Choosing an amp for some speakers..

I have 2 Soundstream SST 6.5" 120 watt (probably 60 watt RMS not sure) speakers sitting here from an old '97 Corolla I intended to fix up. That car now lies in a scrapyard but the speakers I kept. They come with passive crossovers which i hear are absolutely required otherwise the tweeters blow (that true?) They were powered by an Alpine CDE-103BT deck in that Corolla and these sounded fantastic.

So I thought of building 2 boxes to hold them and getting an amp to power them from my computer.
I just don't know what amp to get and what to look for in an amp.

These are 3 ohm speakers so I would need a 2ohm amp right?
Because a 4 ohm amp would have to work too hard feeding these 3 ohm speakers?
Oddly enough, I wired up a 3.5mm jack to these speakers and my phone drives them louder and better than my ASUS Sabertooth lol.


Figured I'd ask the audio pros here instead of blowing up my speakers

Most amps run at various resistance, they just change their power output accordingly. Check the detailed specifications before buying the amp, it should list the various output ratings.

IMO getting a pair of self-powered 6 - 8" two way studio (monitor) speakers will sound better than anything you're going to cob-job. Yamaha, JBL, and m-audio both make decent entry level monitors. Even some of the lesser known brands are making decent enough models.

If you have a guitar center nearby you could go there to hear what I mean.

So i should be looking at the output power at X ohms?

Question is what impedance on the amp should i be getting? A 100w @ 4ohms or 100w @2ohms amp?

I realize that i could just buy better speakers but id rather put these to good use plus i enjoy woodworking and its a fun project to make the speaker enclosures

Most home use amps are designed for 6 ohms and above. Your best bet is probably to use a car amp and a spare PSU to run it.

NiHaoMike said:

Most home use amps are designed for 6 ohms and above. Your best bet is probably to use a car amp and a spare PSU to run it.

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I was thinking of just going that route yeah. But the issue are the 3 ohm speakers. It'll over drive a 4 ohm amp.

So i was reading into this more and so i have 3 choices: wires the speakers in series to get 6 ohms and use a 4ohm amp. Wire them in parallel to get 1.5 ohms and find a 1ohm amp or find a 2 ohm 2 channel amp to run each speaker individually....

Either way ill be underrunning the speakers unless i find a 1ohm amp. But thats fine because these dont need to go super loid anyway

Does that sound right?

Higher number= MORE resistance, not less. 4Ohm amp (no such thing in modern times if we're talking about home amps as they are usually 4/6/8 capable) will NOT be overdriven by 3Ohm speakers.

I really think this is sort of a Trailer Park Boys style idea that you're going with here man. Wouldn't you be happier with some actual audiophile speakers on your desk? Maybe a pair of KEF X300A's? They have DAC/AMP built in. Just plug into a USB port on your machine and you're rockin. They sound specacular and will set u back under $1000. Probably a lot less now due to black friday.

Or if you want to spend 1/2 as much, a pair of JBL LSR305 monitors and an Audioquest Dragonfly.

Or if you want to spend even less, head over to your nearest Long & McQuaide and pick up a pair of Yorkville 5 inch monitors and a 3.5mm TRA to dual 6.3mm TS cable (they sell them). Plug that into a Dragonfly. Or if you're cheap (jk) plug it into your onboard audio.
Any of these 3 options will exceed your expectations and sound much better than the car speakers. I assure you.

Theocnoob said:

Higher number= MORE resistance, not less. 4Ohm amp (no such thing in modern times if we're talking about home amps as they are usually 4/6/8 capable) will NOT be overdriven by 3Ohm speakers.

I really think this is sort of a Trailer Park Boys style idea that you're going with here man. Wouldn't you be happier with some actual audiophile speakers on your desk? Maybe a pair of KEF X300A's? They have DAC/AMP built in. Just plug into a USB port on your machine and you're rockin. They sound specacular and will set u back under $1000. Probably a lot less now due to black friday.

Or if you want to spend 1/2 as much, a pair of JBL LSR305 monitors and an Audioquest Dragonfly.

Or if you want to spend even less, head over to your nearest Long & McQuaide and pick up a pair of Yorkville 5 inch monitors and a 3.5mm TRA to dual 6.3mm TS cable (they sell them). Plug that into a Dragonfly. Or if you're cheap (jk) plug it into your onboard audio.
Any of these 3 options will exceed your expectations and sound much better than the car speakers. I assure you.

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If the amp is expecting a set of 4 ohm speakers and I hook up 3 ohm speakers, more current will flow through the amp and speakers, and if the amp can't handle it, welp there goes the amp. So yeah, it'll fry the amp. At least, that's what I've been reading and seeing online. I don't know if it's correct though.


Aaaaannnnd yeah I'm being cheap here.
I'm not picky about my audio quality. So I'm not willing to spend more than $100 on new speakers.
I wanted to use these old ones for a reason - they have been sitting around for months and I want to use them, so rather than replacing my really beat up Panisonic RP-DJS400 headphones, I thought i'd make some nice looking cedar boxes to hold these speakers.

Besides, I just dropped $450 on a 6700k this morning so there's my free spending money gone!

Silver_Pharaoh said:

If the amp is expecting a set of 4 ohm speakers and I hook up 3 ohm speakers, more current will flow through the amp and speakers, and if the amp can't handle it, welp there goes the amp. So yeah, it'll fry the amp. At least, that's what I've been reading and seeing online. I don't know if it's correct though.


Aaaaannnnd yeah I'm being cheap here.
I'm not picky about my audio quality. So I'm not willing to spend more than $100 on new speakers.
I wanted to use these old ones for a reason - they have been sitting around for months and I want to use them, so rather than replacing my really beat up Panisonic RP-DJS400 headphones, I thought i'd make some nice looking cedar boxes to hold these speakers.

Besides, I just dropped $450 on a 6700k this morning so there's my free spending money gone!

Click to expand...

It's possible that I mis-spoke.
Apologies fellow Canadian Tim Horton's forsaking McDonald's coffee drinker.

BTW my 4790K is hella-jealous of your 6700K. At least my CPU PCB won't bend on me though (jk. Sort of.)

Cobbled car speaker setup is best left in the garage but then again any speaker setup compared to the ones in your monitor will sound good. I'd love to have a hifi setup again but have no space or money for it atm. Besides, my A5+'s with the S8 sub are patiently waiting for the right time. You can buy a decent pc speaker system for $50 if your on a budget. I wouldn't bother with the, I need a car amp and ps setup.

Ya don't use car speakers with your PC. Car speakers are designed to be used in an enclosed space where the sound is going to bounce off a lot of glass. They excel in small spaces. Your room will be much larger.
There are plenty of decent affordable computer speakers. Even the little junkers from Logitech and the like for $25 have come a very long way and sound decent now. klipsch Promedia 2.1 is a classic and can often be found for like $100 on sale. They're built out of recycled kinder surprise eggs and tinsel but until they break down (and they will), they sound great, and usually last 4-10 years before they die.

If you want actual good sound, get a pair of JBL LSR305's. That's a more costly proposition in Canada than it is in the US. If you want something a hair cheaper, you can pop into a Long & McQuaide (they're all over Ontario) and pick up a pair of Yorkville YSM5 studio monitors. Or, if you'd rather spend even less than that, hop on Amazon and get a pair of Presonus Eris 4.5's. They sound damn good for the money. (btw I have listened to all of these speakers I'm mentioning I'm not pulling any of this out of... you know)

I do not like the Audioengine speakers. For the price of the A2's you can get the Eris 4.5 which sounds at least twice as good IMO.

If Klipsch still made the IFI (God those were spectacular) I would recommend them but alas they are out of production.

Well that ends that idea lol
I guess in the end its a fair bit of work for little reward. Ill put those speakers in my car next summer.

Since ill have more desk space soon, ill start looking for a good desktop speaker setup

I have actually tried this. My buddy had a pair of Audiobahn AW1206T (or something similar, he bought them used and this was a long time ago) and some decent Kenwood 200w speakers that he pulled from a Neon he wrecked. He and I built a plywood enclosure and used a couple of car amps. As TOCN explained, the result was much less impressive that we expected. It didn't cost us anything but time and some scrap wood, since he already had the speakers and amps, so I feel lucky that I learned first hand.

It would be a fun project no doubt, but I realize too that I don't even have the space for the speaker box other than by my feet