Questions on tuning a vehicle audio system

How important and difficult is it to tune system components like the amp(s), channels, speakers and subs etc and are there any good sources on how. By importance I mean will most components have decent sound and be stable without expert tuning? I have the Sony 9500 HU and when I purchase the rest of my system I want to get the most out of it.

I posted this in another thread but even though I am a network / systems admin by trade car audio intimidates me a bit because of lack of knowledge. I am still in the research mode as to what components I want. I am used to getting thrown into projects, and just for fun below is a picture of a sound mixer I was asked to setup at work and I had a huge learning curve there. That thing will still do more than I am capable of getting out of it without an audio engineers degree.

 

At low volume an un tuned system may be tolerable even if not sounding great but when you start to crank it it will get funky and you could damage drivers if sending a heavy distorted or dirty signal for extended periods.

It isn't hard. I have no background in this stuff and taught myself how through research when I was still doing that stuff to my vehicles.

Sometimes you won't even realize how much the sound sucks until you set everything to give you proper imaging and staging and feel what you've missed

 

Youtube. 5 star car stereo has alot of videos on tundra audio upgrades

There are videos on how to set amp Gaines properly using a lm2020 oscilloscope they are around $80 on Amazon

 

https://www.tundras.com/threads/small-audio-storm-trooper-2015-crewmax-build.20913/

 

To do it right you need a few things.

tape measure to measure for time alignment.
Spl meter to set levels. Audio tools has a great set of tools for cell phone.
A mic, umik or other similar mic. Cost about $100
Laptop with rew (free software)
Pink noise and a bit of time to spend tinkering.
The main issue is I think the Sony hu has a global eq. To really dial it in you need to be able to eq each speaker separately but you can get a nice tune with the Sony. Sorry you can actually eq each side separately which is nice. Cant do each speaker separately but lf, rf, rr, lr is nice. I guess you could actually do a nice tune with a front 2 way and eq each speaker separately with the parametric eq. You just will not have rear speakers but that is fine.

tuning is a deep hole. But with time and patience you can get a great sounding truck.