Hi all, first post. I have a 2005 mazda 3 s sedan. i think i may have blown my speakers and am looking for a replacement. i know NOTHING about car speakers so need some help. i don't care about listening to music so loud i wake the neighbors up but would like speakers capable enough so it's impossible for me to blow them again.

this guy writing said he thinks the distortion fried my head unit??? I have the Total Care warranty so everything is supposed to be covered on my car. i would assume that includes the stereo and speakers b/c it definitely covers my GPS unit.

What i can't find for the life of me is a mazda 3 part list where i can find out what speakers are in my car. Like what is the RMS wattage of the speakers? are they only 10 watts each? or are they 55 or 65 watts RMS like the sony's i want to buy at circuit city. How would i find out if my head unit is fried?

I need help on my Mazda 3 speaker setup. Are the front speakers 6.5" round and the rear speakers 5" X 7" ? i only have the s edition not the SP23 so i think i have 4 speakers and not 6. Also, i read somewhere on the mazda website that the amp in the car is 160 watt (40 watts X 4 channels). If this is the case and i bought 4 sony speakers that were 55 watt RMS (continuous volume) it would be IMPOSSIBLE for me to blow my speakers right? or can you turn the volume ABOVE what your factory amp can handle? I want to know if the FACTORY DEFAULT SPEAKERS are 40 watts each or 15 or 60.....?

i'm so confused.....

Here is a link to a post i made on the avs forum.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=700498

 

All four of the door speakers are 5"x7". You can use an adaptor plate to put in 6.5" round speakers if you prefer. Most audiophiles go for the round speakers as they generally give less distortion. If you're not that discerning about your sound then you'll probably be fine with 5x7s. Do you have little round tweeters in the triangular panels on the door (inside of where the side mirrors are)? Those would be the other two speakers you weren't sure if you had.

After reading your other post it doesn't really sound like you've fried anything, only that you're turning up whatever you're listening high enough to cause distortion. If you turn it down some does it go away, or is it present at any volume level.

You can make your stock speakers sound better by amping them with more power. Like you said the OEM amp is 40x4, but that's probably peak power. The speakers are probably only getting 10w or so RMS. You'll get even better sound by replacing the stock speakers, and amping them. You'll get even better sound than that by replacing the speakers, the HU, and adding an amp. It's all about how much you want to spend, and what sound you're looking for. For the front speakers I'd either look at a 3-way, or mid-range with a separate tweeter and a crossover. for the back speakers you should be fine with a 2-way speaker (you do most of your listening in the front, right?) Incidentally the difference between the different "way" speakers is that the multiple way speakers will have smaller drivers that will play specific frequency ranges. Big woofer cones don't produce high frequencies well, just like tweeters don't produce low frequencies well. Just a way for the speaker to try and sound better.

 

thank you so much for the reply. It is just when i turn it high that i hear the weird noise...which i have to do when i have all the windows down you have given me much to think about.

So, i REALLY like the 5"X7"s at circuit city that are 4-way sony's and only $60 for the pair. They are 55 watt RMS. What kind of amp do i need to get to compliment those? and then what kind of head unit to compliment that? Also, how do i make sure that my setup is distortion FREE from min volume to max volume?

I really don't know how distortion works or how to prevent it but i would like to.

thanks again.

 

I'm not a big audio guru, so I won't go into giving you speaker/amp/HU numbers and have you go buy that. Distortion wise you're going to be able to distort pretty much any speaker, it just varies with how much power you have to put into it. Have you thought about just rolling up the windows and turning on the A/C? :P Like you said though, if it only does it when you crank it to full volume then your speakers aren't blown, I'd think.

Really I'd go over to www.mazda3forums.com and post some questions in the electronics section. There are lots of audiophiles and installers there that will be able to answer your questions much better than I can. Also it tends to be a slightly busier forum so you'd probably get some answers pretty quickly. Also there are lots of threads similar to this over there (about replacing systems) so you might not even have to ask anything.

 

OK first things first, i think if you replace the head unit, you're gonna lose tha warranty on your GPS unit, im not sure on that but you might want to check with your dealer on that. If youre wanting to go cheap in tha car audio industry then i dont recommend sony, I used to work for a company called The Good Guys as inventory specialist and i constantly dealt with Sony and Kenwood including kenwoods excelon series, you're gonna pay up tha A@# with those 2 when it comes to fixing it, i'd consider pioneer pretty much all tha way around, cheap and still great sound, also i think the amp is internal on the deck so when you replace the deck, you'll only be dealing with deck amp power which is still good enough to blow 5x7's i used to do it alot in the demo room just to prove my point and push people towards JL Audio, and even then JL will blow but it'll take more punishment than anything else we sold

If you're going with a full speaker set up and deal with an external amp, then you're going to want to get a sub and sub-amp, because you better believe that if you amp your door speakers they're going to blow if not properly tuned and the shop wont care about settings to your speakers, because they just need to get you outta tha door and back after the warranty ends so you pay more money for new ones. I recommend it simply because i dont think you know how to tune you're amp and deck, if you have a friend thats into it, and has experience have them tune it, the sub is added for bass because a properly tuned 4 channel amp wont give bass to the door speakers

BEST BET ANDROSS!!!!-just buy a mildy priced pioneer deck, with mildy priced pioneer 5x7's, dont buy the amp, and make sure you jus dont put too much bass into them you should be good, it seems like you dont want to deal with too much trouble with the sound system....i just gave you a bit of my knowledge cause i have a big head and im somewhat of an audiophile, if you have any questions i'll try and get back to the site within the week and remember the rule of thumb in tha audio world "you get what you paid for"

 

o if you go with pioneer, buy it at best buy and get the extended warranty you can keep blowing the speakers and always get new ones, double check with them on that though and be smart with how you ask...damn i have all the inside scoops