But, just to clarify, a 400W amp has no more facility to blow your speakers than a 30W amp.

Well... sort of.

A 30 watt amp might well play as loud as you ever wanted, without capacity to let the smoke out of the speakers. The 400 watt amp would play just as loud as the 30 watt amp, and would send a cleaner signal that was less likely to cause problems. BUT... the 400 watt amp would also have the "head room" to play much louder than you ever wanted and if you were careless with the gain control, could blow up your speakers.

All in all, however, when it comes to amps, more is better. Go with bigger amp.

As for keeping the stock speakers -- that will make installation easier, but at the expense of sound quality. Think about it -- there isn't a factory speaker in that Neon that cost Dodge more than $6 to buy. A really good quality replacement speaker costs 25 times that amount, and people line up to get them. There has to be a reason for that!

tanstaafl.