Old School Clarion Speakers n Mtx Amps....the schnitzel?

[Why So Cereal? 5,000+ posts]

Long story short, my dad keeps talking about how he had S10 with 2 6.5 Clarion Coaxials in each door (not sure which series) with matching 6x9s and a 12" Kicker Solobaric custom built into the center console firing at the windshield. All run on a MtX 4 channel and mtx monoblock He claims that as far as clarity, this setup murders any of mine. So my question is were there some Clarion speakers back around early 90s to mid 90s that were amazing or something? I've heard the latest Clarion stuff and its ok, but not GREAT. and were the old school mtx amps the ish?

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[THATpurpleKUSH 5,000+ posts]

Did you ask him how many systems he had in the past? Or how many others/what he heard to compare? People with their first system will hug it day and night.

 

[Why So Cereal? 5,000+ posts]

Did you ask him how many systems he had in the past? Or how many others/what he heard to compare? People with their first system will hug it day and night.

That was like his 3rd system and he had about 2 after that and still says that one was the cleanest sounding. He actually does have a few trophies in the garage from little local SQ comps and truck shows n what not. From that white S10 and from a black chevy that he said was next to it in SQ. People at our barber shop still kinda hail him as having some of the cleanest systems around. But IDK from my experience with the things he had, I just dont see it being all that great.....maybe he had it was all in his setup....

 

[Z1NONLY 10+ year member]

Keep in mind that speakers used to be more sensitive than today. (Although I thought the solo's were one of the less-sensitive subs of the time)

Once power got real cheap, woofers got real "heavy" to handle the power and generally less sensitive.

My first "good" subs were Cerwin-Vega 12"s and they were something like 98db 1w/1m. Of course their power handling was no where near the subs of today. But then they didn't need much power to get loud

 

[Why So Cereal? 5,000+ posts]

He's referring to the SQ tho. He admits I've had louder setups.

 

[Z1NONLY 10+ year member]

It was in reference to the amps. But you were probably inquiring about the SQ on those too.

 

[Why So Cereal? 5,000+ posts]

It was in reference to the amps. But you were probably inquiring about the SQ on those too.

oh ok i got ya. yea thats probably why they worked for him. Didnt need much power.

 

[Why So Cereal? 5,000+ posts]

from my experiences with him, when listening for SQ in cars he tends to listen to the tweeter the most (which is pretty important but no more than anything else IMO). He doesnt really focus on midbass as much as I do. He wants to hear the "ticks" and cymbals n stuff and also female vocalists when they hit and hold those high notes. I guess he likes a bright tweeter. I do kind of like a brighter tweeter than some people but i also like pretty strong midbass and a tweeter that doesnt cause fatigue or "run people out of the car". Maybe we just have different listening preferences. As for the others around here who say his systems were super clear maybe they have the same listening preferences he does......

 

[Why So Cereal? 5,000+ posts]

sooooo...no magical Clarions???

 

[cablguy184 10+ year member]

from my experiences with him, when listening for SQ in cars he tends to listen to the tweeter the most (which is pretty important but no more than anything else IMO). He doesnt really focus on midbass as much as I do. He wants to hear the "ticks" and cymbals n stuff and also female vocalists when they hit and hold those high notes. I guess he likes a bright tweeter. I do kind of like a brighter tweeter than some people but i also like pretty strong midbass and a tweeter that doesnt cause fatigue or "run people out of the car". Maybe we just have different listening preferences. As for the others around here who say his systems were super clear maybe they have the same listening preferences he does......

Sir ... to truely answer this question, sounds to me like you need to look up the aspects of sound quality to get a idea of the way car audio was judged back then ...

TOTALLY different than the way is is today ... TOTAL system Car audio ... not just how loud the system will go ... Old schoolers want the system to match in every way from 20 to 20k htz ...

sooooo...no magical Clarions???

yes ... old school drivers made in america were alot more dynamic (to me) and built with more pride than most drivers built today (from a sound quality stand point ... not SPL) ...

 

[Why So Cereal? 5,000+ posts]

Sir ... to truely answer this question, sounds to me like you need to look up the aspects of sound quality to get a idea of the way car audio was judged back then ...TOTALLY different than the way is is today ... TOTAL system Car audio ... not just how loud the system will go ... Old schoolers want the system to match in every way from 20 to 20k htz ...

yes ... old school drivers made in america were alot more dynamic (to me) and built with more pride than most drivers built today (from a sound quality stand point ... not SPL) ...

sounds like you think im referring to SPL. I'm not. Our argument was that his system was supposedly cleaner sounding than any of mine.

 

[cablguy184 10+ year member]

Do you compete sound quality ??

Is you system tuned for sound quality ?? Have you tuned your system through RTA ??

your signature does not show your head unit ... are you using time alignment and/or processing ??

If so, I'm almost sure he didn't ... It may or may not have sounded better, just different ...

Then again, I'm just educated guessing here Sir ...

 

[gunz4me2 10+ year member]

The OG Clarion Pro Audio line was pretty good for its day and the first 2 generations of the Solobaric subs were excellent from a Sound Quality standpoint.

I can't comment on the MTX amplifiers from a sound quality perspective because I never ran them myself. I can comment on them from a rock solid standpoint because one of my friends who blew up just about every amp known to man back in the day actually had his MTX amplifiers last more than a year. He always had a knack for pushing the impedance boundary. If the amp said 4 ohm bridged mono stable, he took that as a suggestion and ran it at 2 ohms mono.

As for why the old gear sounded cleaner than the new stuff, well that can be due to a variety of things. Most modern vehicles have consoles along with other things that block the pathways from the locations of the drivers to one's ears. Heck, one thing I noticed about my current vehicle is that it has an extra resonance at 250 Hz and I am guessing that is due to the console. In fact, that is one of the cuts on my parametric EQ to tame that extra spike in frequency response.

Then again, the OP's old man can be going through his nostalgia phase where he feels that old school gear is better. I went through that phase with amplifiers a few years ago myself and I found old school high end amplifiers to be no better than the high end amplifiers offered today.

 

[audioholic 5,000+ posts]

Nope, Clarion didn't make stand-out speakers back then. Their comp sets were decent, their subs were mediocre. Clarion's claim to fame back in the 90's was electronics. They made some of the best h/u's, made solid amps EQ's and crossovers. I ran Clarion decks back then, but wasn't at all interested in their speakers. I still have a Clarion deck from mid to late 90's that I keep around as a back up deck, Id put its sonic performance up against almost any new school deck these days.

Oldschool versus newschool speakers. Seems this topic has come up a lot lately around here. And I keep reminding people that Hoffman's Iron Law plays a large role in why sensitivity of subs has changed so much in the past decade or two. With watts getting so much cheaper, its a natural progression that speakers will become less sensitive. Cars are getting smaller every day, so enclosure space is getting more and more valuable, while watts get cheaper. So again looking at HIL, if watts get cheaper while space available gets more valuable, the only reasonable expectation is that manufacturers will build less efficient subs that work well in smaller enclosures.

But that's only talking about subs, not comp sets or mids, midbass and tweeters. There are plenty of highly sensitive speakers on the market today. Sure there are more high power handling comp sets than there use to be, mostly due to the price of watts going down, but not all of that power increase is by making heavier, clumsier mids. Cooling potential has gone up a lot by using things like better frames (cast alum versus stamped steel), higher excursion potential (pumps more air through the motor), and more sophisticated motor designs that concentrate on improving cooling.

MTX amps were solid back then. The Thunder series were quite popular and performed well.

The Kicker Solobaric was the first sub I ever saw that was designed and marketed to work in small boxes (was their claim to fame when they were new). It was the first step towards the lower efficiency, smaller enclosure using subwoofers that we now see so commonly. Yes, they sounded good too, especially for their day. But Im from the school of thought that newer subs have some pretty exciting new technology on them that subs of that era simply didnt have access to. More advanced motors that improve cooling, lower distortion (BL optimization most notably) and increased displacement potential (higher xmax). Its pretty easy to find a sub these days that can outperform an original solobaric. Even by today's standards they were/are a solid performer, but not a stand-out performer, and certainly no where near the top of the performance list.

Long story short, my dad keeps talking about how he had S10 with 2 6.5 Clarion Coaxials in each door (not sure which series) with matching 6x9s and a 12" Kicker Solobaric custom built into the center console firing at the windshield. All run on a MtX 4 channel and mtx monoblock He claims that as far as clarity, this setup murders any of mine. So my question is were there some Clarion speakers back around early 90s to mid 90s that were amazing or something? I've heard the latest Clarion stuff and its ok, but not GREAT. and were the old school mtx amps the ish?

You cant compare two system like that, especially when one no longer exists to reference, and only discuss brands being used. If his system really did 'murder' yours, it wasn't from the brands being used, it was from the install. If yours gets murdered, or actually murders his, its from the install. You both appear to have/had solid equipment, and imo its obvious that the biggest room for improvement (or failure) was in the install.

Your dad's install had some things going for it, and some potential problems, if Im going to judge only by the very brief description about it that you gave us here. First, small vehicle (S-10). Its tough to fit a 3-way in an S-10 and get everything right. They are small, not a lot of leg room. And, we dont know how your dad's front stage was mounted. Did he use the stock dash locations, firing up at the windshield, for his tweeters? If so, not a good sign. Did he use kick panels? Was his 3-way run active, with the 6x9's running as dedicated midbass? Or were the 6x9's another fullrange driver? The center console, assuming it was built well, it still lends itself to the concern over motor noise.

Id also have some similar questions about your install. I dont know the vehicle, I dont know how your power/xover network is set up, and I dont know how you've mounted the speakers in your front stage. I will say this though, you posses good enough equipment that if your install was done well, and his done not as well, you should have no problem competing against the sonic performance of his setup.

Convince dad to put his money where his mouth is, and build a new system that will 'murder' yours. Invite him to join ca.com too if you want. There's still some of us oldschool guys around that will be able to relate to his memory of what car audio use to be.

Cheers.

 

[Imtjnotu 5,000+ posts]

tell your dad to quit smoking his nostalgia......