CHALLENGE: best sound quality, stealth $1000 upgrade?
I agree with Nazar regarding the rears. Totally unnecessary in this car, especially for an SQ (sound quality) installation. (Rears aren't a good idea in general if you're after proper staging.)
In my opinion, you really should do an amp for the best SQ. From my experience with this car, I'd do this:
1) High quality set of 6.5" component speakers up front. Seal the front doors as much as possible with Dynamat (or equivalent). Don't skimp on the deadening material!
2) No rear speakers. Just unplug them.
3) No sub. It's not needed in the Z if you do the door speaker installation right.
4) A decent 2-channel amp sending sufficient power to the fronts. The amp can be hidden in a number of places so it is never seen. The unused space behind the drivers seat (where the sub is in a Bose system) is a great place to hide an amp. It's definitely worth the effort.
5) A good headunit is *key* here. Get one that allows time alignment and a decent EQ. This is crucial in a car installation if you're after SQ. I'd recommend an Alpine CDA-9815 (last year's model, so it can be had for cheap on Ebay) or the 9835 (this year's model). The top Eclipse units also have this same fantastic functionality, but might be a bit more expensive.
Speaking from my experience with my Z installation (which is a very extensive install), incredible sound can be had from only door speakers and nothing else. I have a set of Dynaudio 240mkII components in my front doors, and we took the time to completely Dynamat the doors and get them as sealed as possible (to somewhat act as a speaker box). If I turn off the sub, and set the front speakers to be full range (20Hz-20kHz, no high-pass crossover), they put out fantastic low end reponse. The sub is only needed for hard hitting, loud bass. I barely have to use it. (However, a sub is indeed nice when driving down the road, since road noise covers up a lot of the low frequencies in a car. A sub can help bring those low frequencies up to overcome the road noise.)
In my opinion, you really should do an amp for the best SQ. From my experience with this car, I'd do this:
1) High quality set of 6.5" component speakers up front. Seal the front doors as much as possible with Dynamat (or equivalent). Don't skimp on the deadening material!
2) No rear speakers. Just unplug them.
3) No sub. It's not needed in the Z if you do the door speaker installation right.
4) A decent 2-channel amp sending sufficient power to the fronts. The amp can be hidden in a number of places so it is never seen. The unused space behind the drivers seat (where the sub is in a Bose system) is a great place to hide an amp. It's definitely worth the effort.
5) A good headunit is *key* here. Get one that allows time alignment and a decent EQ. This is crucial in a car installation if you're after SQ. I'd recommend an Alpine CDA-9815 (last year's model, so it can be had for cheap on Ebay) or the 9835 (this year's model). The top Eclipse units also have this same fantastic functionality, but might be a bit more expensive.
Speaking from my experience with my Z installation (which is a very extensive install), incredible sound can be had from only door speakers and nothing else. I have a set of Dynaudio 240mkII components in my front doors, and we took the time to completely Dynamat the doors and get them as sealed as possible (to somewhat act as a speaker box). If I turn off the sub, and set the front speakers to be full range (20Hz-20kHz, no high-pass crossover), they put out fantastic low end reponse. The sub is only needed for hard hitting, loud bass. I barely have to use it. (However, a sub is indeed nice when driving down the road, since road noise covers up a lot of the low frequencies in a car. A sub can help bring those low frequencies up to overcome the road noise.)
Thread
Thread Starter
Forum
Replies
Last Post
