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SQ around 1000 buck for Camry

3K views 15 replies 8 participants last post by  timbo2 
#1 ·
I'm not great on the tech side of car audio. What I do know is after getting my first "system" (ha), I neeeeed aftermarket car audio.

2 weeks ago my 95 civic was stolen...... BUT I am getting an 07 camry (a deal I couldn't pass up)

My dilemma: what do i put in my camry? I would like to keep it around 1000 bucks and I could go up to about 1500. I'm looking to upgrade the factory speakers and slap in a sub to help fill out the audio.

I have been getting all sorts of recommendations, the best yet, visit diymobileaudio.com

I was thinkin 6.5 components up front and 2-way 6x9 in back and 12 inch sub.

I'm leaning toward the memphis bell 5 channel 1300 watt for my amp, but i'm open for any suggestions.

thanks in advance
 
#2 ·
Welcome to the forum. It may be your lucky day. I have a 2008 Camry that I'm collecting equipment for right now, and as luck would have it, I am doing a build on $500 budget for equipment, but will likely push to $1000 including install materials (kits, wiring, sound deadening, etc.)

Are you planning on installing yourself? That will save you some money, and I'm going by that assumption.

For $1000, budget something along these lines:

Head unit: $200 (you could also use your stock deck and get some kind of OE adapter like an RF 3Sixty)
Amplifier: $300 (don't know how much that Memphis you're looking at costs)
Components (6.5 up front, if you must do rear fill 6.5 coaxial): $300 (Ratio, I would say, $250 for the components, $50 for the coaxials, and tune the rears down low).
Subwoofer: $200

Obviously, what you save in one category you can use elsewhere.

You'll need an install kit and harness. I want to say that this is going to be about $60. You'll need a wiring kit and RCA cable to run your amplifier; this will vary a bit depending on your power handling needs, but let's say a 4-gauge kit will do, and that'll be about $50. You'll need a box for your subwoofer, depending on what size and if you build it yourself, let's say $50. You will also need adapters for the speakers to mount, you can buy these or make these, if you buy it may be as much as $40. Budget the rest for sound deadening or overrun for the equipment.

If you stay vigilant on the classifieds, and depending how you feel about buying on eBay, you can have a pretty good system.
 
#7 ·
I agree with the comment about rear fill. I would spend $1000 in the following manner:

Head unit: active capable with clean outs - Alpine 9886/9887, Pioneer 800/880PRS. These can be had used for $250 or so. A little more for the Pioneer maybe. Search the forums for more info on these units. If you prefer to keep the stock head unit, perhaps a RF3sixty, although this could cost a little more than that. there is a 3sixty.2 on ebay for $300 buy it now price.

Amp: Stick with the Soundstream - sounds like a great deal for less than $200!!!

Front stage: go to Parts-Express (parts-express.com) or Madisound and look at the raw driver selections. The Dayton RS180-4 is a a popular mid-bass driver and would work well with the specs of your amp. On Madisound the SB29 tweeter gets great reviews. There are several different tweeters you can go with depending on the size you need, but I would say you should be out of there for no more than $150-175 for a pretty nice front stage. There are LOTS of options either way if you decide to spend a little more, or want to spend a little less...

Sub: The PG RSd 12d (4DVC) sub seems gets good reviews. It can be had for about $60 and fall within the specs of your amp (340w). With a pre-fab enclosure, you would get this for no more than $95 shipped.

Wiring/dash kit: amp wiring kit, dash kit (if needed) RCA's, speaker wire, etc should run no more than $150 and that is being generous.

Sound deadning: RAAM has a special right now on BXTII. I am going to try it without the Ensolite. This is about $115 shipped.

This totals about $1020 with the $300 budget for the head unit, and IMHO would provide good results. If you do not mind used speakers and amp, then you can likely get better product for the same budget if you take your time...
 
#8 ·
The Pioneer 800 seems to still be going for about 300 (or more) for a good one. He can probably get the 9887 for ~$250 or less (check out hot deals).

He's definitely going to need a dash kit/harness, and adapter mount/baffle for the speakers (thanks, Toyota), which is why my estimate may be a bit more than yours for the accessories. But with your estimates he can still come in under $1000 given a little bit of searching.

Also agree on the RAAM deal, can also find deals every now and again on Second Skin.
 
#10 ·
-Stock head unit

-JBL MS-8 with 20 watt x 8 of internal amplification for all the speakers except the sub.

-A great quality coax in the factory dash location. You might have a hard time fitting fitting a 3.5" coax in the camry dash location though. I would run a 2" Peerless 4 ohm full range on a solid shaped baffle that isolates the front and rear waves. Run it from 500Hz-1000Hz on up and it will sound awesome, play very loud from 20 watts, and fit under the OEM grill even with the baffle plate. No need for a tweeter with this option since the on axis high frequency is there and it will reflect of the glass into the listening area. You might have to angle mount it a little to focus the reflected on axis energy
toward your vertical position, maybe not though.

-A good quality 6x9" in the doors acting as midbass only something like a JBL GTO 2 way). I'd talk to Andy W. on here from JBL about this one. See if you should disconnect the passive and built in tweeter so the the 6x9" acts as a completely active midbass. Ask to see is the nominal impedance of the woofer without those components is within the accepted range for an amp (ie not too low).

-A better quality 6x9 in the rear acting as rear speakers that you can fade to the front when no in use.

-A great 12" sub (JBL GTO) in an GREAT! enclosure that fires through the rear seat arm rest and is closed off from the trunk by its own mounting baffle. That way you keep the trunk noise out of the cabin as well as not having the 6x9" be affect by the bass pressure. Don't seal off the trunk toooo much though since it still needs to vent the cabin with the trunk vents. A sub enclosure with a side to side baffle should isolate the bass in the cabin without sealing it off to much. This procedure will also keep the bass out of the trunk and prevent it from coming back into the cabin out of phase and canceling some of the bass output.

-A 300-500 watt class D amp for the sub. You should be able to find an excellent older model that is that BNIB for VERY cheap.

-And most important!, proper installation of the drivers and sound treatment where needed. This is VERY important on the doors. If done correctly, the 20 watts from the MS-8 will be plenty.

-And as a bonus. You'll have unused output from the MS-8 that can be used for a LOGIC 7 center speaker setup in the future. You could probably fit a nice 4" or 5 1/4" coax on a fiberglass baffle and/or enclosure that is molded to the same shape as that plastic piece. Cover it with grill cloth to look just like stock profile and you'll have one of the best center channels positions of any car.

All this should be below $1500 with maybe even the center. And we're talking about a world class balance system here.
 
#11 ·
-A good quality 6x9" in the doors acting as midbass only something like a JBL GTO 2 way). I'd talk to Andy W. on here from JBL about this one. See if you should disconnect the passive and built in tweeter so the the 6x9" acts as a completely active midbass. Ask to see is the nominal impedance of the woofer without those components is within the accepted range for an amp (ie not too low).
Why use a coaxial if you just need the midbass driver?
 
#16 ·
dont need rear speakers for sq..........

if you are keen to get a good value sq system you will realy have to go active with diy drivers.....

how about this

the amazing HDS tweeter https://www.madisound.com/store/product_info.php?products_id=1744
with seas er18rnx woofers https://www.madisound.com/store/product_info.php?products_id=8181

as for head unit 9887 is cheap and will do 3way
CDA-9887 - Alpine CD/MP3/WMA/AAC In-Dash Receiver

with a 5ch amp like the boston GT-50 - Boston Acoustics 5 Ch. 510 Watt Amplifier

and for a subwoofer IDQ12V2.D4 - Image Dynamics 12" IDQ Dual 4 Ohm Subwoofer

this will sound fantastic and come in at around 1100 plus install....
 
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