Car audio help

[nickanderson]

Hello, I hope this is ok to post here.

I do not know anything about car stereos but I want to make my factory system a little better, I turn the balance to the rear speakers (i have a 4 door mazda 6) and the audio is just terrible in the back, the volume is incredibly low, even when turned up. So I replaced the speakers, but when I plug in the new ones, the audio is still low and terrible. Is this becouse I need an amp? is that what an amp is for?

Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks

 

[Tarrant64]

Not sure whether that is covered in Tech Support or not. Maybe peripherals? Hopefully someone has an answer...because I am thinking about buying a Mazda 6 come spring. this isn't what i needed to hear.

 

[themisfit610]

How big are the speakers in the back? What kind of speakers did you replace the stock speakers with (make and model)

A bit of audio 101:
The amp (amplifier) is the big chunk of electronics that takes an audio signal from the source (cd player), and uses that signal along with the car's 12v power to provide power to speakers. Car CD players have a small amp built in, which is generally plenty for most people. External amps are required if you are running a subwoofer, and will definitely improve the sound quality of any speakers. Most stock CD players have ~ 20 watts RMS per channel, and most aftermarket CD players are ~ 40 watts RMS per channel. RMS means Root Mean Squared. In English, that means the amount of power that the amp can deliver constantly. Often you will see amps advertised as x number of watts peak. Peak wattage numbers are not the same as RMS, and have basically no relevance. So keep that in mind.

Has your car audio setup always sounded like this? If not, that could indicate a problem with the amp in your CD player. I have in my car a Kenwood CD player, 2 Pioneer 6x9" speakers in the rear, and 2 Sony 6.5" speakers in the front. I also have a 120w RMS Pioneer amplifier feeding a Polk 12" subwoofer. I am pretty happy with the sound, though the high end leaves something to be desired when compared to my Klipsch ProMedia 5.1 system at home. The 12" sub is pretty solid though. Note that I do not have a dedicated amp for my main speakers. They are powered through the amp in my Kenwood CD player.

Adding an amp is pretty tricky, and unless you are mechanically and electrically inclined, I would have somebody else do it. Most aftermarket speakers don't need an amp to sound good, but some high end sets definitely do.

 

[nickanderson]

I replaced the rear 6 X 9's with 2 pretty nice infiniti speakers, and there just seems to be bairly any wattage being sent to the rears, even if i put the balance all the way back. Im not sure if this is by design or if there is a problem. Would be an odd problem, I would think it would be all or nothing kind of situation.

 

[themisfit610]

It's definitely not an all or nothing situation. The amplifier in your car CD player is apparently very weak, and doesn't have enough power to drive those infiniti speakers to anywhere near their potential. A good set of 6x9s, which is what most Infinitis are, should make a huge difference in sound quality, maybe even tricking you into thinking you have a small subwoofer.

Infiniti speakers do need more juice than usual. In fact, when they are part of a premium factory sound system in a car, they frequently are installed with a small external amplifier.

I would really suggest upgrading their power source. This can be done one of two ways

1) getting a new CD player with a stronger amp - I like Alpine and Clarion. This will give you (probably) MP3 playback from a CD and on some models from a thumb drive in a USB port. It will also make adding an amp later (for a subwoofer) a lot easier, because it will surely have some preamp out ports, which you need in order to get the best sound out of your CD player to an external amplifier

2) getting an amp for your rear speakers. This will give you really good sound quality from the rear speakers, but unless your CD player has RCA preamp outs, you will have to get an amp that can use "high level inputs", which are the speaker wires that are currently driving your rear speakers. This isn't ideal since this is a powered connection and can introduce distortion. A line level RCA connection from a proper preamp out is the best way. You will also have to run a large wire from your battery, drill a hole in the firewall, run it down the sideboard of your car, through to the trunk to power the amp. You will also have to make a ground connection somewhere in the trunk. It's a little tricky and as I mentioned before, you should have a professional do it if you're not really mechanically or electrically inclined.

~MiSfit

 

[nickanderson]

Hey thanks alot for your time, I learned a bunch! I'll do some research into adding an amp to a mazda6

Thanks again