Hey

[J.W.]

What's up ya'll. My name is J.W. and I'm from Northwest Florida. I went to school at Tulane in New Orleans (1998-2002) and got a degree in Finance. Played ball for a couple years of my college career and then bartended the last two. Now I'm a Financial Planner back here in my hometown. My hobbies have always been messing with computers and audio/video.
I recently bought a 1984 Toyota 4Runner. The truck is sweet. It has a quality Rancho suspension lift with 33" BFG Mud Terrains (not necessarily a big fan of huge tires, but this one looks nice). Besides that, the paint, and a new engine I had put in, everything is original and in mint condition. Unfortunately, "everything" includes the stereo. The guy I bought it from put some cheap Polk speakers in a year or two ago (2-way 4"'s in front and 3-way 6x9's in back), but the Head Unit is stock '84 AM/FM Cassette baby! I've managed to get by these past few months by mounting my palm pilot to the dash and playing mp3's through a cassette adapter, but it still sounds like a 1984 tape player.
I finally decided it was time to upgrade. Whereas anything worth doing is worth doing right, I got on the internet and attempted to learn about car audio because I knew absolutely nothing at the time. I stumbled upon the ecoustics.com forum and could not believe how helpful everyone was there. By reading the past posts, asking questions, and reading info on sites like http://www.bcae1.com, and then finding this forum, I've learned more in the last couple weeks than I thought I ever would. I also learned that I have barely scratched the surface of all that's out there in car audio. I'm moving in the right direction though, and having fun doing so.
I recently purchased the Alpine CDA-9827 and UPS tells me it will be here Tuesday Nov. 30. I'm pumped. Next, is are the components for the front. Looking at Crysal Audio, Infinity Kappas, or Alpines. Then a 4 channel amp and one 10" sub with my own custom box. I've also decided to put sound deadener in the 4Runner. Not only will it help with music, but also roadnoise in general for the ole' beast.
I though I was going to spend a ton of cash to do all of this, but because of all the helpful information people have given me, and a little legwork of my own, it looks like I'll be able to have more than I imagined for about half of what I thought I was going to pay. Looking forward to learning more and sharing what I have learned so far.

[Mercedesbends69]

Welcome to the board! As far as speakers go, don't forget to take a look at Rainbow, Arc Audio, DynAudio, CDT, and Focal. Also look at the Kappa Perfects, I've heard good things about them.

[MobileAudio219]

Welcome to the forum!

Justin

[GlassWolf]

Glad ya made it over here.
as they say, God helps those who help themselves.. and so do we. :)
Always good to see someone willing to do a little research on their own instead of expecting everything to be done for them.
I appreciate that.

[Ryan from Ohio]

Welcome aboard.

The Good, Bad and Ugly list is our largest viewed thread. Usually brought up also on many different forums and I am sure it has a fair amount of links pointing to it.

[William from NOLA]

Welcome aboard.

The Good, Bad and Ugly list is our largest viewed thread. Usually brought up also on many different forums and I am sure it has a fair amount of links pointing to it.

Speaking about that thread, can we sticky that? I think that will help people find it fast since most tend to go straight for it.

[GlassWolf]

sure thing