My speakers sound like mud...

[MusicJunky11 10+ year member]

The stock speakers in my 02 Sierra crapped out so I bought Alpine SPR-17S speakers to replace them. The new speakers sound like crap but I still have the factory HU in my truck. I've read that replacing the HU should improve the sound of the speakers, any truth to this? I planned on doing this anyway, but down the road once I saved some $$$. I also read that hooking the speakers up to an amp would further improve sound, again, any truth to that? Thanks.

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[boomzilla 10+ year member]

an amp will help alot more than getting a new deck.

 

[GAM3OVR 5,000+ posts]

The stock speakers in my 02 Sierra crapped out so I bought Alpine SPR-17S speakers to replace them. The new speakers sound like crap but I still have the factory HU in my truck. I've read that replacing the HU should improve the sound of the speakers, any truth to this? I planned on doing this anyway, but down the road once I saved some $$$. I also read that hooking the speakers up to an amp would further improve sound, again, any truth to that? Thanks.

maybe the system before was running a whack ohm lvls and your say front load is 8 ohm and rear load is 4 ohm = fuxors on the amp

 

[GAM3OVR 5,000+ posts]

an amp will help alot more than getting a new deck.

I beg to differ

S/N ratio on hsi stock deck is prolly as bad as the shit amp

 

[adas Pro Seller]

Yessss new deck will make them sound much better, get a LITTLE louder too.

 

[eharri3 10+ year member]

I put high quality speakers in my truck before off an older HU that probably didn't have much higher output than what many newer factory stereos do. Low volume was fine. If I cranked it even a little bit my speakers popped and distorted something aweful because there just wasn't sufficient volume until you turned it up enough that you were clipping the signal and distorting your sound. Add any bass boost into the eq and it gets even worse, low bass signals can hurt a speaker's power handling. Those speakers you have could handle 100 watts all day long, and I doubt you're even feeding them a quarter of that. That is a huge part of your problem if not the whole thing.

Most really good components need power to make give clear, high volume sound. When I added even a low-powered 35 watt watt amp into my system to feed speakers that needed 80 watts it made a world of difference. I then started giving them 75 watts and they sang.

Do an amp first. An upgraded Head unit might put out 20-25 watts per channel vs. a stock HU's 17-20. Put a 2 channel in feeding those speakers 80-100 watts and you will see a bigger difference.

 

[Louisiana_CRX 5,000+ posts]

at least the speakers sound like mud...things could be worse they could have sounded like shit //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/crap.gif.7f4dd41e3e9b23fbd170a1ee6f65cecc.gif

 

[MusicJunky11 10+ year member]

Thanks for the info guys. I should prob post this under a different category, but seeing as you know what speakers I'm using, any suggestions on an HU and/or what type of power ratings I should look for?

 

[eharri3 10+ year member]

IMHO they'd start sounding decent at 40-50 watts rms, but to get all you can out of them you need to come close to that RMS rating or even exceed it by a tiny bit. Either way I know of know head unit that will accomplish this.

 

[MusicJunky11 10+ year member]

Oh crap...so I have to buy an amp and HU...this project just got more involved...

Thanks again...

 

[eharri3 10+ year member]

If price is a consideration Best Buy has a Pioneer for about 170 with 3 pairs of 4 volt pre-amp out puts. It's one of the best deals I've seen so far for a new in box HU with those features. I love my Alpine but had I seen that before it's what I would have. It's the DEH 4000, IPOD and Blue tooth compatible too.

 

[Etac 10+ year member]

well they probaly need to be high passed.. the speaker is probaly playing frequencies that its not designed too (sub 80hz) if you cross them, with either an hu, or amp, or bass blockers (i suggest the other two before i suggest bass blockers, but these can be very cheap) they will probaly sound alot cleaner... adding an amp will basically make them play louder (yes it will increase SQ but porbaly not the way you're looking for)

the only thing is, if you do add a high pass filter at 80 or so, theyll stop sounding like mud, but you're going to lose alot of bass.. your old speakers were probaly designed to play deeper and to be verrrry efficient... but if you compared them side by side the stock speakers wouldnt touch the highs on your new speakers..

try this out... lower the bass on your HU (if possible) and see if they still "sound like mud"

 

[MusicJunky11 10+ year member]

well they probaly need to be high passed.. the speaker is probaly playing frequencies that its not designed too (sub 80hz) if you cross them, with either an hu, or amp, or bass blockers (i suggest the other two before i suggest bass blockers, but these can be very cheap) they will probaly sound alot cleaner... adding an amp will basically make them play louder (yes it will increase SQ but porbaly not the way you're looking for)
the only thing is, if you do add a high pass filter at 80 or so, theyll stop sounding like mud, but you're going to lose alot of bass.. your old speakers were probaly designed to play deeper and to be verrrry efficient... but if you compared them side by side the stock speakers wouldnt touch the highs on your new speakers..

try this out... lower the bass on your HU (if possible) and see if they still "sound like mud"

You'll have to pardon my ignorance here because a lot of this is new to me, but, I installed component speakers with a crossover. Shouldn't the crossover do that?

 

[GearGuy2001 10+ year member]

The crossover sets the point where the music switches from the woofers to the tweeters, you still would have to set a low cut out point (75hz ish)

 

[MusicJunky11 10+ year member]

Ohhh...thanks!