Quote (premo1985 @ Sep 15 2015 11:51pm)
false. aftermarket speakers need to be amp'd
your stock speakers are a measly 30 watts probably. adding aftermarket speakers that are higher wattage , lets say 150 watts rms. your new headunit will only put on 20-25 watts rms per channel . they will sound like shit.
get a amp for them and dont ever run aftermarket speakers off a stock head or a aftermarket head. they will crackel and distort at higher volumes, ive heard aftermarket speakers sound 100 times worse than stock ones because they wernt getting enbough wattage to them. and your trying to crank out as much as you can from your headunit which will clip the signal and eventually overheat your coild on the speakers and ruin them.
This guy doesn't know what he's talking about.
I do suggest getting an amp for your speakers but you won't clip the signal as long as you keep the ohm loads reasonable. And with the high tech equalizers these days you won't ever have distortion as long as you put your high pass filter and lows/miss/highs at a reasonable level.
When I tune my systems I put the volume on the headunit at about 3/4 to 4/5 volume then turn the mids highs and lows to where I like em. Then I turn the subwoofers on and adjust the amp from the same volume.
If you get a headunit with a 7 or 9 band eq you can get super crisp sound without an amp on you speakers. Just don't be expecting the mid range bass you get from your stock system because you won't get it without and amp since headunit only put out 25-35 rms.
Alpine makes a small compact amp you can connect to your headunit (if it's alpine) to boost the powrr output to around 55rms. If you don't want an extra amp in your trunk.
Like I said before pm me for more questions.