What is the best sound system to get for a car for $500 dollars or less?

Question

This is a sound system for a 1997 Grand Prix GTP. I like bass alot and want a system with that.

Answer 1

If you're looking for booms I'd get Pioneer all around. If your looking for sound quality go w/ a Bose sound system. very good quality

Answer 2

With $500 to spend you're going to have to prioritize. That won't get you a whole Bose system, and won't get much with all Pioneer.
To support your system you'll want a head unit with preferably front, rear and dedicated sub RCA outs. You can get away with 2 sets (front/ rear with one switchable to to non-fading) but it may limit future upgrades. You should be able to get that for less than $200 in most name brands. Avoid the fancy display high end units or you'll just eat up your budget. I do suggest going with a name like Kenwood or Pioneer for the head. They're the best quality for the money. I strongly suggest you avoid swap meet brands.

If bass is the priority then there is another question, is it for you in the car or the people around your car?
If you don't care to impress then realize you want as much air moving inside the car as possible. You can get a lot of quality volume out of a pair of good 6x9s in the rear deck and an amp to drive them. Do that and add a powered sub (maybe Bazooka?) in the trunk up against the rear seat and you'll get the best quality and quanity of bass to your ear and still be well in budget.
If you want to impress others or listen standing around the car not in it, then forget about the 6x9s. The cheapest way is to go with a two channel amp of max wattage and run it into a custom enclosure for two woofers. With about $300 to $350 left to spend you'll probably best aim for a box for 2 10" woofers and maybe a 500W/channel amp.
Check out Q-logic and Klausaudio for the box. Name really does make a difference. Maybe try Ebay as a box is something that shouldn't be damaged by the previous owner.
Go cheaper on the woofer as you'll be replacing them about once a year or more anyway, maybe Polk or MTX.
What ever you have left goes to the amp.

Answer 3

Here you go, all priced from woofersetc.com:

Alpine MRPM350 - Alpine 1 Ch 350 Watt Amplifier

Kicker 05CVR10-2 - Kicker 10" dual 2 ohm voice coil subwoofer(x2)(wired in a series/parallel configuration.)

Alpine CDA-9856 - Alpine MP3/WMA/CD Player

There you go. Build or buy a box and some install stuff, and you are at about $600. You could save 80 bucks and get a single sub, because that amp doesn't have enough power for both subs to reach their max, so there will be NO difference in SPL. One sub running at 300 is the same spl as 2 running at 150. Save the money and get 1, or maybe up it to a 12"(if you do decide on a 12", get this one, so you can maximize your amplifiers output: Kicker 05CVR12-4 - Kicker 12" dual 4 ohm voice coil sub-woofer, and wire it parallel.)

Hope that was helpful.

Answer 4

You can get a lot of things for $500 or less online... especially Ebay. Or friends even if they are also into cars and want an update on their system tell them to sell you their old one.

But I would recommend:

JL audio
Kickers (the squares)
Rockford Fosgate
Audiobahn
Pioneer
Alpine

~ I have two 12" Alpine type R's (dual voice) that I've have had for about one 1/2 or two yrs I think and they are AWESOME for deep bass. I hooked them up to an audiobahn amp.

Good luck

Answer 5

http://spkrbox1.spaces.msn.com/Default.aspx for real "sound" advice.

Your system won't mean squat without a well designed box to put your subs in. Some manufacturers have recommendations as to dimensions of various types of boxes. It is best to find someone who builds boxes if you go with something other than a sealed box.

You should always match up RMS (Root Mean Square) watts of Subs and amp per channel as well as impedance's(resistances).

If your amp is rated at 4Ω don't subject it to 2Ω, it will fry.

Here is the formula for subs in parallel:

Z = 1 / (1/sub1 + 1/sub2 + 1/sub3 + ....)

For series, just add them up (sub1 + sub2 + ...).

You can mix and match these equations to get the right impedance required by your amp.

Example: 4 subs @ 4Ω each. If I connect two in parallel and the other two in parallel and tie the two pairs in series, I would have a total impedance(resistance) of 4Ω. So to the amp, it's just one sub.

You should use a capacitor as well.

Recommend for every 500 watts MAX you use a .5 Farad cap
Example: 1000 watts MAX - 1 Farad cap

Try http://www.soundomain.com/shop you can find some really good deals, and this site is manufacturer certified. VERY IMPORTANT WHEN SHOPPING ON-LINE!!!

You will also need what's called a "line level converter" if your stock head unit doesn't have RCA outputs or your amp doesn't have high-level inputs.

If you like I can send you some plans for reference. My plans are for a 4-th order band pass bass box that holds two 12's. Also included are java calculators you can use to figure parallel and series values given Ω values.
Just e-mail me [e-mail]

My system

Blaupunkt TSw1200 subs with a Sony Xplōd XM2200GTX.
My amp is 1200 watts, subs are 600 watts each, cap is 1.2 Farad

SPL is about 112 db

Total cost(so far) = $410

Answer 6

A lot of bass for less than $500? There are really only a couple of options. $500 is not a lot of money - but click the link below for a couple of options. Both will sound decent, but you're not going to get 150dB worth of bass with only $500.

http://www.crutchfield.com/S-xIyULSaQUdF/cgi-bin/ProdView.asp?g=208250&I=700MXART12
http://www.crutchfield.com/S-xIyULSaQUdF/cgi-bin/ProdView.asp?g=208250&I=700ALPPKG2
http://www.crutchfield.com/S-xIyULSaQUdF/cgi-bin/ProdView.asp?g=208250&I=700PIOPKG2