Yup, the original dash speaker was junk. I took it out, made a template for the spot, and stuck a pair of 4" speakers in there. I did use bass blockers so they didn't destroy themselves.
Speaker placement is something that always involves trade-offs. Kick panel speakers work but the sound is down by your ankles. My ears are on my head so that wasn't something I wanted to pursue. Speakers in the dash are a clean install but won't have the same audio quality as other locations. I went the route I did so the car mostly looks stock but sounds a whole lot better. And yes, retrosound is one of the folks that will rebuild your radio to modern specs.