Hello, I just bought a 2007 and wanted to know what the best value in upgrading the stereo system, speakers. I don't want to modify the car by adding a large speaker system and want to keep costs low.

 

You want 6.5" component speakers. A woofer and separate tweeter. These will fit right into factory door panel.

There is a good diy in here somewhere. These speakers typically come with a high pass filter crossover for the tweeters. This usually fits into a convenient pocket behind door panel. Diy shows where.

Expect to pay $75+ for speakers worthy of bothering to do rhe work to install them. You coukd easily spend many times more than that, but its a noisy convertible, so you soon reach a point of quickly diminishing returns. No point in going over the top.

Its worth upgrading the head unit too. Consider a digital media receiver (no cd player). They are much smaller, and leave room for a compact class D amp behind head unit right in dash. These are typically 90w rms per channel, if you bridge the front and rear channels (we don't have rear speakers, so you can double power sent to front by bridging amp outputs).

Use rca connectors from hu to amp (not the high level hu speaker outputs).

You can usually then power the headrest speakers off the hu rear speaker output. So amp, bridged, runs door speakers, hu powers headrest speakers.

Just go with a name brand hu, pioneer, kenwood, alpine, jvc, etc, and you'll be good. Pick based on features.

Crutchfield.com is the best place to buy audio stuff. Their customer support and wiring help techs are the best.

All in you can do a very decent (for a loud convertible) and powerful system for around $400.

 

Head unit replacement is not just recommended, its a MUST. The stock unit barely has enough juice to power the stock speakers. New bumpin speakers with the stock head unit will sound like fuzzy trash.

Although I added a head unit, door speakers, a pair of 8" subs and amp, a head unit with ~45wrms and component speakers is more than sufficient IMO - and the route I should have went. Loud system + loud car = a bunch of LOUD noise, lol.

Edit - I should add, be sure to check your speakers first and make sure they haven't been upgraded already. I thought my speakers were blown but they were upgraded already. It was just the weak sauce head unit couldn't keep up.

 

Thank you for the information this is the exactly the type of informaton I was looking for.

 

Thank you for the detailed information this will help me research the equipment I need, perfect

 

If you are a subwoofer guy, think about a footwell sub box on the passenger side. It takes away a very small amount of legroom but is the best place for a subwoofer, by far. No rattles - like, at all! - and it keeps ALL of your precious trunk space. I put a 5 channel amplifier in the spare tire location (get AAA and don't worry about a flat tire) which is able to run the sub and 2 way components.

Details of my install with pics here:

https://www.s2ki.com/forums/mid-atla.../#post23670746

 

I second the head unit replacement as the priority. I replaced the OEM HU (I happen to have a 2009) with a Sony unit (thank you Crutchfield for getting one that I knew would fit) that had 45 watts. I also went with Modifry for the plug and play harness and ability to use dash controls-I keep the radio door closed almost all the time and stream from the phone using dash controls all the time.

I was going to replace speakers but the improvement brought about by the new HU made that moot for me. I might add I also installed sound deadening (NVH) material in the doors that amped up the sound (pun intended) on its own as well. I used both B Quiet and 3M Thinsulate.

Do the HU with some juice first and then see if you want to replace the speakers. That is the most economical way to start, IMO.