alpine, kenwood, or eclipse can be had for cheap on your local car forums or craigslist.

i have a kenwood that i got for 25 bucks that is great. plays cd and has the flip down face

 

i have had alpines for as long as i can remember but recently swapped my IDA-X100 for a pioneer premiere and i really like it... comes with bluetooth already installed and ready to go unlike the alpines which require an adapter and the pioneer also comes with a steering wheel mounted remote and voice activated calling all nice features with our recent hands free cell phone law

 

While I'm at it, does anyone have an opinion on speaker position?

I can re-install my overhead soundbar with a pair of 4.5" in it OR mount a couple 4.5" in the liftgate. Which will sound better??

 

OR you can take out front speakers and put 6.5" on the doors, and 6.5 on the soundbar, it will sound better.

 

Will 6.5's mount to the 4.5 screw positions in the liftgate and/or the front doors?

The soundbar will only accept 4.5" speakers - it is molded using chopper-gun fiberglass.

 

i cut my soundbar up to mount 6.5s in it but i need to re upholster it and all that jazz

 

Several things, including what Diesel mentioned. Higher volt pre-amps, for a cleaner signal to external amplifies. Larger band EQ, for sound control adjustments. Crossover control, better sound control for components.

These are the things that make a big difference if you're planning on throwing in some higher-end components. It will obviously help in any application, but these features really stand out when you have the correct "hardware".

A note on the USB/AUX feature on most decks these days. Most manufactures are catering to the "apple fanboys", if you will, and the USB input is designed specifically to support the Ipod/touch/phone/etc. Now, you can always just go with a USB thumb drive, which works just slicker than ****, but I always try to educate people that just becuase your MP3 player has a USB cable, this does not mean your head-unit will detect the audio files on the device. As long as you have an AUX input though, you can always go that route.



The only downfall of running a "higher-end" setup in a Jeep is the size limitations. The doors are very shallow, limiting your ability to run components with large baskets. You can work around this with some units by cutting the stock door panels out and using the supplied, or aftermarket, speaker grills. There's always the option of building/buying aftermarket kick panels as well - this would relocate your front speakers lower to the floor. In the XJs though, this really cramps your leg room so I've never been a huge fan.

Also, the stock soundbar has the needed room, but in most cases will need to be modified/supported in order to handle the weight of some sets.

 

Front doors you take out speakers AND take off the grills. Than just buy 6.5" speakers screw them into the door panel and put the grills on them I did that with SE6500's. And soundbar I just cut it out a little, threw some 5 min epoxy on the fabric so it wouldnt fall, and mounted the 6.5" speakers, the speaker mounts covered the epoxy.

 

Thanks much. Maybe I'll upgrade the head and stay with the small speakers...I don't have the time to get into a big project modifying door panels and the soundbar right now. Any recommendations on speakers in that size range.

And thanks to all for all the input - it has been a huge help sorting out the options and ideas.

 

Eclipse, Alpine, Boston Acoustics, Polk Audio.

Polk would probably be your best bet, they have amazing sq and wont break the bank

 

Anytime. For the money, Kicker has great line-up currently. Either the the entry level DS series or step up to the KS. Great value for the sound they put out.

Polk Audio and Boston Acoustic are also great recommendations. You may spend a bit more, I haven't priced them in awhile, but 99% of the time it's worth it. You get what you pay for, as they say.

I stay as far away from Alpine as possible. Just my .02 though...different strokes..

 

If you have the coin for r or x, alpine is good.

 

I just thought of another issue...it used to be that you had to be very careful about impedence loads on the amp. I gave some thought to putting six 4.5's in the car - front doors, soundbar, rear liftgate - and then it occured to me how would I balance the impedence. I looked at the Pioneer and Sony heads and both showed 4 ohm. I have forgotten how to wire speakers to achieve a 4 ohm load...and never was any good at it in the first place.

Any ideas/thoughts??

 

4 rear speakers total? and two front?

What channel are the two extra going on

 

Running your rear speakers in a series/parallel configuration should keep the load at 4ohm