Looking for some advice on a new speaker amp please!
 

little background for ya, i've got an AVIC-D3 head unit with pioneer 6x9 coaxials in my front doors and 6.5's in the rear doors (remember i'm in a truck lol), running straight off the headunit through the factory wiring harness. i also have a 400peak/200rms amp powering an 8" polk momo sub in a custom box in the backseat area.

having said all that, i've been really happy with my setup for a couple years now. is it perfect? no but for as little money as i have in it, i've been satisfied. now up to date, i happened across a set of polk components, 2 sets of 6.5's with crossovers and tweets, that i've been eying for a while for a song from a fellow clubfrontier member. i'm picking them up this weekend. so now onto the question: what would be a good four channel amp for mid level speakers and tweeters? they are rated at 100rms but i really don't need that much power. i'm looking for somewhere around 50rms @ 4 ohms per channel. i'm using a kenwood amp for my sub right now but i'm not limited to that. i'm looking for good clean sound with good bang-for-buck. i'm not afraid to spend a little more for a lot better sound but i'm also not looking to spend a lot of money on it either. i've seen some that are upwards of $400-500 (alpine digitals for instance). i'm probably thinking something in the $100-200 range if there's anything worth buying in that group.

so, lay it on me! what should i look at?

oh, forgot to ask, should i wire the amp separately? or should i scrap my wiring set that i have now (8 ga) and get a larger lead wire going to a dist block then go to each amp from there?

I would look at a matching 4ch. but thats me i like everything to match. As for the power wire...yes go up to a 4g and then distro off to each amp. The other thing i would look at, and not sure if you'd be interested but selling the amp you have now on the sub and buying a 5ch. amp it would make for a nice clean install and for how much power you want it would work out great! MTX has one A RFL805, JL has one, can't remeber the model number, but it's in their HD line. And i'm sure a few other companies have them, Ayduison does also i think.

yea i thought about doing a 5 channel amp but i didn't notice any that had the power outputs i was looking for. they either had too much going to the doors and too little going to the sub or the opposite. i'll look a little closer when i get to work sunday :)

The Alpine PDX 5 has good output. You could run a 3 ohm component set to get a little more juice to the front if you don't bridge the 4 channels. Run a single 12" sub with two 4ohm voice coils to get your 2 ohm load on the 5th channel.

JL 900/5 is pretty sweet. Or the Alpine PDX5 as mentioned above.

the speakers are 4 ohm tho? and i already have a sub and am happy with it, i don't need a larger one

If you are only running front speakers then check out the Micro amp manufactored by Elf Audio for about $199. I know its an off brand, but its a secret in the Harley Davidson community. You can mount this tiny A/B class amp almost anywhere and its got about 75w per channel. Also, it may be ELF Audio brand but in fact ARC designed and developed it at a much higher cost. Get the Elf unit for about half of what ARC wants.

The amp is just a tick larger than 5x7x2 inches.
2 Ohm stable

Elf Audio page:
elfAudio

ARC Audio page: NOTE ARC actually sells a 4 channel version.
Arc Audio

ACR vs ELF Audio comparison:
Mini Amp Debate..... Elf-Arc guts pics - DIYMA.com

If you are going to go that small I would got to a alpine ktp-445, just hard wore it to your harness and it will work with any head unit. Much more power than the elp which I have never heard of.

i'm gonna amp all four doors/speaker sets. so i need a 4 channel, thanks for the info tho

It is a 4 channel, it produces 45 watts rms X 4 but is underrated and really puts out around 60.

damn that's cool as hell! it'd be a bitch to wire into my harness and there really isn't any room behind my double din (avic d3) to put it. also, i checked a couple sites and it's out of stock. i would have to cut the harnesses up and splice all the wires for my pioneer harness wouldn't i?

It is pretty simple, color coat the wires from your pioneer harness to the one side of the alpine amp the other side foes to your vehicle harness. It will fit in a small opening under where the head unit pocket is. Might be some work but if you do not want a lot of weight or run wires this would be what I would do. What I did for trooper is cut the four speaker wires that go to the front and run new wires from there to the crossover and from there to the new speakers,

there is no room at all under my stereo, it's practically touching the A/C controls (remember, i'm in a frontier, not a Z). and the HU is backed up against the dash support as it is. this would have to go somewhere else behind the dash

There should be lots of room under the dash on the drivers side. I do think you'd be better of with a stand alone amp...cleaner power.

These are stand alone amps just powered threw the stock wiring. I have used them before very clean and loud power.

the reviews that i read from the sites that i saw them on weren't that positive but i always take those with a grain of salt thinking that for every person that posts a negative comment, there's probably 4 positive to go with it, especially when dealing with a more "top shelf" brand (not cheapo's like Dual et al)

I also heard that Alpine inline 45x4 amp was not so great. Its better than stock or aftermarket HU but not by much. No corssover or gain controls. I hope your HU has a built in crossover for it.

Not a problem just a suggestion, they are underrated and head units only put out around 22 watts RMS this is under rated and puts out more like 65 watts rather than the rating of 45 watts rms.

couple options i'm looking at:

JL Audio J2 320.4 4-channel car amplifier — 60 watts RMS x 4 at Crutchfield.com

Kenwood KAC-8405 4-channel car amplifier — 60 watts RMS x 4 at Crutchfield.com

or

Alpine MRP-F300 V-Power Series 4-channel car amplifier 50 watts RMS x 4 at Crutchfield.com

thoughts?

also, i may or may not buy from crutchfield. i have in the past and they are awesome but if i can find it for less elsewhere i may buy somewhere else so i'm just posting links to what i found, not exactly where i would buy them from

I like the alpines great bang for the buck compared to a JL amp. The F300 is what I would go after.

Hey guys, I actually have an Alpine in-line amp and I'm very impressed.

For such a small unit, it is putting out some good power, and sounds great through my Polk Audio db6501 Components.

For such a small price, and such a small unit, I think this is a good choice.
And can easily be removed and upgraded at any time.

Does not require additional power cables and RCA cables etc etc.

Just plug & play, and provides good volume above and beyond what the head unit alone can provide :tup:

For a small car I thought this was a great choice, since there are no rear speakers to power either, all I had in addition to this, was a 1ch mono amp for sub.

Thank you trooper for chiming in, if you are using it for another brand head unit than alpine than you just have to wire it up with the harnesses. Other than that it is a great unit.

Just a note, there is plenty of cable, I would think at least 2 foot going into amp, and 2 foot coming out of amp.
I think the idea is that this can be installed in a glove box or other hidden area and just plug in-line with head unit.

Check out some YouTube videos :tup:

bringing this one back from the dead. i still haven't bought an amp yet, lots of other expenses on my table so i, consequently, still haven't installed the polk's yet. i was over at a friend's house in clemson yesterday and saw a couple amps laying on the dining room table and he informed me he was selling his old stereo stuff from his M5 which he doesn't have anymore. i saw this gem laying there:

JL Audio Slash v2 300/4v2 4-Channel Car Amplifier

he said he'd sell it to me for $250. first of all, looks like a really nice amp with plenty of power to push the components without running it wide open all the time. second, fair used price? he said it was ~ 2 years old but it's been out of his old car since feb this year so it was only in use for 1 year.

he also has a matching 500/1 sub amp and 2 JL 10w3's if anyone is interested in the SC area...