Looking For A Little Advice...

[tipsy Jock]

Evening guys,

I'm looking for a little bit of help from you audio experts out there. I've recently been given a considerable sum of halfords vouchers and since there is nothing that i need for my bike i thought i'd get a decent setup for my car.

I'm looking to spend between £150-200, it has to have an aux input so that i can route my mp3 player into it, other than that the only condition is that it has to be stocked by halfords

Now i found this one that i quite like but i don't have the first idea about head units.

Kenwood Head unit

I figured that the head unit would be the first thing to get then i would go from there so any advice on speakers would be great. I'm not looking for any max power install crap just a decent sound system so that i can crank up my tunes

Help!

cheers in advance dudes.

Edit: sod that just found that head unit on Amazon for 90 squid. Bloody halfords so stupidly overpriced! I'll buy it from there instead if its any good, advice still needed muchly guys!

Pete

[nmt_oli]

If its just a HU, sony GT 300. solid, simple, nice to look at feature full for the money.

[tipsy Jock]

The Sony looks nice, not to keen on the front mounted aux socket though.

Sony GT300

Similar price to the Kenwood too (now that i defo wont be buying it from Halfords unless mucho discount is given!)

Keep em coming dudes

Edited September 19, 2006 by tipsy Jock

[tipsy Jock]

Anyone else able to point me in the right direction? I did have a look at the Kenwood and the Sony today in Halfords, The sony was £150 and the Kenwood £199!?!?! But i've seen it for under a hundred in other places so i think i'm leaning towards that one.

Speakers people? what on earth do i need to know?

[nmt_oli]

What car have you got?

A new HU will make you factory speakers sound better FACT. If you go mad and turn the bass up to max, you WILL get distortion and prob damage the speakers though, so be warned.

New speakers will probably bring the volume down a bit as they need more power to move the cone the same distance, but they will sound better and distort less. You will still get distortion if you turn the HU right up though as the little piddly amp can't cope.

Most HU's are rated at 4x50w, this actually means 4x25W rms so any speaker with RMS up to 50 will go quite nicely, and youl get a lot out of it. If you go for some silly high power speaker the HU wont cope, and will nto drive it to high volumes. Ie, lots of distortion and possibly damage.

I thoughally recommend JBL Gto series speakers, or Infinity reference. may be a little high power wise, but the HU will be ok with them.

If you go for big components of something the HU will struggle a little, amping components is always a good idea.

[tipsy Jock]

The car's a vdub polo (R Reg), that reminds me actually i need to whack a photo into the VW thread

Its currently got speakers in the doors and then also in the dash, they sound alright with the volume up sort of about half way, i'm not looking to blast tunes out i just want it to sound good when i turn it up a bit to wake me up a bit on the way to work in the morning lol.

What i might do is get the head unit first (probably the Kenwood as i can't see much difference between them in spec and they are the same price on a nice site i found on the hoobynet) then maybe play around with that and then go for some speakers.

Pete

[nmt_oli]

ahh, you have factory components! no rear speakers at all? i woul dbe surprised if it didnt with factory comps.

you could just uprate the main (door) speaker, but the balance between the woofer and tweeter may be affected, so its best to replace with a set of components, but as i said off a HU you can suffer from low volume as they need a bit of humph. They will work, and sound good up to a certain volume but will distort easily unless amped.

If you have no rear speakers, i reccomend putting a co-axial speaker of the relavent size into the factory space to maximise the fact the stereo has 4 channels. If your not worried about sound staging too much, throwing speakers into a parcel shelf (as long as there mounted right) can provide good results for not a lot of money, but looks a bit chavvy and brings the soundstage back a lot.

See how it sounds with the new HU before committing to speakers anyway.

[tipsy Jock]

No rear speakers pour moi I know what you mean about looking chavvy, if it sounds dire with just front only speakers then i may put some in the back, i realise the sound stage will be entirely forward but i reckon i can deal with that.

Right i think i'm defo going to go for the Kenwood head, then go from there. I've got two mates that seem to know sound systems pretty well so i reckon i can cope with using them if things get tricky. How hard can it be to fit a stereo

[JTM]

Id say get your speakers from halfords as they are less overpriced than the head units, which are robbery. What size mids are standard in your car? I assume the speakers in the dash are tweeters? Ebay is 100% your best bet for a head unit, they loose value as soon as you buy them. Stick with alpine or pioneer and dont worry too much about mp3 player connection as long as it plays mp3s

[tipsy Jock]

Id say get your speakers from halfords as they are less overpriced than the head units, which are robbery. What size mids are standard in your car? I assume the speakers in the dash are tweeters? Ebay is 100% your best bet for a head unit, they loose value as soon as you buy them. Stick with alpine or pioneer and dont worry too much about mp3 player connection as long as it plays mp3s

Yeah thats what i was thinking, theres only so much even halfrauds can mark up a set of speakers, i found the head unit i like from caraudiosecurity for a reasonable enough price, anyone here dealt with them?

yeah the dash one's must be tweeters, the mids can't be any bigger than 10-13cm i don't think, probably only 10's. I figured i would upgrade them first then see how it is and maybe if it needs it put some on the parcel shelf.

Pete

[nmt_oli]

car audio security are ok, car audio direct are better though.

[tipsy Jock]

Reet just ordered my head unit, got it for £100 less than halfordo's inc postage, score! I went for the Kenwood unit in the end. Now onto speakers, i'm going to try the head with the standard speakers first and give that a lil go. I also need to buy a haynes manuel and figure out how on earth to get into the dash mounted tweeters as theres an air vent built into the grilles that cover them. A friend has recommended these speakers to me what do you guys think? + they're all availible from halfords which means i can use up my vouchers.

These for the dash provided they fit

Alpine 10cm's

and probably

Alpine 13cm's

although these are a possibility but i think are probably ott

16.5cm's

Cheers for all the help dudes

Pete

[JTM]

Id always say go for the largest mids you can fit, and please do not buy rear speakers, we have been through this a million times on here. Its chavvy, sounds shit, and money is much MUCH better spent elsewhere. The infinity reference and vibe ones are probably the best that halfords do to be honest

[tipsy Jock]

Id always say go for the largest mids you can fit, and please do not buy rear speakers, we have been through this a million times on here. Its chavvy, sounds shit, and money is much MUCH better spent elsewhere. The infinity reference and vibe ones are probably the best that halfords do to be honest

largest i can fit eh? I shall remember that, the only problem is that i don't want to risk the speakers being underpowered by the head. Oh and theres no risk of rear speakers i don't think You not rating Alpine then?

Pete

[haydon_peter]

Id always say go for the largest mids you can fit, and please do not buy rear speakers, we have been through this a million times on here. Its chavvy, sounds shit, and money is much MUCH better spent elsewhere. The infinity reference and vibe ones are probably the best that halfords do to be honest

Dont forget about JBL John, they are made by the same company as Infinity and offer some really nice speakers for the price tags.

Dont even look at speakers that have Sony written on them, if you dont believe me just go and listen to some Sony speakers in Halfords then compare them to the other speakers on display...

[nmt_oli]

Dont even look at speakers that have Sony written on them, if you dont believe me just go and listen to some Sony speakers in Halfords then compare them to the other speakers on display...

Now, a year ago i would have whole haeartedly agreed with you tic, but recently, sony speakers have got A LOT better, they really have! I can say that with confidence, as i worked in halfors on that department for a good few months recently. they were a good price too, much better than the kenwoods for the money thats for sure.

JBL and Infinity are both part of the Harman group, and make fantasitc stuff.

JTM- now, in risk of opening the rear speaker debate again, it depends what is wanted from the system. YES rear speakers drag the soundstage back, and YES they arent nessesarily needed, but just two speakers running off the HU doesnt always cut the biscuit, and if you just after some tunes and not after audiophile quality, theres nowt wrong, IMHO, in properly fitting a set of rear speakers- and i do even extend that to 6x9s if you do it properly, as they can get some great results in terms of bass. It wont be anything like amped front comps and a small sub by any means, but on a budget, if you know what your doing they can yield very surprising results.

i personally liek having at least some rear speakers, as my sub is in the boot and i find it helps to stop the seperation of bass which can occur with some tracks, i also find it slightly better balances the sound, even though there not really heard, and my soundstage IS infront of me, when you fade them in and out you notice the difference.

It is all personal preference though- lets try not to have another raging debate, it has been had- im just stating my opinion, and jutifying my reccomendation for rear speakers in a set up like tipsy jock is going for.

Edited September 21, 2006 by nmt_oli

[tipsy Jock]

Right i've just measured up the car and the current dash speakers are 10cm so i can defo fit a set in there although it looks like i'm going to have to drill some holes Also the door mounted speakers are roughly 16.5-17cm edge to edge, is that what i'm supposed to be measuring? not the actual size of the speaker? sorry for being stupid but i'm new to all this.

Lastly i'm wondering about RMS values, the head says that its 30W RMS and the speakers i'm going to get are 25W and 40W for dash and door respectively. Will this combo be ok?

Thanks again guys,

Pete

Edit: Oh and one last thing, Can i use the existing wiring for the speakers, or would i be better off replacing and upgrading it?

Edited September 23, 2006 by tipsy Jock

[tipsy Jock]

Bumpy, That was the last question i promise!

Pete

[nmt_oli]

Righty ho, sounds like theyve set it up so 4 channels are fronts in dash, rear in door, which is pretty cool.

The standard wiring should be fine, but you can uprate if you like.

If you not sure about speaker size, whip em out and compare them to some in halfords, just to make sure.

The RMS values youve quoted should be fine, not likely to fry anything at all.

Once its all in, i would personally use the fader control slightly to the rear to balance out the fact you have more powerful speakers in the doors, and i would also fit 'bass blockers' to the 10cm dash speakers, these will remove very low frequencies helping prevent distortion, they are basically an inline capacitor, and are available at halfords.

[tipsy Jock]

Awesome, thanks a lot dude,

What i might do is unplug one of the door speakers and take that with me to compare lol Head should be with me tomorrow, you wouldn't believe how long it took me to figure out how to get the existing one out lol, typical vdub eveybody else has clips down the sides but they decide to put them at the top!

I'll give it a whirl with the standard speakers for a day or so until i can be bothered to go down and try get the speakers i want from halfords. I'll have a look for these bass blocker contraptions too

Pete

Edited September 24, 2006 by tipsy Jock

[tipsy Jock]

Me again!

Got my head unit today, far easier to fit than i thought to be honest, got my 10's for the dash, but had to order in the 16.5's also the 10's may be a bit ott considering the speakers that are coming out of there are roughly the size of the tweeters on the 10's Having a few issues with fitting and clearing the covering grille but that shouldn't be a problem. Can't wait to get the 16.5's!!

It seems that the current set up is just spliting the audio between the dash and the door as opposed to seperate channels, will this be a problem? The other thing is that the connectors that are on the car are 90 degrees away from the ones on the speakers. although it looks like they can be turned round, anyone had any experience with VW OEM connectors?

Oh and lastly i've been thinking about making a converter for my 12v socket so that i can charge my MP3 player? 12v cigarette lighter to USB do able?

Pete

[nmt_oli]

right------- you did have factory components as i origonally thought, so if you want to run 10cms and 6.5"s you WILL HAVE TO run new wires, as runnign 4 speakers off 2 channels is not a good idea at all, it lowers the impedance to 2 ohms and the amp will be drawing more current, and is not likely to be 2 ohm stable as its just an HU.

In terms of speaker terminals, chop em off and use new crimp on conectors, alhtough this will be irrelevant if your rewireing anyway.

[tipsy Jock]

New wires you say? Pete's going to have a good old fun time reaching around by behind the dash then lol How on earth do i get a wire from the the door to the HU? Am i right in thinking that it would be best to connect up the door speakers so that they are wired up as rear speakers?

Pete

[nmt_oli]

Yes, wire door speakers as rear.

The wiring shouldnt be too bad, i fyour lucky you may be able to tie new wire to old and pull it through- but knowing VW itl be neatly in the loom so that wont work.

If youve got a hayned manual, use that to halp you remove as much plastic as you can confidently, trim and stuff isnt usualy too hard to remove, and it makes it much easier, unless your a supper flexy thin armed person.

The other option is to buy a set of components and install those properly, and take other speakers back. still involves wire cutting- but not replacing.

[tomturd]

12v cigarette lighter to USB do able?

Yep, ebay. I got a FM transmitter with USB attachment thing off there for £4 delivered for the trip to mongolia. USB thing worked, but wouldnt charge my mp3 player, and the radio transmitter is shit. Worth a try though..

As for the rest of the topic -