Originally Posted by 86Capri

I have to agree with what a lot of you are saying. Kicker l7's would be nice but take way to much power. On a boat you need it to be efficient and not require tons of power. That kicker 5 channel amp I showed will run my 4 kicker comp 12's and all the mids and high almost to the max. Which means only having to power one amp which will draw less on your batteries. Also if you can push speakers to the max you would be surprised with the sound quality that will come out.

"Those mids that you suggested I am not a big fan of, for a few bucks more you can have the next step up in kicker marine comp speakers, the 6250 and have a huge difference in sound and power handling. http://www.amazon.com/Kicker-09KM625...onent+speakers"

The ones you are suggesting are just the newer model still the component series. Personally I would just run the regular 6.5 kicker marine coaxials. Remember I was talking budget you could buy 2 pairs for the price of your 1.

Over the years of messing with stereos I have found it better to power match. All I was giving was my opinion on a cheap but still nice sounding stereo. That will run on just 2 batteries for a while.

You want to be able to hear the stereo while you are running not just sitting still.

Originally Posted by MILD THUNDER

Im surprised nobody is talking about the Alpine Marine stuff. I am running a pair of their 10'' Free air subs under my rear bench, powered by a old school Fosgate 800.2 amp, and a two pairs of their 7'' coaxials in the cockpit, powered by a old school aurasound amp. Loud, Clear, and thumps pretty good considering the sub enclosure kinda sucks (would be much better in a sealed box design).

I was underpowering the subs when I first installed them. Running the big fosgate amp woke them up big time. Much better sound. I may build a enclosure for them this winter.

Originally Posted by Rambocj7

Some good options there! How important is to have matching speakers?

So far I have:
- pair of RF 282 8" 2 way
- pair of Polk Audio mm 6502 components

Should I get another pair of one of the above? Or something like the kickers that were just mentioned?

How many speakers can you run off a 4 channel amp at 4 x 200watts at 2 ohms?

Originally Posted by 4bus

I disagree for passing on a cap in a boat, for two reason. One is the batteries are a long way from the amps, that alone will cause voltage drop on big hits. Second most of us run high resistance marine batteries, which are great for long periods of steady power, but suck at delivery of quick burts of high amp power. The low resistance of a cap fills this gap and keeps the music clean on bass hits, without the music gets muddy any time high amp draw is called for. My cap keeps my power above 11.5 at all times, before the cap I was seeing voltage drop in the 10's with big hits. Huge difference when trying to sustain clean sound.

From my experience; while coved, where most duration, high volume stereo is played - If there is more than a .1-.2v voltage difference between readings at the battery and at the amp during high volume bass hits, there are system resistance issues. (usually too small of wire for amperage but can also be at fuses or due to electrical corrosion)
If the overall system is fluctuating more than .3-.5 volt, more batteries are needed as the system is not stiff enough to handle the drain.
More batteries = longer play time and hopefully less drainage. (we both know the fastest way to destroy a battery is deeply discharge, only thing worse is not fully recharging)
While there may be some small differences to how a deep cycle releases it's charge, more batteries releasing their charge is better than a capacitor which merely hopes to store a charge long enough that the batteries recover and thus resupply the cap to the banks resting charge before the next hit.
It is simply better if the battery bank is not put in that position to begin with. More batteries store more energy; summing faster and lasting longer.

Richard Clark uses detailed, long winded explainations as to why caps are more of a band-aid than tool. excerpt (somewhere there is a better webpage of his discussions) - http://www.glasswolf.net/papers/nocaplesson.html



Suprised you are having a heat issue on that RF amp, what ohm load are you running? I installed one of the Rockford 8004T that runs 8 speakers at 2 ohms with no fan in a closet, no issues. Those amps are one of the few 4 channel amps that are one ohm stable.

I have a T600.4 bridged to 2 ch and 2ohm. "Stable" but not rated according to RF. I know that is a little different than just being 4ch at 2ohm which is rated.
The amp does get HOT to the touch so I run a fan in a preventative maintance effort to keep it cooler which should allow it to run more efficient (thinking the fan energy used is less than the loss of efficiency due to extreme heat). Cooler temps are also better for the life of electronics. This one has passed 6 summers of constant abuse. I have never thermal protected so I dont know exactly where the threshold is but if a $8 fan can extend the life of two $300-400 amps, I am all for it.

An issue almost as big as frying an amp is ego. Rock'n the party and things shut down due to equipment issues on a hot July day.....buzz kill.

Originally Posted by 4bus

I would add another set of the polks and a set of the super tweets. 8 speakers off 4 channels parallel to get a 2 ohm load, which will increase your wattage. Please tell me you didn't get an onyx amp hahah

Originally Posted by Rambocj7

Price was just too cheap to pass up! lol I can buy spare amps for the price of others. Been researching and they 'bench' what their rated for. Ppl are saying that hifonics, MB quart and Soundstream are all in the same category. So yes I did buy the Onyx, damnit! lol

Good to know about the polks, will find another set.

Also, I willl be running at least 4 batteries. I have 2 in the boat now, but have 3 other spares I can put in the boat too...

Originally Posted by 4bus

Maybe you will have better luck with the onyx line than I did, l just couldn't get clean power out of them.

Sounds like you are on the right track. You do have shore power and a genny right?