting my amps in so that I didn't have to pull the dash apart a second time. When the amps arrived I just used the RCA cables, cut the speaker wire connections and wired them into the amp.

 

It's math.

The Pioneer put out 22 watts (50 watts peak )

The Infinity amps put out 111 watts.

Off the top of my flat head that's about 7 dB more worth of sound - they went from loud to way loud enough. I really don't crank my music as I have to retain my hearing for my job. Exposure to excessive levels of music damages your hearing pretty quickly and forever - I have a disability from the military for ringing in the ears ... it sux.

What that amp will do is allow the music to reach higher levels when it needs to - unless you listen to music from the last ten years or so and then it's pointless - there is no dynamic range to speak of anyways.



Have a look at Orban's web site if he's still got his white papers on the dynamic range of each decade of music up. Ray did too many drugs in the '60's I think but he knows his shat about compressor/limiters/processing and his proffessional broadcast equipment is used in all the top stations. Music producers have been compressing the dynamic range of music about 10 dB per decade until now there's nothing left.

 

I was looking into this today as a matter of fact. I had all my factories replaced and a new head unit installed last month. Today, I went back to the stereo shop and heard my same set up with and without an amp turned on. BIG difference. With the amp on everything sounded much better. I was looking at the Alpine V-12 4 channel, and I think it adds another 75 watts to each speaker. Sounded very good. Next payday I'm looking to do the install.

 

Thanks for the info guys, lots of things to talk about.

 

its more than simple wattage.

most headunits, even good ones (forget what the little sticker says on the face), will usually pull 15-20 watts at around 1 percent distortion...this usually happens at somehwere around 60-70 percent one the volume adjustment, above that, it just clips, sending loads of distortion to what ever sepaker you use, resuling in a distorted sound. also, most headunits's internal amp is not sending out a flat signal, usually with heavy trailing off near the low freq...

this is the reason that when you use a deck to power speakres, they will distort, its not the speakres cant handle the headunit's power, its hte headunit that is sending tons and tons of distortion to them...

a good amp, lets say one rated at 50 watts RMS, just like the headunit's "rate output". will easily be able to do 50-60watts rms at .01-.1 percent distortion, the response is a lot more flat.

there is also the added avantage of having the abilty to high pass the signal to a mid/high speaker, resulting in more control and less distortion at hte speaker level.

the end result is that with an aftermarket amp, your speakrs will simply sound a lot better (not just louder), than if you use a headunit to poewr it.

but, it is no problem to power it iwth your head, just remember there is more improvements to be had when you add an amp, a noticable one