Focal IS 690TOY Front Speakers Designed for Toyota

[Louisiana Overland]

I mistakenly ordered the IC690TOY instead of the IS690TOY, for my front doors.

Are they identical, minus the tweeters? Will the IC690TOY fit in the front, or just the rear doors and hatch?

Need to know ASAP if I need to amend my order.

TIA.

The ic165 is a 6.5" round coaxal that WILL fit rear doors and hatch locatiins with zero modifications.

 

[Capt.Canuck]

The ic690 is a 6x9 and will not fir rear doors or hatch. It is a coaxal speaker and will fit the front doors however the tweeter is built into it rather than separatey like the is690. The is690 is a xomponent speaker with separate tweeter that mounts in dash locations with 6x9 woofer in the door. Id change the order to is690. They will make an amazing improvement. If you use the ic680 and leave the stock tweeter I doubt you will be very impressed.

Thanks, I appreciate it.

 

[cheeser]

Just installed these speakers today...mainly a plug n play install for me...about 1 1/2 hours at a slow pace.

I chose to use a Dremel cutoff wheel to nip off a small section of the original brackets where the new brackets interfered a bit...simple. I also chose to leave the panels hanging on the door and work behind it. A bit harder to remove/install the speakers, but didn’t have to remove the window and door lock cables.

They were substantially heavier than the stock speakers...hope they are worth the cost.

 

[johnbt]

Toyota should be embarrassed about using these cheap lightweight speakers. And they sounded worse than they look. My refrigerator magnets are bigger and I got them for free.

 

[Capt.Canuck]

Just installed these speakers today...mainly a plug n play install for me...about 1 1/2 hours at a slow pace.

I chose to use a Dremel cutoff wheel to nip off a small section of the original brackets where the new brackets interfered a bit...simple. I also chose to leave the panels hanging on the door and work behind it. A bit harder to remove/install the speakers, but didn’t have to remove the window and door lock cables.

They were substantially heavier than the stock speakers...hope they are worth the cost.

Let us know your impressions once you've listened to them.

I also picked up some sound deadening sheets, so will get those put in at the same time.

 

[gordy]

With the LE JBL you guys owe it to yourselves to try filtering the front doors before going down expensive rabbit holes. The highs are there. They’re being drowned out by the front door speakers. Check out oem plus. They have plug & play in-line door filters.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

2018 LE here. I really have the opposite. The front dash tweeters over power darn near everything. So much that I have to fade one notch to the rear to pad them down. They very much overpower the front doors. I really would just like to even things out. I had a full on custom system in my 07' Sport and ran Focals throughout. I guess I still used to that.

 

[Capt.Canuck]

I just had my Focal IS690TOY speakers installed with sound deadening mat, and I'm really pleased with the upgrade.

This is the deadening mat I used.

https://www.amazon.ca/gp/product/B00URUIKAK/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o04_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

I'm no audiophile, but to me it sounds dramatically better than the stock Toyota speakers.

I also like how much more solid and substantial the doors sound when I close them now.

All in all, one of the best upgrades I've done on the 4R. Well worth the $.

 

[Millerrh]

I just had my Focal IS690TOY speakers installed with sound deadening mat, and I'm really pleased with the upgrade.

This is the deadening mat I used.

https://www.amazon.ca/gp/product/B00URUIKAK/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o04_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

I'm no audiophile, but to me it sounds dramatically better than the stock Toyota speakers.

I also like how much more solid and substantial the doors sound when I close them now.

All in all, one of the best upgrades I've done on the 4R. Well worth the $.

My exact sentiments.

 

[MikeMike5280]

Focal IS 690 TOY in 2018 TRD OR

One of the first things I noticed about the audio in my stock 4Runner was the boomy bass and muffled mids. I've been playing with "higher" quality DACs on my computer (targeted for the home recording studio market) and went back to a component stereo system at home over the last few years, so I've become accustomed to what a decent stereo should sound like to me with the EQ set flat. In the 4Runner I had to decrease bass two notches and bump up the mids two notches to get a tolerable tone. After reading this thread and a few others on this forum about the Focal IS 690 TOY speakers, I decided to give them a shot. Bought them from Crutchfield along with a set of trim pry tools. Did the install myself after watching the YouTube video posted earlier in this thread. I did NOT use any sound deadening materials. Just pulled out the factory door woofers and dash tweeters and dropped in the Focals. For me, the difference is HUGE. With the EQ set flat, bass is now tight, the mids are clear and brought forward and the highs are very clear as well. I can actually hear the individual instruments on the tracks that I've been listening to since the install. :rockon:

Quick question for those of you who installed sound deadening material: Did you install it on the inside of the door itself (on the back side of the exterior skin), over the area directly behind the door panel that has the clear plastic or both? I had read some of the materials can make maintenance inside the doors very challenging and am interested in opinions. Thanks!

 

[Louisiana Overland]

One of the first things I noticed about the audio in my stock 4Runner was the boomy bass and muffled mids. I've been playing with "higher" quality DACs on my computer (targeted for the home recording studio market) and went back to a component stereo system at home over the last few years, so I've become accustomed to what a decent stereo should sound like to me with the EQ set flat. In the 4Runner I had to decrease bass two notches and bump up the mids two notches to get a tolerable tone. After reading this thread and a few others on this forum about the Focal IS 690 TOY speakers, I decided to give them a shot. Bought them from Crutchfield along with a set of trim pry tools. Did the install myself after watching the YouTube video posted earlier in this thread. I did NOT use any sound deadening materials. Just pulled out the factory door woofers and dash tweeters and dropped in the Focals. For me, the difference is HUGE. With the EQ set flat, bass is now tight, the mids are clear and brought forward and the highs are very clear as well. I can actually hear the individual instruments on the tracks that I've been listening to since the install. :rockon:

Quick question for those of you who installed sound deadening material: Did you install it on the inside of the door itself (on the back side of the exterior skin), over the area directly behind the door panel that has the clear plastic or both? I had read some of the materials can make maintenance inside the doors very challenging and am interested in opinions. Thanks!

I used noico deadener from amazon. On the inside surface of the outer skin I used the foil lined butyl mat. There was an attempt by toyota to deaden the door with what looked like a kevlar patch glued at the center of the panel. I did not cover that patch with the mat because I feared that it may not get a tight seal to it and could bring on condensation and perhaps rust. You will have noticed the plastic liner on the outer part of the inner door frame behind the door panel. I carefully pulled that back to access the area where I applied the mat. Then reattached it. Over that entire surface I installed the noico sound deadening foam. Its about 1/4" thick and I cut out the speaker mount so that the foam also behaves as a gasket between the speaker frame and its mounting surface. I did the same for the rear doors. In the rear doors and hatch I installed the Focal IC165 TOY. Crutchfield does sell them but I was able to find them cheaper on ebay direct from Italy. You already noticed the improvement with the front door/dash install....so put your high dynamic track on and set the controls to suit your tastes and then adjust the fader to rear only and you will be very disappointed at the muck spewing from the rear speakers. Swapping them for the 6.5" focals again made a huge improvement in sound quality. There is so ething that will leave the rears lacking though. Toyota wired the rear doors and hatch in series. By doing that, the rear speakers might be only seeing 5-7 watts each. They will sound better, but you probably already discovered with the fro ts that they really come alive as you apply more volume....more watts. My guess is that Toyota did this to prevent low ohm load on the factory head unit.

I decided to add an amplifier. I installed a JL Audio xd700/5 v2. Its a 5 channel amp with 100 watts per channel at 2 ohm rating. I think 75 watts per at 4 ohms. The rears are an 8ohm load since they are in series so my rears are sharing less than 75 watts. Im still toying with the idea of reconfiguring that rear wiring to parallel which would be a 2 ohm load...I think. Then they would share 100watts. This would of course put the front /rear volume out of balance and that can be corrected by lowering the input gain on the amp for the rear channels which would decrease any chance of distortion. The 5th channel on the amp is a 300 watt subwoofer channel that I will hopefully utilize eventually. Between the amp and head unit I installed a processor. It drops the output signal from speaker level to line level to a safe voltage to input into the amp. These can be simple or complex. I used an audison bit ten processor. It has adjustable inputs to avoid distortion. It also has the ability to de-eq the signal from the head unit. That is, it flattens the frequency of the signal by removing any equalization that toyota engineered. A usb port allows adjustments via laptop/software to "tune" the system. Theres multiple options for crossovers, time alignment, and 24band equalizer for EACH channel. After my install I brought it to an audio shop and they used a microphone and test tones to tune the system. They created 5 different tunes. One being "flat". The sound quality is unbelievable.

 

[12Bravo4R]

My only issue with the Focals...

The reflection of the tweeter brackets drives me nuts, especially when driving at night and it gets reflected every time I drive past a street light. Happens on both sides.

I know the fix is to paint/wrap them...Ive just been too busy to get to it.

...and for the life of me I cant figure out why some pics get rotated?

 

[Justin M]

I decided to add an amplifier. I installed a JL Audio xd700/5 v2. Its a 5 channel amp with 100 watts per channel at 2 ohm rating. I think 75 watts per at 4 ohms. The rears are an 8ohm load since they are in series so my rears are sharing less than 75 watts. Im still toying with the idea of reconfiguring that rear wiring to parallel which would be a 2 ohm load...I think.

Hey, just to clarify so when/if I add an amplifier for the front set of speakers only, do I need a two channel or four channel? It sounds like somehow you wired one channel per set of woofer and tweeter. How does that work? Do I run the wires in series?

Thanks

 

[Soccer13]

Is this a pretty good improvement over stock without adding an AMP to power them? Im getting mixed reviews on FB about it not making a difference unless you add them with an amp

 

[MidnightOffRoad]

Having done this sorta venture on my Ford (which has a woeful system that's WAY WAY worse than Toyota), what I found is that Focal is very popular, but for what you pay, you're nearly to the price of some gear that's much better than even Focal.

I'd check out Hertz. They have several lines of speakers, but even their economy speakers blow Focal out of the water in terms of performance, materials, etc.

Without pushing an amp, you won't notice a huge difference between the Focal and Hertz, but under power, there's a HUGE difference.

Of course, just about anything beats most non-premium factory systems, but if you pay $270 for Focal and the similar dimension components from Hertz is say $300, I recommend spending the additional 10% for something that's appreciably better.

 

[Bar4x4]

Night and day difference. I also added sound dampening while i had the doors apart. It also sounds substantially better after the speakers are broken in a bit. Mine took a week or two.

 

[MidnightOffRoad]

Is this a pretty good improvement over stock without adding an AMP to power them? Im getting mixed reviews on FB about it not making a difference unless you add them with an amp

Any upgrade to speakers is going to be a larger improvement under more power.

The problem with cheaper components is that they begin to distort quicker under more power.

If you're not going to add an aftermarket amp, then a simple swap of speakers will make a noticeable difference.

If you're going to push more power, I'd recommend finding a speaker that performs better than Focal. Focus on RMS (continuous power) instead of peak power. Next look at the range. Wider range and lower for things like large(er) speakers like 6.5s and 6x9"s is better.

 

[Louisiana Overland]

Any upgrade to speakers is going to be a larger improvement under more power.

The problem with cheaper components is that they begin to distort quicker under more power.

If you're not going to add an aftermarket amp, then a simple swap of speakers will make a noticeable difference.

If you're going to push more power, I'd recommend finding a speaker that performs better than Focal. Focus on RMS (continuous power) instead of peak power. Next look at the range. Wider range and lower for things like large(er) speakers like 6.5s and 6x9"s is better.

The front focals made a tremendous improvement in sound quality for me. An amp is not required. I did want a bit more volume, so I later put focals in rear doors and hatch and then added a 100 watt per channel amp. I used focal IC165 toy at all rear locations. With a front set only on factory power you should see a big improvement in clarity and deep punchy bass. Very clean sounding. I also sound deadened the doors. You might get different results without that.

 

[97BlackAckCL]

Is this a pretty good improvement over stock without adding an AMP to power them? Im getting mixed reviews on FB about it not making a difference unless you add them with an amp

Any speaker with a real magnet is going to be an improvement, as long as they're decent quality. I personally think the Focals are way overpriced, but I do all my own wiring. For true plug and play the Focals seem like the way to go, I just refuse to pay that much for speakers

 

[V2009]

The front focals made a tremendous improvement in sound quality for me. An amp is not required. I did want a bit more volume, so I later put focals in rear doors and hatch and then added a 100 watt per channel amp. I used focal IC165 toy at all rear locations. With a front set only on factory power you should see a big improvement in clarity and deep punchy bass. Very clean sounding. I also sound deadened the doors. You might get different results without that.

I was thinking about doing IS690 in the front and IC165 in rears and hatch, along with sound deadening. Will it sound good enough without the amp?

 

[12Bravo4R]

I was thinking about doing IS690 in the front and IC165 in rears and hatch, along with sound deadening. Will it sound good enough without the amp?

Yes. 165's in the hatch are next for me.