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BTW-I've been told i have a "wierd ear" - so seriously, FWIW. i started with the factory amp and 6.5 woofs in the front door, stock head unit and stock speakers everywhere. it sounded OK, but i wanted just a little more detail so i replaced the 3.5's in the dash with boston acoustics FX's. i covered the 3.5 mounting spots with dynamat and put some polyfill in the dash below the speakers just for good measure. indeed i got more detail, but then noticed 2 more problems. first, the gap in frequencies between the dash speakers and the 6.5's in the doors is very noticeable. what i mean by that is - the 3.5's don't roll on frequency-wise until way after the 6.5's roll off. secondly, the added high-end of the boston's actually made the system too bright. i could turn the treble down, but that dropped the detail i thought i'd picked up.
So - a'splicing i did go. into the 8-pin din to get the line-level outputs from the head unit. i put an alpine mrv-f357 (5 channel amplifier) in the trunk. installed boston pro 6.5's (component speakers) in the front with the midbass in the front-door stock location and the tweeters in the 3.5 location in the dash... firing strait up just like the stock 3.5's did. didn't need the factory amp anymore, so i mounted the ba x-over's on abs plastic where the factory amp used to be. i was proud of that install. then i listened for a couple minutes. Talk about harsh. I'd just spend a load on equipment, and it sounded like garbage. Even with the tweeters wired out-of-phase and x-over for tweeter set at -6 (lowest tweeter volume setting) - they were still WAY too loud. think about it - they're up there in the dash - hitting off the glass and a-piller - it's like a horn-loading effect. so i decide to power them separately - i used the crossover on the tweeter, and ran the midbasses strait from the amp - crossed over at 110hz. after dynamatting the front doors, finally i had the detail i wanted, but the image was all wrong. i could close my eyes and tell exactly where the tweeters were... and there was STILL a big gap between the midbasses in the door and those little tweeters.
in desperation, i picked up another pair of front speakers - some boston SL65's (2-way's). WAY cheaper than boston pro's... and instantly, i'm really close to a good stage in the front. problem now is that the high's are confused... they're coming from everywhere... down in the doors, up in the dash... each arriving at my ears at different times.... it just wasn't crisp. i noticed that it became more precise the more i turned those dash tweeters down. optimum setting for me was dash tweeters playing really low, aimed at the opposite-side person's ear. in other words, driver dash tweeter is aimed at the passenger's left ear. passenger dash tweeter aimed at driver's right ear. turned down so low, you can't tell they're even playing until you put your head right next to them. sweet image finally.
so with this nice image up front, i began wondering how much better it could sound with a nice head unit. my brother had a cheaper nakamichi (35z) sitting around, so i put it in just to see. bummer - i was hoping to NOT hear the difference, but sadly i could. As much as i love the "stock" look and functional steering wheel controls... i craved the clarity and purity a little more... seriously - i debated this decision for months. finally, i gave in to the dark side and got a nakamichi cd400. in a world of flashy, do everything except sound quality head units, this one stood out to me. it doesn't even plan mp3's (but it's got aux-in, and dual 24-bit dac's - so who cares!!) also, you can set illumiation to orange display w/green buttons... very similar to the 9-3 dash. simply - the nak rocks. it's sensitive to scratches... but it's such a smooth, rich, full sound. fm's not bad either.
step forward a couple months and i replace the rear speakers with boston NX69's and get a JL 10" mounted in a sealed box in the hatch. it sounds even better but during those months i've noticed that while the stage is great in the front, and the detail is all there... the balance up there is messed up. no matter how i adjust the bass/mid/treble of the nakamichi, i can't get the right balance of low-bass/bass/mid-bass/midrange/upper-midrange/lower-treble/upper-trebble.
so that brings me to this weekend.. when i installed one of the cheapest eq's on the market, a brand name in memory of class 900's... a CLARION EQS744. after some initial ground-loop noise, i've worked most of those issues out and i'm now enjoying cd's i haven't heard in years... and hearing things i've never heard before on those cd's. I've also got 1/2 of a custom fiberglass enclose for the sub complete... but after all these trials... motivation to complete it is scarce. plus it's getting hot and that re-breather isn't nice on 90 degree days.
SO - if you think you might have a "wierd ear" too consider this: were i to do it all again, i'd skip the 3.5's AND components and go strait for coax's in the doors. a nice pair of coax's in the front doors.. decent rear speakers, a nice 4-channel amp, and a head unit of your choice should do the job. if you're the understated type... i'd suggest the nak, unless you can afford one of those super-sweet $1000-$2000 decks by mcintosh/denon(rockford)/alpine(not cheap alpine, but 24-bit). if you don't mind chrome and flashy nightlife, pick a nice sounding deck with a 6-or-7 band EQ built-in and you should be set. Clarion even has some 24-bit units for fair prices now - DXZ745MP i think?
posted by 64.12.11...
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