I need duff duff

[BlackVr6ix]

depends on your setup, if by six you mean rear doors, front doors and a tweeter in the dash then yes you can do that.

[Oneofthegreats]

Well I can say after I fitted my alpine setup, I'm more than happy with it. It cranks alright for what it is.

It cost me $440 for head unit, 6x9"'s, speaker cable, aerial cable, aerial, Ipod adapter etc.

I'll post up some pic's later if I get a chance in my audio thread.

[Water Boy]

depends on your setup, if by six you mean rear doors, front doors and a tweeter in the dash then yes you can do that.

Sweet...

[ScienceVR6]

You can, but it will mean you will lose control of 2 of them, as you will need to run 4 speakers off 2 channels. Also you will need a headunit that is 2 ohm stable, and i don't know how many of them are that good. Explain how you want to run 6 speakers, and i'll see if i can devise a way to do so.

[Golf Houso]

I've just got a decent alpine unit which replaced the $2 unit that I had in when I got the car, that sounded much like your "PA" unit. After that, the sound is drastically improved with alot more bass and clarity, but I still get distorion as the volume increases. I'll get an amp when I get paid.

[Mrk_Mickey]

Here's an explanation of the speaker setups, in a nutshell

All headunits have RCA Pre-outs. These are the outputs which run to your speakers that make them PLAY SOUND! Most headunits have 4 RCA Pre-outs which means you can run four seperate speakers. However as for some of the more special headunits, i THINK they can come with more pre-outs (i THINK..).

As for speakers, you get all the different types -the tweeters, the woofers (most speakers are these), or the splits (which are speakers with two or more separate speakers - mostly the woofer/tweeter set-up). Most speakers are simple and come as one piece; BUT, for some types of splits, the tweeters can be mounted separately. This is still essentially "one speaker" because the high/low frequencies are split up into the different speakers (tweeter/woofer respectively) for better sound efficiency.

To wire up speakers in a car, most people use one line per speaker. The pre-outs are almost always used in 4-ohm mode, which is just normal and is NOT worth explaining. Some headunits come with more options such as a 2-ohm mode. With 2-ohms, you can run "double the power", and therefore hook up two speakers to one line, but you have to "halve" the speaker ohmage, from 4-ohms to 8-ohms, so all the ohmage stuff matches up (the higher the ohms the lower the 'power' - ...it's complicated stuff..). It works well, especially for people like me who want a temporary fix to 6 speakers, a sub, and only one four-channel amp

SO. If you personally would like to play 6 speakers at once, and if you include the tweeters used in the dash as separate speakers, then yes it is possible to wire these up with a normal headunit (and it's recommended! I did it too - cheaper, and better sound - better than more speakers, because the high frequency sounds that come from speakers are more directional [and should be put higher - e.g dash, door cards]).
If however you want 6 SEPARATE sets of speakers, then you will need either a headunit with 6 pre-outs, or an amp. And naturally I would suggest the amp because you can plug more speakers into the amp and then it sounds awesome!

Hope this helps Water_Boy! Sorry if it's confusing..i've been reading about all this for ages as I'm really into car sound. My cuz and I are about to make a fiberglass mould for my sub just like Louis did! Yay for sound!

[Gigitt]

Eeeek!

Here's an explanation of the speaker setups, in a nutshell

All headunits have RCA Pre-outs. These are the outputs which run to your speakers that make them PLAY SOUND! Most headunits have 4 RCA Pre-outs which means you can run four seperate speakers. However as for some of the more special headunits, i THINK they can come with more pre-outs (i THINK..).

RCA Pre-Outs are audio outputs that you connect to external amplifiers.
The RCA leads carry the audio signal to the amplifier. The amplifier then powers the speakers.

Most headunits (HU) have 4x faded RCA Pre-outs (Front L+R and Rear L+R). Faded so as you can balance the sound front to rear and left to right.
Some Head units also have an aditional 2x Non-faded Sub RCA Pre-out (L+R) Which will bring total to 6 Pre-out RCA.

Also make note of the RCA Voltage output.
Crappy HU are <2V, You should get a HU with at least 2V Pre-out, 4V is better and some HU now come with 6V and rarely 8V. Make sure that the Amplifiers you choose will work with the HU RCA voltage...
Most Clarion HU are 4V, and I think this is becomming the common RCA voltage output.
Why... The higher the RCA Voltage the easier it is for you amplifier to amplify the audio output.
eg 2V RCA vs 4V RCA into same AMP at same HU sound level = 4V should be twice as loud!
A reason behind this is to reduce noise that might be introduced into the RCA leads from being amplified. 4V RCA will have less 'Signal to noise ratio' than 2V if the same noise is introduced into the RCA.
But a main reason is that the amp will run cooler and use less battery current as it not working as hard for the same sound level you hear.

As for speakers, you get all the different types -the tweeters, the woofers (most speakers are these), or the splits (which are speakers with two or more separate speakers - mostly the woofer/tweeter set-up). Most speakers are simple and come as one piece; BUT, for some types of splits, the tweeters can be mounted separately. This is still essentially "one speaker" because the high/low frequencies are split up into the different speakers (tweeter/woofer respectively) for better sound efficiency.

There are 3 types of speakers.
1) Most standard is the coaxial where the tweeter is mounted in front of the woofer cone and it is basically considered 1 speaker.
2) Splits where the woofer and tweeter (and in some cases a mid-range) are separate speakers all connected to a crossover that splits the audio frequencies to the correct speakers. Splits are used to bring the high range audio from the tweeters closer to the listeners ears as high range audio is directional... you dont want tweeter firing from the door straight at your feet as your feet do not have ears. Pont the tweeters up to you or mount them higher on the dash.
3) Subwoofers - doof doof

To wire up speakers in a car, most people use one line per speaker. The pre-outs are almost always used in 4-ohm mode, which is just normal and is NOT worth explaining. Some headunits come with more options such as a 2-ohm mode. With 2-ohms, you can run "double the power", and therefore hook up two speakers to one line, but you have to "halve" the speaker ohmage, from 4-ohms to 8-ohms, so all the ohmage stuff matches up (the higher the ohms the lower the 'power' - ...it's complicated stuff..). It works well, especially for people like me who want a temporary fix to 6 speakers, a sub, and only one four-channel amp

Speakers are not connected to RCA pre-out leads!!!
Speakers connect either from the Speaker outputs on the back of the HU (using the HU built in amplifier), or you connect your speakers to an external Amplifier. All speakers have 2 wires ... except those OEM speakers that do common negative grounding and are a PITA.

SO. If you personally would like to play 6 speakers at once, and if you include the tweeters used in the dash as separate speakers, then yes it is possible to wire these up with a normal headunit (and it's recommended! I did it too - cheaper, and better sound - better than more speakers, because the high frequency sounds that come from speakers are more directional [and should be put higher - e.g dash, door cards]).
If however you want 6 SEPARATE sets of speakers, then you will need either a headunit with 6 pre-outs, or an amp. And naturally I would suggest the amp because you can plug more speakers into the amp and then it sounds awesome!

You can have as many speakers you want in a car... but you are still only going to use Front L+R and Rear L+R (and Sub L+R) - unless you are into multimedia/DVD's and have 5.1 HU then you will also have a centre speaker.
How many speakers you run is up to you and the space needed to install them.
You then need to consider how to wire them up. HU will want to see only 4ohms per channel from the built in amplifier.
so you wire the speakers up into 4ohm configurations. (Most Car audio speakers are 4ohm).
If you use and external amplifier to drive multi speaker set ups, then you can run speakers at what ever ohms the amplifier can handle - just make sure you wire the speakers up acordingly... subwoofers can run 4, 2 or 1 ohm if your amp can handle it.

I have 11 speakers in my Mk3 Golf Split Fronts (Woofer and Tweeters), Split rears (Woofer, Mid and Tweeter) and Dual Voice coil Sub - does that count as 12 speakers then???

Hope this helps Water_Boy! Sorry if it's confusing..i've been reading about all this for ages as I'm really into car sound. My cuz and I are about to make a fiberglass mould for my sub just like Louis did! Yay for sound!

I fixed up some of your misconceptions.

[Mrk_Mickey]

Mate, there is no need to burn up my post. Sounds a bit silly anyway, because you basically just gave a confusing version of what i said:

I mentioned RCA Pre-outs, and you said they went to amplifiers. What about these "RCA PRE-OUTS"?

Most headunits (HU) have 4x faded RCA Pre-outs (Front L+R and Rear L+R).

I also mentioned the different types of speakers. What I was referring to was the types of speaker-cone-thing-whatevers, not style of speakers. Sorry I didn't make that more clear..

Speakers are not connected to RCA pre-out leads!!!
Speakers connect either from the Speaker outputs on the back of the HU (using the HU built in amplifier), or you connect your speakers to an external Amplifier.

SORRY. I said Pre-outs instead of speaker outs. It was wrong. However I didn't say RCA so my "SIMPLE" explanation still sounded alright..

You can have as many speakers you want in a car... but you are still only going to use Front L+R and Rear L+R (and Sub L+R) - unless you are into multimedia/DVD's and have 5.1 HU then you will also have a centre speaker.
How many speakers you run is up to you and the space needed to install them.

That's just starting to take stabs. I posted this for someone who wouldn't have stupid amounts of speakers. Think realistically..How many speakers will you really cram into one speaker output? We're talking no amplifiers here.

I have 11 speakers in my Mk3 Golf Split Fronts (Woofer and Tweeters), Split rears (Woofer, Mid and Tweeter) and Dual Voice coil Sub - does that count as 12 speakers then???

And here comes the derogatory comment.

I fixed up some of your misconceptions.

You actually said more confusing things (NOTE: I said simple explanation, ie dumbing down and generalising), correcting my one mistake of RCA pre-outs.

[Gigitt]

Dude... You do not know what RCA Pre-outs are!

It's information like this that confuse the newbies and they go blow up their speakers!

[Mrk_Mickey]

Then say that Don't try to correct everything I said cause it didn't all need to be corrected. All cooooooollll okay?