Attn: Car Audio Enthusiasts...I need some advice

[Viperoni]

Yup.
Start off with a high quality headunit.
No point in getting sweet speakers/amps if the source is distorted

 

[virtuamike]

I agree, Pioneer does have some really good stuff for this year. Check out the 7300, it's on the Pioneer car audio main page. The Pioneer Premiere 720R is nice too, like the look of the 7300 better. As far as front speakers go, I really like MB Quart, clean lows and great mids. Highs are a little sharp but you can tweak them with the head unit. Boston is nice too. Wouldn't spend too much on the rears, better to get a nice set of fronts.

 

[kumanchu]

square subs == kicker solobaric's

here are some prices most of you didn't consider:


a.) headunit - $30 labor + $15 install kit + $15 wiring harness
b.) speaker (pair) - $30-75 labor (depending on type of speaker component or coax)
c.) amp - $80-100 labor + $50 amp wiring kit + speaker wire costs

ooops didn't see that you were installing yourself

the costs of taking out your "possible" bose system will most likely be little to none, it is a "service" provided by the store, especially if they are truely a "hifi" store, because they want your business. most of these places also offer free uninstallation of anything installed by them if you want to later sell your car.

now with that said, a new headunit and new speakers is probably all you can afford. remember be reasonable. listing brands doesn't help, as all brands have their strong units and their poor units. the absolute best way to choose your audio equipment is for you to go and have them all demo'd. Listen to the head unit you want with the speakers you want, and if you are happy, then go for it; if not, then try another combination within your price range. remember no audio store will have these prices listed WITH their speakers/headunits/amps, they will tell you AFTER the fact you have found what you wanted. I used to install professionaly and used to compete in sq as a amature. If you aren't trying to compete, just make yourself happy. don't settle for second rate components, get the best of what you buy, and you can build your system slowly. getting a quality head unit and quality set of speakers will be a better decision in the long run, especially if you will upgrade later.

I would recommend first upgrading your headunit to something along the lines of this:

AIWA CDC-MP3 headunit - voted one of the best headunits of 2000. can play mp3 cd's as well. OT the sony MDX-C800REC was a headunit also voted one of the best headunits ( this particular unit is a MD player tho) just thought i'd mention that for all the anti sony headunit people the aiwa unit goes for about 300 bux or thereabouts.

image dynamics chameleon separates - just do your fronts first, and then your rears later, or if you can goto total $800 get your rears as these too. they go for 250 a pair or thereabouts, and i must say that these are "very very naiiice", there is a reason why Image Dynamics wins a lot of sq (sound quality) competitions.

 

[mpg]

Thanks, I'll probally get it done at bestbuy or something where people dont hand off your address to theifs. Where is the best place to buy the headunit at low price the pioneer one looks nice, but I can't tell by the picture where exactly the CD goes.

 

[virtuamike]

On the Pioneer, the face folds down and there's a slot that the CD goes in.

Please please please stay away from the Aiwa!!! If you have a burner, better to just make audio CD's. Sure the Aiwa can decode MP3's but as far as sound quality it is pure crap! The Pioneer sounds much better, more options too. Besides, Sony and Clarion have MP3 units on the way, only ones currently on the market right now are the Aiwa and Kenwood, so just wait if you're planning for an MP3 unit. Who actually voted the Aiwa #1??? I'd like to see a car with an Aiwa HU in a sound comp.

 

[Viperoni]

IF you can afford it, go Image Dynamics.
Keyword = IF

'Nuff said.

And BTW:, who's "Aiwa"???

 

[mpg]

Ok tomarrow I have a choice of either Circuit City or Best Buy and I can basically get anything in the 800-900 range ... after installation/wire fees. Parents are maxing out CC's so I think they will be lienent about the price. SUGGESTIONS PLEASE! I'm pretty set on going to best buy they are much better, I think and they are open till 9PM i dont know about Circuit city. I'm so happy! I especially want to hear from kumanchu!

 

[kumanchu]

if you are going to enter any sound comp, then i would not go with a pioneer 7300. i would go with something like a kenwood Kenwood eXcelon Z919. i used to compete with its older brother the 911. If you are also trying to say that carsound doesn't know what they are talking about, why don't YOU write for a nationaly syndicated mag? a Kenwood eXcelon KDC-X615 or KDC-715S
go for around 350 and would beat the pants off of a pioneer DEH-P7300. but like i said before, don't go with just OUR advice, go and listen and find what you think sounds best; your opinion my vastly differ from ours.

and since you ARE thinking about letting the BB people install let me give you a few words of advice about that too. First, i have yet to find an installer at BB to be competent. They are able to do VERY basic installs, like head units, and factory sized speakers, and basic amp installs, i of the apprx 8 bb installers i've talked to, only 2 of them said they knew how to make a simple amp rack, or to make custom enclosures and such. The best idea is to talk to the installers, and see if they have any pictures of anything they have installed themselves, NOT pictures of what their "shop" has installed, since their "shop" could be any BB install bay. Goto a few real car audio places, take a look at their garage, and projects they are working on. look at the quality of instalation of their real high end stuff, cleanliness of install, how well it is layed out, how well the fabrics have been stretched over custom surfaces, how stable it is, and especially how good it sounds. and since you are looking to get good speakers, i highly recommend dynamating around the speakers, for the few extra dollars you have to pay for these 1'x1' sheets of dynamat, they are well worth it.

 

[BigLance]

<< Strokers are for the weak anyhow, so go stroke it. >>



LOL, yea I dont like them either !

Check out these sites for Car Audio
CarMedia1
Sound Habit
SQ Audio
Woofers ETC.
Matrix Car Audio

 

[mpg]

Like I said I HAVE to go to one or the other store I'm thinking of getting just head unit and speakers now (possibly a amp). I don't know if my dad is ready for the price it will cost but it doesn't matter because they are getting rid of their CC's. I saved most of the recommendations and will print them out tonight and bring it with me tomarrow when I get my system. I suppose I can't get dynamat installed at BB?

Basically I will be happy with BETTER than I have now. Because my civic is only AM/FM and cardboard speakers, horrible. Can anyone recommend any amps also? Does anyone know what kind of supplys (brands and such) they have at Best buy?

 

[kumanchu]

if you are going to go BB, they can do the dynamating there too. dynamat is easy, if you passed kindergarten, can use scissors and a hair dryer, you can install dynamat around your speakers. you basically cut out the area in the middle so that your speaker JUST fits into it
then peel of the back, and stick it onto your door like a big sticker. then you sick your hair dryer on it to cure it.

if i were to choose between Best Buy and Circuit City, i would have to say go Circuit City. Depending on where you are, they will have a regional garage that is REALLY REALLY good. I have met a bunch of installers that are highly qualified from there, they train much harder than i expected, but like i said, talk to the installers. and since you ARE going to either a cc or bb, when you go there, talk to other sales reps in other departments that look young, more likely than not, they have taken advantage of their discounts on the stuff, and will know which installer is best, at least at the store. component wise, i would have to say that circuit city has better stuff, higher quality, and some of their installers know custom work, hell I was one for a while ^_^. i also worked the bb route, talked to other installers that worked there and left pronto. right now, bb carries rockford fosgate amps/speakers. if installed correctly they will sound pretty good. circuit city has MTX amps and speakers that sound good, and as always, the bottom line of any particular brand will still sound like crap, so stay away from the Road Thunder MTX, and the lower end PUNCH amps and such from RF.

At the chicago auto show i got to talk to the installers of the Rockford Fosgate Demo vehicle (nissan truck, i think it was a frontier) and was the only one allowed to check out their instal tee hee (insider connections kick butt). It sounded pretty nice. I competed with MTX for a while, before moving on to ID. ID has to be my fav as of yet, but they can only be found in true hard core car audio stores, neither bb or cc carry them at the moment. but IF i was constrained to stick with either of the stores and the stuff they carry, i would have to vote cc hands down. i would also look at the polk audio speakers and such while you are their (BB doesn't carry polk either). Polks have very nice sound, and are very controlled speakers, i love their voice i used to have polk db separates all over my car ^_^, they are the predecessors of the polk momo series, and have little relation with the dx series past cosmetics. the dx series still sounds great, but the db/momo sound sometimes wants to make me melt. as far as headunits go, they will be pretty much the same at cc and bb, with cc having a better selection, and higher quality stuff, such as the kenwood excelons and the crazy expensive alpines. I would also warn you not to get any of their double din stuff. they look cool, are insanely expensive, but have crap for processors. high end single din head units tend to sound much better, and are of better construction. you will be able to hear the pioneer the other boys were talking about head to head against the kenwoods i was talking about at CC, and i don't think that BB carries both.

i hope you are happy with your decisions with what you buy. if you need any other advice feel free to email.

 

[mpg]

I should call you on my cell phone (free ld) while I'm at BB or Circuit City! Let me know i'm PST did i mention my car is 98' civic if that makes any difference.

 

[kumanchu]

call me??? i can't hear that well over cell phone anyway ^_^. no really, from here on it really SHOULD be YOUR decisions. you are the one that is going to live with them, not me ^_^. i just wanted to arm you with info to make educated decisions at least ^_^.

in the end, all you want is to please yourself, not me. but if you need advice you can email me and i will send you my cell number if you want.

 

[mpg]

whats DIN?

 

[mpg]

I don't want to be suckored into crap is the only problem.

 

[kumanchu]

a single DIN ( i forget what it stands for) is about the size of a 5.25 drive, a bit larger, but you get the general idea. just about every head unit made is single din.

double din would take up twice the space vertically, like in a computer, if a drive were to take up 2x 5.25 spaces; one on top of the other. granted they LOOK nice and offer lots of features, but you pay for features that are generally pretty useless and don't get the sound quality you could from other similarly priced single din head units.

 

[Z24]

What do people think about Eclipse? They are low on flashy bells and whistles, but high on quality.

 

[mpg]

My dad said its cool if we goto circuit city. Higher quality equipment cool.

 

[mpg]

what exactly do you mean by &quot;flashy bells and whistles, but high on quality&quot;? I suspect you are talking about headunit but if you are talking about speakers I don't understand.

 

[mpg]

Oh ya I live in Los Angeles.

 

[Z24]

yeah, sorry. referring to headunits, although they make speakers and amps aswell.

check out their webpage here

Read the stuff about the &quot;Eclipse Commander&quot; too... some crazy stuff!

 

[kumanchu]

eclipse is a division of fujitsu-ten. they are a quality company, and worth looking at, BUT you won't find eclipse units at either CC or BB. they would be in stores where you would find Image Dynamics and the likes; specialty car audio stores.

and what z24 means, is that though the eclipse headunits don't have lots of flashy functions, it excells in what its supposed to do; produce solid sound.

i'm sure that in LA you can find hifi car audio stores IF you wanted. they tend to be a bit more expensive, but carry the true HiFi equipment. but for MOST cases, going to CC will be fine, as they will have plenty of stuff within your range ^_^. also i forgot to mention that eclipse is a bit expensive.

 

[Zucchini]

500-600 budget? Ouch Car audio is pretty expensive for anything halfway decent. For speakers i would suggest infinity or higher end polks, they use silk dome tweeters, no harsh highs in my experience. They tend to cost a pretty penny though probably $100-150 a pair or so depending on model. Rear speakers are necessary, and won't wreck your soundstage unless you have nice compound(separate tweeter on dash) in front.. most front speakers fire at your feet anyhow. The rears are more efficiently positioned, so best to get 2 or 3 way speakers. A decent headunit will cost you $150 or so, installation with all the harnesses and stuff will take another 25-40. Amps are suggested, those will take you for another $200-300.. not sure how u'd get one for 200 though. I got lucky with open boxed items for 1/2 price. Why aren't you replacing your front speakers? Best to do all 4.. factory speakers tend to suck, esp in older cars.

If you consider all the installation costs, wires harnesses, blah, it really adds up very fast.

MPG,

I also have a civic 98 Guess i'll tell u what i have. I upgraded bit by bit. 1st i went for a cheapie panasonic 40x4 peak power headunit..~140 in 1998. Harness and stuff cost about 25bux/ install was free. Combined with the cheap factory speakers it was still pretty horrible. So i had frys install 2 3way 6x9 infinity references in the rear, i installed 2 way polk ex(silk dome tweeter)in the front since those were so much easier to do. Install was 30 i think. Not enough power from headunit to sound decent or clear.. held out on buying an amp till now because of the cost. Got a sony 4 way 40x4 RMS 90peak..1/2 priced open boxed. Cables were about 25 i think, and install was 50.. it took a couple hours. It all sounds ok, my klipsch promedia's still sound better though

 

[Viperoni]

<< most front speakers fire at your feet anyhow >>



Zucchini, that's a good thing.
Having kickpanel is the first step in creating a realistic soundstage.
My suggestion: Get the headunit, and a pair of really good front speakers.
Upgrade the rears later.
Remember, the rears shouldn't play much bass, or hit any highs; I read in a car audio mag that actually rolling off the frequencies above 5k @ 3db/octave would make the front sound stage even better.
That means that you could use almost any crappy speaker, but it's always a good idea to use all the same speaker (like get polk 6.5's in the back if you have polk components in the front kinda deal), to keep the timber the same across the soundstage.

Oh, and no matter what anybody tells you, the front speakers are most important

GL!

 

[Zucchini]

Zucchini, that's a good thing.
Having kickpanel is the first step in creating a realistic soundstage.


Ok, now i'm confused. For better stereo imaging ppl ussually get components for the front.. so how would getting coaxials that fire at your feet be better?

Upgrade the rears later.

Ok, i guess you haven't seen the civic factory 6x9 paper rear speakers.. they are horrible.

As for having all 4 speakers from the same line, yes thats optimal. I used to have 4 infinity reference speakers, but the front left blew a tweeter because of my lousy head unit(b4 amp). I wanted to replace them with the newer infinity reference 6.5 2 ways, but the magnets are bigger now and don't fit at all. I had to buy the more expensive polks $150, but it was worth it.

Also, give this guy advice assuming he isn't getting a sub Subs expensive