Stereo upgrade advice, different emphasis

[freidawg]

Hey team, this is a great forum. I am inspired by some of the stereo upgrades you guys are doing. I'd love to see/hear some of these systems. I've been a car stereo nut since 1978. (The Pioneer Supertuner Cassette player was the shizz back then).

My truck has the RF system and the bench seat. It just sucks when you turn the volume up. That sub is a muddy sounding toy...

I am planning an upgrade, but I have a different emphasis than some folks when it comes to car stereo.

1) My truck is a king cab and I dont want to loose any cargo space. (I often load tools etc in there with the seats folded up.)

2) I have done a few aftermarket stereo systems and the one like best is in my BMW 2002 with twin custom sub boxes (sealed) under the back seat and 6.5" subs. (read I like tight, accurate bass, not booming thunder).

3) I dont want to drop thousands of $$. I dont need KW's of power, I don't blast it past the point of pain.

Any input is appreciated, here's what I am thinking:

Build a custom sealed sub enclosure for an 8" driver that will go under one of the front seats.

Mount a 5 channel amp (or two amps) under the other seat. Don't need tons of juice, but good quality gear. Whats the good stuff these days?

Get a high quality set of separates for the front (6 1/2 or 6 3/4 mid bass. choices in 6x9's seem to be limited, MB Quarts used to be too bright are they still?) match the rear door speakers to the front (maybe go with co-axials from the same brand/series). Recommendations?

Good quality head unit. An Alpine unit with the IPOD controls is where I am leaning. Although they only got the user interface about 80% right. I saw on Clarion's website that they have an IPOD enabled unit coming out early next year, anyone have any details? Other choices out there?

I am one of these guys that doesnt like to drive a 5000lb truck at 75 mph while fiddling with the controls of a handheld device, so the intergrated IPOD controls are mandatory.

Changer? Who needs a changer if your whole music collection is in your IPOD. These things are going the way of the record changer.

SAT Radio: still trying to decide, probably go with XM.

Thanks in advance for any and all feedback.

Cheers,

Eric

[smoketitan]

ddont knw oyour budget but lets assume you are doing okay but dont want to break the bank on speakers

1st of all dont go through the hassle of under the front seat been there done that (four boxes) and came to find out that there is no way to eliminate the rattling inder the seat since there is no foam or fabric under the seat just open metal. and sound waves against metal are a big no no

so anyway but if you must you have a mouting depth of no ore that 5"

so that leaves you with

1) Resonant engineering 8"
2) elemental designs 9kv.2
3) image dynamics id8v3
4) kicker l78
or even a adire audio extremis 6" or RE XXX 6.5 mid sealed (these two may work under the front seat very well)


for a little fun check out the excursion video on the extremis ( the little 6")

its 10mb file http://www.adireaudio.com/Files/Extremis6.AVI


components

that all depends on your taste
sets I like

1) DLS Iridiums 6.2 (I have the 8.2 but that takes too much work)
2) focal k2p ( but the tweeter are really bright like the mbquarts)
3) morel elates--bst Ive heard but they a really expensive like 900 bucks
4) alpine spx-177r (low end in comaprsion to these but nonetheless the tweeters/crossovers are awesome-mids just okay
5) kicker ss65.2 very good set if you can catch them off ebay for around $300

spend you big money on your front speakers,and put a lesser set in the rear, once you out your sub in, the rears dont add that much to the sound stage anyway but others may think differently

I have heard all of these and they all are very nice, there are tons of other sets out there, others can chime in

If you want to keep the space I recommend taking one side of your rear cab, and put two smalll 8" subs, or 1 10" ( 11kv.2 or a id10v3.2)

for SQ , the both need small power,and small boxes. give it 0.8 cu ft and you are good

amps the best 5ch I have used

is the usamps 5600x 75x4, 200x1 into 40hm, but the sub channel can run at 2 ohm for 350w, thats enough for the two 8's or one 10

these are hard to find, but ID highly recommend to get one soon as usamps just got sold so the amps may not be as good as they once were
knuconceptz.com makes the best cost vs perfomance wire kits on the market. their power wire is excellent mroe strands (more flexible/more current) than anything on the market at half the price, rcas are nice, distro's etc..

there are many car stereo folks who have done it

do a search for stereo , aftermarket sub box to find many good ideas

good luck

[WazzuCoug]

Alpine's newest decks are capable of controlling your IPOD through the deck. It is a though since you are interested in the IPOD route. They also make many decks that are XM capable and I know of one them is a single DIN and has no external satellite tuner required. Check out http://www.alpine-usa.com/ for more info.

[bbplayajs]

I have the Alpine 7996... (for sale by the way) is this capable of controlling IPOD??

[smoketitan]

oh yeah I have the 9835/ipod controller and it works well

[WazzuCoug]

You will have to research to see if your alpine is new enough for the controller. The website I previously mentioned says it has to be a 2004 or newer alpine. I read a little bit more today and the IPOD controller is around $100 and the cheapest deck that is capable is around $200. So it looks like the cheapest you could be into it for is around $300. One cool feature is that you dont need to be able to access your IPOD with the system. you could hide it out of the way under a seat or in the glove box for security (maybe over head consule) and still use it as normal. Another plus is that the alpine will recharge your IPOD while it is in the truck... kind of a nice feature.

[WazzuCoug]

Hey smoke,

Do you have any more insight into how seamless it works? Is it really as nice and efficient to use as it seems? how about searching and finding songs?

[smoketitan]

the search is a little slow by artist or song. if you search by playlist its as fast as searching through a cd

I have to pick up another ipod after christmas (as I was using a friends for a day to test it out and I had sold my old one)

but for the few hours I messed around with it I liked it, mine is in the glove box (the unit is very small, and the wire I just ran though a hole behind the dash)

its worth the $100 (I got mine for $50 off ebay though)

but all in all the 9835 plays mp3 cdr's fine if you make the file structure right

but its nice to have all your albums at your finger tips

if you get (ipod controller) one get a deck that has the biolite screen as its hard to read the text otherwise

hope that helps

hey wazzou sorry we havent hooked up yet----having two children really cuts into my fun time--lol

did you finish your install yet??

[WazzuCoug]

No worries, God I wish I could finish. Hoping to steal some time over the holidays. To be determined...