If you're referring to me, I know who Eclipse is. I'm using their 7002 headunit right now and my roommate used to exclusively use their headunits. I just don't want to give advice on amps that I don't have any personal experience with. I don't have any personal experience w/ CDTs, but I'm recommending that he audition them because they sound like Dynaudios and I have a System 340 in my car and I really like how they sound. If the lower end sets sound close, then it's worth giving them a chance at a fraction of the price.

 

Rearfill is preference. When your rear speakers are open to the trunk, they will distort from the compression of the subwoofers. So unless you design enclosures for them, they will distort. Not all that stupid is it.

Any woofer is tunable by box design.

 

I hope that's not directed at me. Eclipse is far from top of the line car audio. I will put my Alpine DVA 9861 up against even the mighty Eclipse CD7000 with all it's fancy bells and whistles and whimpy 24bit DA converter. I love my Alpine with it's 32bit DA converter and BBE sound processing, laser pickup that plays even the most scratched CD's I own, and simple classical Alpine look. I may not have GPS or a fancy display but IMHO, the Alpine DVA 9861 is the best audiophile quality headunit one can buy for a reasonable price (under 700). All the great headunits (Alpine F1, Nak CD-700II, and McIntosh) are in the upper 800 to over 1200 dollar range.
If you even remotely think that Eclipse is "top of the line", think again. There are things out there that are far superior to Eclipse. Alpine F1 series, Nakamichi CD-700II headunit, Focal amps and speakers, and McIntosh amps are just a few high "HQ" products out there. I'm all about HQ and could'nt give a damn about high "SPL" products. Eclipse may be fine for the casual music listener but for a musical fanatic like myself, Eclipse is second rate equipment and does not impress me in the least.

 

Maybe if you have some serious SPL's going on in your trunk but I don't, I hate high SPL woofers. The Infinity Kappa Perfects are more of a HQ woofer and don't produce that high of SPL levels and therefore don't "distort" the Focal coaxial speaker. Now, if I did have high SPL woofers, like a set of JL W7's or Earthquake SubZero's, then I would mount just a set of tweeters in the rear deck instead of a coaxial speaker. If you mount just a tweeter, like a set of MB Quarts PTE 25 1" tweeters, in the rear deck then there is no woofer part of the speaker for the high SPL level to "distort" like there would be on a coaxial type of speaker. If one wanted to run a coaxial speaker, then building and enclousre like you stated would also work. It takes serious Sound Pressure Levels to distort a good set of coaxial speakers like the Focals. I never thought I would have to explain this to people that have a background in car audio.

...and for your second little statement, why don't you read up on the Infinity Kappa Perfect DVC woofer with it's adjustable Q here http://www.infinitysystems.com/caraudio/product.aspx?ProdId='KAPPA+PERFECT12DVQ'&Ser=KPE&C at=SUB. No sh^$. Yes you can build different boxes and tune speakers but the Kappa Perfects are different, the woofer itself can be tuned for different style boxes (sealed, ported, bandpass).

 

as far as infinity, i dont care for them personaly. So they have an adjustable woofer, Id rather purchase a woofer designed for the enclosure i prefer.

Tweeters in the back... I think you're kind of reaching here. And mb quart tweets at that.

The point to my statement, was that you're ignorant if you believe its "stupid" to use a front stage only, when the idea of car audio is to represent an in car concert. Have you ever been to a concert with speakers behind you?.

 

Whatever man, who told you that the idea of car audio is to recreate what goes on at a concert. I can't believe you are trying to compare what goes in a car to what goes on at a concert. Let me take for example one of my favorite bands - Metallica. I've seen them 3 times and believe it or not "live" music is different than "recorded" music. Live music is not broken down into "left and right" or "front and back" as recorded music is. At a concert you are hearing all instruments and vocals played as is with no stereo seperation so it does not matter how the speakers are placed. Also at a concert they are usally playing for a large amounts of people so yes, the speakers are on the stage facing out towards the crowd. Also, music at concerts like Metallica, are played at such loud levels that it really don't matter if the speakers were in front, behind , or on the sides of you. You are going to hear the music the same as long as the speakers face you and are not turned around away from you. It's just easier to set the speaker system up on the stage with the band. It would be impractical to set the speakers behind the crowd. Now, in a recording studio music is broken down into stereo seperation. Different instruments come from the left, right, front and rear channels. Songs like "One" by Metallica start off with a hellicopter and different battlefield sounds. In my car you can hear the chopper blades start at the front left speaker and systematicly travel around the car going to the front right then the rears and back up to the front. While the hellicopter is going on I can hear different machine gun and mortar blast comming from various front and rear speakers. I can also hear the battlefield cries comming from all around me also. When Metallica plays "One" live, there is no stereo seperation - all the sound comes from in front. A well set up car system should sound like you are in the center and the music is "around" you, kind of like a surrond sound system. If your theroy was correct cars would only come with front speakers but cars do come with rear speakers because a front and rear sound stage is needed to propperly experience recorded music.
You say I'm "reaching" by suggesting just tweeters in the back? I would like to hear your explanation of why that's considered reaching. I've installed a few high SPL systems in my day using big Zapco amps and Earthquake woofers and we used the MB Quarts tweets with absolutly no problems. Once again, if you would read up on that particular part number from MB Quarts you will find that the tweeters come with an electronic crossover and are 1" titanium tweeters, they give a very full and rich rear sound stage when paired with the right amp and crossed over correctly. Also, if you feel a company like MB Quarts is no good, I want to hear what you think is better. Personally, I go for companies like Focal, MB Quarts, and Alpine F1 series for my high and midrange choices.
Lastly, most woofers can go in either a sealed or ported box. The Infinity is the only woofer that can be optimized to take advantage of the different style boxes. I'll take for example the JL W7, it can go in either a sealed or ported box but the woofer itself can't be adjusted to take full advantage of either. If you have never heard the Infinity Kappa Perfect DVC woofers, don't comment on things you have no idea about. Personnaly, I don't comment on products unless I have first hand experience with them.

 

lol, I guess we all have pretty big egos and are quick to jump to defend ourselves, me included.

Anyway, I didn't really read all of the arguments above, but if you compete in SQL car audio competitions (USAC, IASCA, etc), you'll find that the competitors do try to get the soundstage to come from directly in front of you, around the front half of the hood.

That being said, I prefer the soundstage to be right around the plane of my face. I had my friend helping me tune my friend's stereo in his evo and kept wanting to move the soundstage forward, because he used to compete, but I told him that George would probably want the surround sound feel, since it was a 5.1 surround sound system after all. A lot of aspects of car audio are personal preference.

 

I'm done with this. To the starter of this thread - listen to the experts, go with a 2channel amp and just have a front soundstage, forget about having rear speakers because you know, the inside of your car is just like attending a full fledge concert with live music. According to the experts, that's the way it's supposed to be. Who am I to argue. Also forget about the brand names I suggested - go with Eclipse all the way.

 

Why not a JL amp instead of the Eclipse?

 

i had cdt hd briaxles in my old cl there amazing. as for sub what kind of music do you primarely listen to and how much space are you willing to lose?

 

rear speakers are for people who don't have good enough speakers up front...

- your music is two channel
- when you go to a concert, the band does play from behind you!!!
- don't get a 4 channel amp, spend the same money and get a better 2 channel one.

so why speakers behind you?

anyway... I like the CDTs, I like your amp, I even like your headunit (but prefer eclipse). Alpine sucks, it's not the 90s anymore, they're just a brand name now.

for a sub I would go with a JL 12w6V2... I have one in my evo and love it. make sure to give it 500rms or better.

pictures of my install if you're intersted: http://www.nyssan.org/gallery/main.p...=359&g2_page=1

 

back to topic,

which CDT components do you guys advise? There are so many versions across wide price ranges!

 

Make sure you check into the Focal components too. Not gonna get into any of the my equipment is better than your equipment war with anyone but Focal makes a damn good speaker. Everything from the axis series to the berrillium series are good stuff. One amp that does it all and right would be the JL 500/5 Gives you the power where it counts. The new alpine headunits are only ok (excluding the F1 status stuff). They are focussed more on multi-media than the total sound experience (again excluding the F1 status). Ecliipse products are still great so you can't loose with them. Shop around and try to find stores where you can listen to the product. I personally like Focal components, JL amps and subs, and Alpine multimedia headunits because a good overall sound with great ipod controls and navigation is important to me. To each his own and good luck.

 

I'm just going to add a few comments.

I never saw a "whimpy" 24 bit DAC and I doubt there ever has been a human that can hear the difference between a 24 and 32 bit DAC. Especially since evry CD you play is recorded at 16bit unless it is a magical head unit that can remaster a CD when playing it.

Nak had about the highest defective rate of any head unit manufacturer I've ever experienced. They came and went in the car audio arena many times. They never committed to the category or properly supported their products.

McIntosh was 100% Clarion. You can still get their 120db S/N ratio super CD player as a factory option in Subaru Legacy's in Japan and Europe since Clarion is trying to unload the last of them. A 16 bit Cd player has a S/N ratio of 96db and even this head unit can't improve the original recording.

Should we go into how meaningless THD is?

Eclipse was the best sounding product "YEARS AGO" They committed to having
the best sounding radios and they delivered with excellent preamps and the best source impedance in the business. Those are the specs that matter than you don't normally find on a spec sheet amongst the bullsh!t. Their 10 year quality mission statment expired and these days Eclipse is just chasing market share and trying to be Pioneer.

Any Head unit with a crap DSP or BBE, preset sound fields is just putting junk in there to try to hide the fact that it sounds like crap. The original Eclipse's did the opposite and you could defeat the simple bass and treble controls.

 

This thread is going to get closed soon

Everyone needs to stop flexing their muscles and give this guy advice he can use. All he asked for were recommendations on front speakers, an amp, and a sub.

Don't get me wrong, I agree with a lot that has been said, but it's not what the original poster was asking for, and it's not leading anywhere constructive.

I agree with the Focal recommendation. If I didn't already have Dyns, then I'd get Focals. What's your price range for everything?