I set up my vehicle with a aftermarket head unit that is rated at 220 watt and is putting 50 watts out to each speaker. Currently my door speakers are Kenwood four way 6" circles but my rear speakers are fusion Encounter 6x9 two way speakers part # FES-692.

As of now I have a speaker out back that is making a rattling noise that I believe to be a tweeter that has finally went out after 8 years of use. My problem is now that I dont want to put speakers in the car that will sound worse than the ones I got. I lucked out getting such a great sounding speaker to begin with.

Currently those speakers I dont have the rating for them other than they are 260 Watt with a 4 Ohm impedance. The guy from fusion said that those speakers are more around 75 Watts rated power.

Question I have is would going with a lower rating wattage be beneficial for me? Currently theses 6x9`s are mounted in the rear shelf and my large trunk is acting like a large speaker box. But my friend at work was saying a smaller magnet in a larger box can produce a better sound than a bigger magnet in a larger box that is not getting the rated wattage.

So in my case if the speakers I had are 75 watt rated and I am only putting 50 watts to them then would I see a increase in performance by going with ones rated at 55 watts and put 50 watts to them while using the same style "enclosure"?

Currently my two options are as follows.

Fusion Encounter - EN-FR6931
Crossover Type - 1st Order
Frequency Response - 28Hz to 24kHz
Peak Power - 310Watts
Rated Power - 55 Watts
Sensitivity - 89dB
Voice Coil Impedance - 4Ohm

or

Fusion Performance - PF-FR6930

Crossover Type - 1st Order
Frequency Response - 26Hz to 27kHz
Peak Power - 450Watts
Rated Power - 75Watts
Sensitivity - 90dB
Voice Coil Impedance - 4Ohm

Personally I keep leaning towards sticking with the Fusion Encounter series even though the guy I talked with from Fusion said my old Encounter speakers are rated at more like 75 Watts while the new ones are rated at 55 Watts. i think this would be a better route for me due to cost but I just wonder if I could get improved sound response by going with a speaker rated wattage that is closer to my radio`s out put. I orignally went with theses speakers cause I planned on running an amp which I dont think I would do now.

 

Unless you really want to get off in the weeds it's tough to take manufacturer claims about power output seriously and then, making comparisons between different manufacturers plus, the same applies with the power handling ratings between different speaker manufacturers. Even the nominal ohms is a moving target. Just use plenty of clean power with good speakers with some kind of matching of power ratings. A 200 watt amp with a 50 watt speaker is OK, a 50 watt amp with a 200 watt speaker would be risky.

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Well I dont have a amp and the speaker that I currently am using that I am throughly sastified with is made by Fusion, its a old Fusion Encounter 6x9 speaker. The man from Fusion I talked with said the old Fusion Encounter 6x9`s were closer to 75Watts. The new Fusion Encounter that I looked at which is now a 3 way vs the 2 way I have currently is only rated at 55 Watts. If I go with the Fusion performance series of speakers they are rated at 75 watts. I just wonder if I should go with the Fusion Performer or stick with the Fusion Encounter even though the one I have were rated at a higher wattage than the new ones.

My big concern would be the sound quality and how loud I can turn my radio up. Typically I keep my radio around 40 on volume with 50 being the max. No distrotion and crisp sound. But I am afraid some what that if I go with a 55 watt rated modern day Fusion Encounter 6x9 it might distort at the volume level I typically run at. Like wise my friend at work who was into audio many years ago was telling me that a 75 watt speaker being given 50 watts would not sound as good as a 50 watt speaker receiving 50 watts from the radio.

Currently I know I dont need a huge magnet nor a huge power house speaker as the encolosure its going in is basically the trunk itself as its mounting in the rear shelf in the oem factor 6x9 location. So I should in theory be able to run a smaller magnet speaker at lower wattage and still get great sound.

I am just not a speaker or a audio guru so I want to ask those that know more to help out. I think I lucked out getting sound quality that I loved and impressed many people with getting theses fusion speakers considering the were close out speakers on sale for $20 for a pair.

 

Like I said, you can't believe anything when it comes to stuff like that. You said yourself you aren't a real fanatic on audio. And it's all hype and BS. You get what you pay for. Good gear is expensive. Buy it, use it, play good music.

Consider though, that if you have a 20 watt amplifier, and you work all summer detassling corn to get a bigger amplifier. The new one is 40 watts! Wow.

Twice as many watts means - twice as loud right?

No! It takes about TEN times as much power for a perceived doubling in the loudness of sound. So there is no way to really make a distinction between a 50 or a 75 watt amp.

If they are of equal quality you'll never hear a difference. Then, they can cheat. The "50 watt" amp may run rings around the "75 watt" amp. One company uses industry accepted standards, the other fails to mention or in small print "20% THD @5kHz" you either have to do your homework and learn the specs, or forget it.

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Blown speakers can also be indicative of the power amp not producing enough power to play at an acceptable listening level for an individual.

When/if a power amp sees distortion or a clipped signal from the pre-amp that's a spike of a level massively higher than the power amps rated output, albeit for only a nano-second but still of sufficient wattage to cook most any speaker.

When it comes to rating power amps as Tedstar9 says wattage isn't all that meaningful UNLESS said power amp can/does also produce sufficient current to push high-capacity speakers to their nominal sound levels.

Also as Tedster9 says so much of the ratings are pure BS making it tough to really compare and weed out all the claims manufacturers make regarding such things.