Car Stereo ?
 

Which car do you think would sound better and why. Don't ry to make sense of it, just a ?.

Car

Stock head unit
stock speakers
4 channel amp/ crossover/ mids/ highs
2 channel amp w/crossover for subs/ lows

Same Car

Stock head unit
Good after market midrange speakers/highs/ mids/ lows
2 channel amp w/crossover for subs /lows

dont bother trying to amplify the stock speakers. Most are already at their max. Upgraded speakers will sound good but really should be amplified.

So pretty much they are both a waste of time, do the first one and upgrade the stock speakers

you can amplify the doo-doo out of the stock speakers as long as you are crossing them over above 150hz or whatever. problem is, they probably wont go as high up in the frequencies as an aftermarket set. but you could add a set of tweeters to help with that. i dont know if we are talking about a 1974 nova or a 2011 mustang..... stock speaker quality can vary alot.

i will go out on a limb here and say the amped stock speaker setup could sound better, given you have the opportunity to cross those speakers over, and you will have much more power available to them than the stock head unit alone.

Depends on how loud you turn it up. Factory speakers (descent ones) can be fairly loud but won't have any quality at louder volumes.

So if you just want mild bass added to what you have now go #1 if you want good sound quality and volume plus the bass go #2.

Pretty much depends solely on how happy you are with the quality of your factory setup.

Most factory stereos will process the hell out of the outgoing signals to make the crappy factory speakers sound ok. Only reason I would not replace the factory stereo and speakers is if the stereo has all your controls integrated into it also. Now if this is the case, you can buy a processor that will resum all the outputs and give you a full range signal to work with.

I got my ass handed to me on the F150 forum but I still feel that I am right. Head units simply don't have the power to power a good set of after market speakers. At low volumes it may sound better but you wouldn't hit half volume before they got muddy. The guy wanted a much louder system. I simply told him not to make the rookie mistake of getting great mid ranges and expect them to get loud with the power of a stock head unit. That even stock speakers(2012 F150) would give him better louder sound if he threw an amp to them, cut out the low freqs and added a sub w/amp for the lows. He could adjust the gain to get more but not too much power. I'm not by any means saying keep the stockers, that is retarded especially after going through the trouble to add an amp to them. Just that many people buy high end mids, run them off the head unit and go WTF when they sound like shit at half volume. Of course...I'm the dumbass. :confused:

The only way to get good sound quality at high volume is replace the speakers and add power. But like most things what some think sound good others won't.

The mustang mach1000 is an OK setup. To me its not great but put my old man in my car and he says it rocks.