WTF is the deal with car audio wattage ratings?

[glenn1]

Who the helll came up with the system of specifying what wattage a speaker is? All I want is to buy a couple of half-way decent 6.5" speakers to replace the front speakers in my Acura. I have a Pioneer CD player that says 4x45 on the faceplate, but evidently speakers aren't rated the same way? WTF?

BTW, anyone with a brand/model suggestion would be highly appreciated....

 

[xchangx]

Generally the wattage on the speakers are the MAX (peak) wattage, look for a RMS wattage

 

[Acanthus]

Originally posted by: glenn1
Who the helll came up with the system of specifying what wattage a speaker is? All I want is to buy a couple of half-way decent 6.5" speakers to replace the front speakers in my Acura. I have a Pioneer CD player that says 4x45 on the faceplate, but evidently speakers aren't rated the same way? WTF?

BTW, anyone with a brand/model suggestion would be highly appreciated....

Youre replacing the BOSE spreakers in your acura???? :brokenheart:

 

[JonnyBlaze]

if your not pairing it with an amp, dont even worry about what it says for watt ratings. you should get the ones with the highest sensitivity rating as they will be louder with you limited stock radio's watts

JBlaze

 

[MikeMike]

4x45 means, 4 channels, 45 watts each max power.

which really means

4 channels, 22 watts each rms <--- what you MIGHT get

which only really puts out
4 channels, 15 watts each

just go and find a decent pair, listen to them and then if you like them buy. SQ (sound quality) is really dependant upon your own ear. getting a high end 6.5" mid is not gunna be good, because they only like certain frequencies, and normally require a crossover to play well.

MIKE

 

[Howard]

Most stock head units put out between 10W and 15W RMS per channel. The power rating for speakers is either the maximum power that can be sustained forever, or for a manufacturer specced duration of time.

You can't go wrong with Infinity coaxials/(triaxials, if they have them). But ideally, upgrading both speakers and the amplification is the best way to increase sound quality AND loudness.

 

[glenn1]

Youre replacing the BOSE spreakers in your acura????

The front speaks are going bad I think, lot of crackling, distortion, and ocassionally dropping out altogether. They're the original speakers and about 12 years old, so they've had a good life. I'm not an audiophile or trying to replace them just to get something different, just want to be able to listen to my music in peace. I doubt for the stuff I listen to (Andrea Bocelli, The Coors, Josh Groban, Mandalay, etc) will sound much better or worse no matter what brand speakers I get.

 

[tfinch2]

look at the infinity reference series speakers if you are looking for quality at a low cost.

 

[AlienCraft]

Originally posted by: glenn1
Who the helll came up with the system of specifying what wattage a speaker is? All I want is to buy a couple of half-way decent 6.5" speakers to replace the front speakers in my Acura. I have a Pioneer CD player that says 4x45 on the faceplate, but evidently speakers aren't rated the same way? WTF?

BTW, anyone with a brand/model suggestion would be highly appreciated....

Think of speakers as a light bulb.... It may handle the amount of power listed, but that is the MAXimum it wants to see. An amplifier has the capability of putting out 2 or 3x the rated power, INSTANTANEOUSLY depending on the frequency, which is much different than a continuous output level.
A good rule of thumb is to use speakers with a rating equal to double the rating of the amplifier. This will mitigate Voice Coil Overheating and the Distortion that accompanies that. if the amp say 25 watts RMS, get a speaker that says 25 to 50 watts.
If you have a balanced, accurately rated system, I would then say you could get speakers with 1/2 the rating of the amp, but that would require accurate level setting and an EQ discipline that most car audio enthusiasts do not have.
Pushing the eq knob at 100 hz up 6db will be delivering over twice the rateed power, at that frequency to the speaker. ex. 25 watts RMS + 6db@100 hz = over 50 watts @100hz ONLY (within the "Q" of the passband) Q= slope of eq = adjacent frequencies affected by the freq. being adjusted.

 

[Black88GTA]

You can't just replace speakers in a Bose system with off-the-shelf aftermarket ones. IIRC, most Bose systems use really low impedance ratings in the speakers. I'll see if I can find a link, brb...

Edit: Here's a link. Just googled it up real quick, and it's kind of limited, but it states that most Bose speakers are 1-2 ohms, and aftermarket usually runs at 4 ohms. If you search more, you may find some more in-depth explanations.

 

[BigPoppa]

Increasing the ohmage he presents to the headunit won't hurt it at all. Now decreasing ohmage can.

 

[Black88GTA]

Originally posted by: BigPoppa
Increasing the ohmage he presents to the headunit won't hurt it at all. Now decreasing ohmage can.

True...but the sound will suffer tremendously for it. Higher resistance in the speakers = less wattage driving them. He'd be greatly disappointed when he tried to crank the volume up.

EDIT: Oh, damn, I just noticed he has an aftermarket Pioneer HU. This whole time I was thinking he was trying to replace Bose speakers on a Bose HU. Regular speakers will work fine. Carry on.