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| Panasonic DPX30U Cd-Receiver. This deck features 35W x 4 amplification and 2V dual pre-outs. It is a basic deck, but it is a good value, with quite decent sound quality. The deck is exceptional in tracking scratches on CDs, and it rarely ever skips even on the awful roads up North. The only weak area of the deck is the pre-outs, they are rated at 2V, but in reality they are closer to 1.5 or 1.6V, so I was forced to run the gains on my amps pretty much cranked. A line driver or a new deck would make a big difference. |
| Phoenix Gold QX2100. This amp is part of Phoenix Gold's low level line, but it is still a quality product. In my system this amp pushed my JL 10" sub. The amp is rated at 100 watts RMS into 4 ohms, but Phoenix Gold tech told me it's more like 180 watts, and this is realistic. The amp pounded the JL sub. The amp is pretty clean too, it sounds awesome on a pair of mids, but it only has a low-pass cross-over which makes it more suitable for a sub-woofer. |
| Kenwood KAC-943 Amplifier. I purchased this amp used from a friend, it is about five years old. This amp is a decent 4-channel amp, it has dual variable high/low pass cross-overs. The amp is rated at 60 watts RMS x 4 into 4 ohms. This maybe a little optimistic on Kenwood's part, but it isn't that far of. This amp isn't as clean as my Phoenix Gold, but it still sounds pretty good. I ran some Soundtream components of the front two channels and on the two rear channels I ran some 5 1/4s and some speakers in parralel. |
| JL Audio 10-w0. This sub rocks. It is part of JL Audio's low level line, but it still pounds and it sounds excellent. I put the sub in a ported box made of 3/4" MDF. The sub was tight and it goes pretty low, most people were amazed at the output from a single 10" sub. In fact, it put out about as much bass as my friend's 12" Phoenix Gold sub. |
| Soundstream SPL50 Components. These are 2 ohm speakers, so when I ran them of the Kenwood amp, they played louder than a normal 4 ohm speaker would. These speakers got 60 watts RMS each or so and they were crossed-over high-pass at 120Hz. The speakers a pretty good, in the van they were mounted in a less than ideal position (in the dash firing into the windshield) and in leaky enclosures and they were still quite clean and crisp, although at high volume they could sometimes be a little harsh. The imaging was quite strong though, the images were at about head height, although they were not centered. Overall, they were pretty loud and pretty good sounding |
| Blaupunkt RL5429 Coaxes. I just has these speakers kicking around from before I had the Soundstreams, so I figured I may as well use them. I built a couple of small boxes for the coaxes and threw them under the middle bench of the van. The speakers sounded pretty good, they were getting about 50 watts RMS each, so they were loud, and they had decent midbass too, in the small enclosures. They were crossed-over at 80Hz (high-pass), running on the same channel as the house speakers. Mainly though, they were just for rear-fill |
| Paradigm Titans. Yes, I did have house speakers in my van. I only put them in because I had no other use for them and so that people in the very rear of the van could get something other than bass. The speakers have a 6.5" woofer and 1.5" tweeter. They each got about 50 watts RMS, they are rated to take up to 100 watts RMS. They were cross-over with the coaxes as they were running on the same channels. Basically, these were just so rear passengers could enjoy the music too. |
