i think that speakers sound like shyt when powered from the HU. power your speakers from a large class AB amp and they will fawking sing! trust me. whenever i power speakers from an HU i'm disappointed. put them on a nice, clean, large amp, and you will smile.

just be careful with your gains. you have TOTAL control over how much power they get. with component speakers, bass is a delicate setting. too much and you can damage the speakers. too little and it sounds weak. a good multi-band eq can do wonders. using a DMM to set gains is a nice, easy method. just download a non-clipping 50Hz test tone. burn it to a CD. then play it through the system. use the DMM set to VAC to measure voltage on the amp terminals. look at the wattage of your speakers. try to set the output of the amp when the HU is at the highest setting you will use (not usually the actual max volume). the number on the DMM is RMS Voltage.

the equation for determining the RMS Voltage corresponding to the desired wattage is given by the following equation:

Wattage = Voltage^2 / Resistance

4 ohm speakers
Want 100W RMS

Voltage = SQRT (Wattage * Resistance)


Voltage = SQRT(100W * 4) = SQRT(400) = 20V RMS.


For subs, i use 10AWG under 1000W.