Help required..

Liz · December 22, 2005, 21:03

I have inherited with the Porker a crap stereo, a whole £54.99 worth of Kenwood Pap which keeps tuning itself into radio 4 whether I like it or not, even interupts the CD to do so, I leave it off now and listen to the Boxster howl instead...I need some help from you guys with ICE knowledge about the way to go.

I have purchased one of these....

Sony CDX-NC9950 - I won't be using the sat nav facility - its alot of dosh...but speakers and crossovers are what I need help with.

On the dash facing up towards the windscreen are 4" midrange and 0.75" tweeters - in the doors, and barely audible at the moment are 6" speakers. There is also a Nokia amp underneath the bonnet. Has anyone got any idea what I can put in to get some bass and have a nice sound. I went down to a local ICE shop and got dazzled by the neons and left with a quote for £800 s:shock: :shock: s:shock:

I am willing to pay if someone has good knowledge and they can get it sounding ok for me...

markiii · December 22, 2005, 21:10

do you have any reasonable space in teh cabin to put a sub?

any space behind teh seats?

Liz · December 22, 2005, 21:23

No to that one Mark, BOSE do a sub for the little shelf (i use the term loosely) that is below where the roof sits, that however is about £4,000 as a new option. I just missed out on a sub which someone had made for the footwell on the passenger side which was a shame, not normally pipped on ebay but I was this time s:evil: :evil: s:evil:

kanujunkie · December 22, 2005, 21:34

up behind the dash Liz?

cut into ant panels behind the seats, without piccies its hard to guess

BTW go listen to some Rainbows, you wont be sorry s8)

s8)

markiii · December 22, 2005, 21:40

how much legroom is on teh passenger side?

could you have a box made for behind teh seats? or in teh footwell, without requiring teh passenger to be a dwarf?

Liz · December 22, 2005, 22:00

Quote from: "kanujunkie"up behind the dash Liz?

cut into ant panels behind the seats, without piccies its hard to guess

BTW go listen to some Rainbows, you wont be sorry s8) s8)

I think behind the seats is the engine, sounds like it anyway, leg room is really good at the moment and I wouldn't really want to compromise it...How much are rainbows (german I believe - would match the car!) I will have a look. Just found another boxster forum and one of them has put JL 6WO subwoofers in each of the door panels and a 4" component on the dash, don't know whether he has used 4 or 8 ohm (not that I know what that means) but would that work?

markiii · December 22, 2005, 22:13

yes and no

it will work if the doors are capable of coping without rattling, I would expect you to need some serios fynamating to make them solid enough, normallly you take bass out teh dorrs.

kanujunkie · December 22, 2005, 22:16

Quote from: "Liz"I think behind the seats is the engine, sounds like it anyway

no cubby holes on a Boxter then s:roll: :roll: s:roll:

kanujunkie · December 22, 2005, 22:26

Quote from: "Liz"don't know whether he has used 4 or 8 ohm (not that I know what that means)

does this help?

m http://wolfstone.halloweenhost.com/Tech ... ching.html m

Anonymous · December 23, 2005, 10:20

If you know what you want give me a shout as I run a small internet ICE shop and I might be able to get you a good deal.

I would recommend some CDT Eurosports s8)

s8)

If you are ever near Reading come and have a listen to my demo car. It's being rebuilt at the moment but I can still give you a few ideas about what might sound good. It's running some Eurosports and the sound is superb.

Anonymous · December 23, 2005, 11:13

Liz

you can buy two speakers to go in the long cubby that runs along the top behind the seats, they go for about £80 - £100 new on flea bay with porsche surrounds and all wiring to plug directly into the porker harness

then change your dash top speakers for any good quality 4" speakers using the existing speaker mounts, then chuck the crappy paper ones away.

Door speakers I havnt looked at yet, but the main improvement I found was when I bypassed the nokia amp and took the speaker feeds directly from the HU. In the OEM set up the stock speakers are poor quality and just arnt up to handling the amp output. and ther stock HU isnt much cop either.

you may find as I did that just the change of HU will be enough if run through better speakers dash speakers?

good luck s;-) ;-) s;-)

Anonymous · December 23, 2005, 15:27

Quote from: "Liz"Sony CDX-NC9950

Excellent choice Liz. I am not a fan of Sony car hi-fi (I prefer Nakamichi and McIntoch) but this has 2 24bit Burr-Brown DACs. This is the proper stuff and sound quality is as good as a Nakamichi. I am actually thinking of getting one of these myself.

For starters, the Nokia amp will do nothing but harm the sound of this unit. I suggest you remove this amp until you can afford a better one.

Secondly, I would recommend supplementing this unit with a set of the best speakers you can afford (perhaps we could make a few suggestions if we knew your budget).

If and when funds allow, you can add an amplifier and a sub.

Edit: You can not be too careful when asking for quotations at these places. They see a Porsche, they charge an arm and a leg.

Liz · December 26, 2005, 23:41

I did say to the bloke, just because I have got a Porsche doesn't mean that I am loaded!!

I have found this sub: m http://www.alpine-electronics.co.uk/con ... d+1600#694 m

Main question, will this plug in ok with the Sony Head Unit?

I am also looking at some Rainbow speakers - but they are all the ones with combined tweeters in them, would it be ok to have 2 sets of those - one set on the dash and one set in the doors? I think I will take Perrys advice and by pass the amp as well, unless you can offer advice on a good one, this sub is nice and small and will fit high up in the passenger footwell, some Boxster owners put theirs under the seat, but no room in mine for that!

Anonymous · December 27, 2005, 09:40

The SWD-1600 will work with the Sony just fine. It is an "active subwoofer" which means it has it's own internal amp. The connections are all standard; connect the sub's line-in to the headunit's sub-out (not to be confused with the pre-out). Active subs do not sound as good as "proper" subs but they do a fine job for the price/size.

With regards to speakers, yes you can have 2 sets although it sounds like you need a set of components for the dash and a set coaxials for the doors but I would also consider one set of 3-way components (bass unit on the door and midrange/tweeter on the dash). I personally like the sounds of MB Quart and Focal but this is subjective.

As far as amps go, I am using a Genesis Profile II. It costs around £200 and it sounds awesome (at least to me) but it is not very loud. I would recommend it any time but, as before, this is subjective so listen before you buy if at all possible.

kanujunkie · December 27, 2005, 10:10

agree with Perry on by-passing the front amps, head units nowadays are more than powerful enough to run them, as for the bass unit, it'll be easy enough to rig up if you've got a non fading RCA output from the H/U,and if not you can use the RCA outputs for the rears, or a lot of sub/amp units will also allow the use of high level inputs

Liz · December 27, 2005, 12:38

Quote from: "kanujunkie"agree with Perry on by-passing the front amps, head units nowadays are more than powerful enough to run them, as for the bass unit, it'll be easy enough to rig up if you've got a non fading RCA output from the H/U,and if not you can use the RCA outputs for the rears, or a lot of sub/amp units will also allow the use of high level inputs

Not sure about the RCA bits, this is the full techical blurb on the head unit...

m http://www.sony.co.uk/view/ShowProduct. ... +CD+Tuners m

It has a specific sub plug in on the back and is controllable from the H/U...

Also what do you think of these...

m http://caraudiosecurity.com/shop/produc ... /3983.html m

I am confused when it mentions woofers, but I don't think it would be as deep a sound as what the seperate sub will give out......

kanujunkie · December 27, 2005, 20:21

You'll need to make up a standard setup, normal outputs to the crossover and then to the speakers and an RCA link to the Alpine sub. If you do decide to put in amps later Liz, then you may need to put in a splitter on the RCA outputs and balance the fade on the amps directly.

it says on the link Woofer / Midrange, this is a standard component item Liz, similar to the focals you had in the 2

Liz · December 27, 2005, 20:47

Thanks Stu, so would the bits that I have posted above be ok to start the set up with? If so I will get using my itchy credit card, one site is doing that sub for £94.99 at the moment!

kanujunkie · December 27, 2005, 21:27

yep, they'll do fine providing you have checked the sizes and space for installs, only extra you may need is a bit of wire and an RCA lead to the sub. Just remember that the Rainbows, whilst excellent speakers may not seem as powerful as a fully amped system, max output per channel will be 36Watts RMS and not the 52W as stated in the text.

Liz · December 27, 2005, 23:08

Could you give me a link to an amp which would be good for the speakers please, preferably from the people on the link for the rainbow speakers as they are the ones doing the sub mega cheap...I am such a thicky with this sort of stuff s:oops: :oops: s:oops:

kanujunkie · December 28, 2005, 09:01

i'm afraid that when it comes to amps you pretty much pay for what you get as with a lot of things in life. if i had to recomend something then it would be from Rockford Fosgate or Audiobahn, but thats simply because they're the ones i have any experience on and not because of any other reason and i would like to point out that the Rockford one i was installing to cost a hell of a lot of money and was being fitted to a Boeing 757! so it would sound differently anyway. If i were you Liz, try sending a pm to Vspec, he's got some contacts who may still have some Bazooka stuff left over and for what you want they'll be fine. Hope that helps and i'm sorry if it sounds backoffish but i wont recommend something i've never heard.

Liz · December 28, 2005, 10:04

Thats a fair enough comment and I appreciate what you, and everyone has done so far, just one more question when I am asking about amps, do I need a 2 or 4 ch one?

kanujunkie · December 28, 2005, 10:36

you've only got 2 channels out of the H/U but 4 speakers, so you can split the signal and go to a 4 channel amp or 2 x 2channel ones, really makes no odds except for the balance side. If you go for a 4 channel one make sure you can still adjust the fade on it, otherwise you may end up with a blast of noise but no direction from it. 2 channel ones will have a loudness control that will effectively allow the adjustment of this. Just an idea though Liz, i'd be tempted to see what you think of a direct output from the H/U amps are easy enough to add later and you may be happy enough without them, plus looseing a big cost

Liz · December 29, 2005, 17:59

Have ordered my bits and pieces now...had a quote today for £300 fitting, good price? We are going to by pass the amp for now but leave it so as an amp can be fitted if necessary, the sub is going behind the drivers seat now otherwise it will get kicked, lord help me it has a neon on it s:oops: :oops: s:oops: ......do you know anyone who would do it cheaper!!?

kanujunkie · December 29, 2005, 18:14

Quote from: "Liz"......do you know anyone who would do it cheaper!!?

how about for a beer! s:wink: :wink: s:wink: