Stereoupgrade gone bad...
06-09-2008, 03:25 AM
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My Ride: 2007 520dT LCI,
titansilver, advantagepack, comfortpack, coldclimatepack, 242-rims, black Daytona leather, chrome line, grey highgloss int.
Retrofit:Brink towhitch.
Upgraded audio: Audio-System Xion 200(4"mids, highs and 8"underseatsubs), JBL GTO 427´s in the ceiling and JL-Audio A4300 amp.
For the dark & snowy season: Nokian Hakka 5 studded, Hella 3003 Compact auxilary lights.
1999 523i,
Oxfordgreen, Sandbeige leather interior, style 89-rims, HiFI pro DSP, Xenon, PDC, ACC, double glazing, removable tow hitch, cold climate pack, wood trim, cruise control, armrest front, Steering wheel heating, Lumbar support.
Previously owned BMWs:
1999 528iA E39
1990 735 iA E32
Hi there,
Just thought I?d share a stereo mod story gone wrong.
Since my car has the standard EU-stereo setup (6 speakers)
and it sound like crap I thought "let?s upgrade".
Bought a sweet little system from Audio System, the X-ion 200.
It?s a system with 8" shallowmount subs, 4" mids and doorpost highs.
For the ceiling I opted for a pair of JBL 427?s.
Powered it with a JBL GTO 1004 amp and ran the processing through a JL Audio Cleansweep.
All wiring from Supra.
Tapped the highlevel signal from the headunit to the cleansweep and ran the linecables to the boot
where I mounted the amp. Powered the amp straight from the battery. Tapped the remote from the headunit.
Not the ideal way since the amp stays on until the car goes to sleep but anyway.
So far so good right... I expected a real lift in sound quality after the job was done.
That didn?t happen though. What I got, and plenty of it, was interference.
After some research I found that the headunit in the standard EU-setup is impedance-sensitive.
As soon as the headunit don?t recognize the correct load from the standard speakersetup it sends out massive interference to the system.
Since I tapped into the speakerwires to feed the Cleansweep the impedanceload shifted from speakerload
to something the unit couldn?t recognize.
The reason for using highlevel in the first place is because the headunit doesn?t send any linelevel.
If it did, problem solved.....
After hours of headscratching and numerous calls to friends who works in caraudio we
came to the conclusion that this will never work....
We even tried switching the amp from the JBL to an Isotec4 BMW-modelspecific amp. No luck...
We also ran the system from an amp in another car but since we fed it the linesignal from my car the interference
was ever present.
What to do then.
Well we kept all the aftermarket speakers.
Tossed the amp and processor. Removed all the wiring.
Hooked up the underseat subs in parallell with the 4" inch mids in the doors. (The standard is connected this way....)
Passively LP-filtered the subs.
This way the headunit got it?s wanted load and the interference was gone.
The sound then.
It?s not groundshaking but definately an improvment over standard.
But it?s a waste of time and money since the system has got much higher capacity/potential than the built-in amp in the headunit
can deliver.
If anyone out there has done a succesfull mod in a car with the standard EU-setup
please let me know how you did it....
I for one will regret that i didn?t tick the logic7 box on order....
Cheers
Daniel
Just thought I?d share a stereo mod story gone wrong.
Since my car has the standard EU-stereo setup (6 speakers)
and it sound like crap I thought "let?s upgrade".
Bought a sweet little system from Audio System, the X-ion 200.
It?s a system with 8" shallowmount subs, 4" mids and doorpost highs.
For the ceiling I opted for a pair of JBL 427?s.
Powered it with a JBL GTO 1004 amp and ran the processing through a JL Audio Cleansweep.
All wiring from Supra.
Tapped the highlevel signal from the headunit to the cleansweep and ran the linecables to the boot
where I mounted the amp. Powered the amp straight from the battery. Tapped the remote from the headunit.
Not the ideal way since the amp stays on until the car goes to sleep but anyway.
So far so good right... I expected a real lift in sound quality after the job was done.
That didn?t happen though. What I got, and plenty of it, was interference.
After some research I found that the headunit in the standard EU-setup is impedance-sensitive.
As soon as the headunit don?t recognize the correct load from the standard speakersetup it sends out massive interference to the system.
Since I tapped into the speakerwires to feed the Cleansweep the impedanceload shifted from speakerload
to something the unit couldn?t recognize.
The reason for using highlevel in the first place is because the headunit doesn?t send any linelevel.
If it did, problem solved.....
After hours of headscratching and numerous calls to friends who works in caraudio we
came to the conclusion that this will never work....
We even tried switching the amp from the JBL to an Isotec4 BMW-modelspecific amp. No luck...
We also ran the system from an amp in another car but since we fed it the linesignal from my car the interference
was ever present.
What to do then.
Well we kept all the aftermarket speakers.
Tossed the amp and processor. Removed all the wiring.
Hooked up the underseat subs in parallell with the 4" inch mids in the doors. (The standard is connected this way....)
Passively LP-filtered the subs.
This way the headunit got it?s wanted load and the interference was gone.
The sound then.
It?s not groundshaking but definately an improvment over standard.
But it?s a waste of time and money since the system has got much higher capacity/potential than the built-in amp in the headunit
can deliver.
If anyone out there has done a succesfull mod in a car with the standard EU-setup
please let me know how you did it....
I for one will regret that i didn?t tick the logic7 box on order....
Cheers
Daniel
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