Fire 'em Up: Subaru Subwoofers Belt Out Hot Tunes

Actually I feel blessed i don't my "time alignment" from my "phase distortion". It'd probably drive me insane like what happens to quality "custom home" builders. Their brains fry every time they walk into a new "tract home", but have to suffer in silence. But why does it have to be all one way or the other? What if you just want to improve what the factory put in your basic 1/2 ton, a hundred times over, for around $100 in flea-market equipment? You'd be (OK maybe not YOU) amazed the "highs" a basic, poverty spec stereo can put out when you tune-out most of the bass, up the treble then crank it. OK then you "piggyback" whatever amp/box/subs you can integrate without affecting cargo/people carrying ability (much). Meaning you tap into either rear speaker for "high level" input, using the "fader" on the stock stereo to control/balance sub (amp) volume, tuning out all the amp highs. Yes OMG it's not gonna land you trophies at the local soundoffs with a picture of a hot young thing in a teeny bikini hugging on you, but it's just one of the those things that improves the quality of life a hair, makes the commute much "shorter", for not much cash outlay, and completely un-installs in literally seconds.

@DenverMike I don't even want to think about that stuff either. I just want a system that plays the full frequency range powerfully, with minimal resonance, so that I can crank it up on highway trips and immerse myself in the sound. If I can't notice any distortion or harshness, then there's nothing more that I need. It always started in high school by just changing a pair of speakers or a head unit. Nothing expensive, but the results were typically so dramatic that every guy would catch the bug and want to do more. Everything was a hack job at first but we continually learned from each other. It was evolution at work. The systems were constantly being compared and we worked on things together, so it was obvious who was doing it right and using the best components. And by best I don't mean the most expensive. It really doesn't cost much to get decent sound. My favorite car speakers ever were a pair of paper cone two-way Clarion 6x9's. Speaker shopping was a lot of fun. Every electronics shop had huge soundboards, and you could listen to dozens of speakers in an afternoon between all them. You'd take a CD with some heavy guitar rock that sounded harsh on bad speakers but glorious on good ones, set everything flat, and quickly compare a bunch with the push of a few buttons. I listened to other types of music too, but any speaker can come across as decent on a quick listen with the more heavily produced electronic stuff. That stuff was used for testing subs, to make sure they can play the entire bass line without tapering off. I'm somewhat saddened at the idea that kids typically don't experience this anymore; learning about and refining those things until they have something unique that they're proud of creating. I imagine they just accept that these overpriced and overcomplicated factory stereos are good enough. They're not, if you know what you're missing.

@rpn453 I used to work for a couple of (big name) car audio companies who had both big aftermarket and OEM businesses. 90% of the aftermarket stuff is junk. they spin these wonderful stories about their mica-and-fairy-dust-impregnated cones, the "rigid" cast tungsten basket, and their "75 watt continuous" power rating, but in reality they have 80% THD at 16 watts (typical head unit power) in the lower frequencies and terrible modulation distortion. and they sucker rubes into buying this junk because they have you listen to these things at about half a watt of power on the "sound boards" at the car audio shop. then when you put them in the car and start playing them at actual listening levels they're a blatty distorted mess. don't get me wrong, most OEM speakers are pretty bad too (though I have some which buck the trend and are rather good) but you're not automatically going to get something better in the aftermarket. maybe by the time you get into Focal territory you can find decent stuff, but I'm not going to shell out that much money just to evaluate them.