Apologies for my complete lack of knowledge but what is the cheapest and most effective way of improving the sound system in my MY00.
I am a complete novice when it comes to ICE, but I know my system is sadly lacking.
Help!

 

Hi CLS

Upgrading speakers to start personally i would go with the best set of components you can afford for the fronts and ignore rear speaker, then next up grade head unit then amplifier then sub box. Chiark has done a very good

 

Ps The best set of speakers are necessarily the most expensive but the ones which sound best to <B>your</B> ears.

Simon

 

Thanks for that Simon I'll hopefully get myself sorted thanks to your advice

Cheers

Chris

 

CLS,

I just upgraded the head unit. This really improved the sound quality so the standard Philips unit must be poor. I haven't felt the need to upgrade the speakers.

DaveW

 

Upgrade the Head Unit, the thing in it as standard is absolutely terrible (unless you listen to the radio, in which case it is average).
I had planed on leaving the standard one in until I had the Clifford and Tracker fitted, but could not cope with it and fitted the Sony minidsc unit as soon as I got the car home and just hoped no-one stole it.
You will notice a huge difference.

 

Fit Alpine. Not the cheapest nor the dearest, but provide excellent quality, both head units and speakers.
Most of their units aren't excellent looking, but most of the lookers don't perform as well, and are more fiddly.
If you don't intend on fitting extra amps, then make sure your head unit has a good standard amp, i.e. 4x40 +.

 

Alpine? Sony? Too many fancy gadgets and flashing lights for my liking (getting old and having problems with all this new technology ).

I went for a Nakamichi single CD head unit since all I wanted to do was listen to music. Cost about the same as an average head unit plus speakers but the sound quality is very impressive

DaveW

 

Headunit first.. I've opted for alpine H-U + DDDrive speakers, sounds good (well to me anyhow)..

rgds, Alex

 

Got the new Scoob at the weekend - fantastic!!!! Stereo hopeless as predicted. First change headunit (couldn't stand the original for more than one hour). Kenwood 5080R single slot CD player - some improvement, but still horrendous. Then changed front speakers last night with 4 sq m of sound deadening in each door. Changed to Kenwood's top of the range 160mm HQ167DB - fitted straight in with original spacer splash guard trimmed only slightly - even the mounting holes in the right place. Sounds amazing. Even though they are co-ax rather than components (didn't want the hassle and all the ones in my price range had lower power handling or lower sensitivity -3db usu) the treble detail is phenomenal even without turning up the treble - the staging is correct even though the tweeter is by you fibula. And the fader set to +7/15 in favour of the fronts. All in £250 & 2 hrs work (1 hour of this spent trying to remove a VERY tight door handle screw - had to drill head off and replace it in the end). Have kept original wiring so far (cannot bear to start ripping off the splash guard). Anyway, I have the 4ch amp and sub along with shed loads of cabling to install at the end of the week. There is occasional vibration from one of the doors at present when HU turned up really high (not bad though). I reckon once there is a high pass on them it should improve. The bootlid is like a biscuit tin lid so I think the other 9sq m of soundproofing will be going on there and behind some of the carpet panels in the boot near the sub otherwise there will be an embarrassing spoiler shake sounding like a pig in a biscuit tin.

My point overall is that for £250 I am delighted with 9sqm soundproofing Kwd HQ167DB + 5080R. It makes me wonder why I bought the amp + sub, but I guess we'll soon think they are also the best thing ever.

[This message has been edited by john banks (edited 18 October 2000).]

 

I have a 4*40watt head unit and when thats up loud it causes a lot of rattles in the interior.Any one else find this?

 

Rattles: I've given in trying to stop 'em and just turn the volume up.

There's been some very good posts on how to stop/kill rattles if you search the archives.

Good luck!

 

As a follow up to my earlier post - amp and sub and metres of wiring now installed - cheated a bit and put 12V cable down L side, speaker cable, RCA, power on cable down middle. Sounds fabulous, but the input sensitivities have to be a lot higher than I thought - the headunit claims 1800mV preout in the manual, I can get 1VAC at max volume but with bass/treble etc at 0. Even so the input sensitivity is at 0.15V for the sub! Goes ape when HU volume above 20/35 with a bit of bass boost. I was a little surprised by this - maybe a 4V HU would fare better, but the quoted voltages seem optimistic. (It is all wired properly, polarity correct, good wiring, good supply voltage under load etc.) I can't decide if reversing the sub polarity makes any difference.

When played loud, the limiting factor is rattles. Today I will put some sound deadening in the boot, try and tape down this damn waterproof membrane, cable the front speakers directly rather than cheating using factory cable, and try a bit of sponge!

 

Finally finished! Sounds amazing now (to my ears anyway). Further 9sqm of sound proofing to boot floor, rear quarter and lid. The bass really kicks now (the mirror shakes Lee-style!) One inch foam to doors from local upholsterer and a bit more sound deadening. They now feel like real car doors, and no discernible rattles at all.

I bottled out again from trying to put proper speaker wiring to the doors. Instead I have connected them behind the head unit to the original wiring loom. Sounds fine though (I am sure I don't know what I am missing). I cut some 6mm MDF to wedge into the rear quater panel on the left with a retaining beam to screw into it to hold it secure near the jack. There is a gap to get to the jack and tools. The sub is then strapped to this through slots in the MDF. The amp is screwed to the top.

All in £600 including accessories, and about 15 hours work (my first install on this scale).

Thanks for all your help and advice over the last few months - both directly to me and from info given to others.

 

Well, I thought I'd finished, but I just had to persist with this speaker wiring directly to the front speakers - another fairly impressive improvement for doing so. The speaker wire was too thick to get through the existing black rubber tunnel which was quite tight to start with. There was an unused grommet on both sides above the one that leaves the car to the doors, but I had to make a small cut in the actual door grommets to get the wire through. Well worth it though!

Total cost finally worked out to £620, 17 hrs work, and the help of a heavy neighbor to help drill off a pesky screw head!