Man, gotta love fatwallet! And Crutchfield. First off, I also gotta share my opinion on the sony bashfest going on... I agree, sony car audio products seem to be the lowest of the low you can get. I mean you can tell its bad if even at Bestbuy (which sells relatively bad car audio stuff for way inflated prices) Sony is ranked at the bottom. Hehe, now that I got that off my back.
I ordered the MB Quart 15" sub and the Q-logic sealed box (plus the dash kit and 4ohm wiring kit for my altima) they offer to complement the sub for like 230 bucks. As a pleasant surprise, the Q-logic box also came with a bag of free polyfill, defintely a welcome surprise. I called in first to get some advice and the salesperson was a girl named Lucy, sounded very nice, about 25-30ish in age (actually, at the risk of sounding lame, she sounded pretty hot over the phone and she had a awesome personality) and she hooked me up. I am a fair novice at car audio... looked in envy back in high school at my friends and other kids who installed slamming systems in their cars and now that I am in college and finally have some relatively disposable income (thanks in part to my scholarship, summer job, Pell grant, getting into the game of buying new cheap and selling used for more, and Staford subsidized loans) I finally got the means to be able to finally fulfil some of my audio cravings. Anyways, alot of my friends installed systems in their cars, ranging from crap el cheapo systems they bought onsale from Best buy to nice $1000 systems... some of their knowledge rubbed off on me. I expected Lucy to be the sterotypical girl and kinda be clueless about car audio but i was actually amazed to find out she really knows what she is talking about and actually give me some ingenious pointers on wiring up and installing my new system. It didn't hurt that she got me the 10% discount on the mb quart sub, the 20off mastercard, 20off referral (my first purchase), and free shipping!
Since this was my first system, I made the common mistake and totally overdid the bass without thinking about anything else. One of my friend's friends worked at Bestbuy and so he bought a nice Dual brand deck, the 7700 model (yes, I know Dual is not exactly the best brand, but I got suckered in by how cool the deck looked, with how it mechanically unfolded to two parts, had xm radio, aux input, played wma/mp3s, advertised 220watts (4x55 peak, 4x22 rms) and was had for $140!) I then made the mistake of buying into lanzar. one of my friends had a old school lanzar opti amp made back in the day when they made real quality stuff and so ordered a Lanzar 248 amp rated at 800watts rms bridged at 4ohms for like $120. As a tempory measure since my lanzar amp ran into shipping delays, I bought a amp from bestbuy, the rockford fosgate P6004 (600watts rms bridged at 4ohms) for $580! (again, emphasis on how overpriced best buy is) fully intending to return the RF amp once I got my lanzar amp.
I didn't know how to install the system and since I was impatient and it was the summer and all my friends were busy on vacation or working, I jumped the gun and went to Best Buy for them to help install it. It cost me like $60 amp install (wiring up, mounting amp, and getting it dialed in), $15 sub install (putting the sub in the box), and $20 for the wiring harness (installed the deck I bought from them for free though.) So not bad considering the two techs spent about 2.5hours for my $100. They did a pretty good job, did very good job of hiding all the wiring, and routing the bass control and aux input remotes while hiding the wires. All except for the fact that later as I uninstalled the RF amp I discovered they had maxed out the gains on the amp... Yikes! It was a good thing I returned that amp. Anyways, I discovered at that point you really did get what you paid for (unless you know about fatwallet, then you make out like a bandit  .) The Dual deck looked nice but even compared to my old oem stereo, definitely sucked in ergonomics and I seriously doubt their powerratings... I am sure I had the crossover on the RF amp set up properly and it didn't make my speakers sound that much nicer. Anyways, long story being short, the MB Quarts pounded like heck! Even sitting in the back of my 99 Atima's trunk. Figure they were getting about 650ish rms power.
That you get what you pay for notion is reinforced once I got the lanzar amp I ordered... looked nice but no guts... for one thing, it was a "immense" pain to install. The giveaway was that I couldn't even get my 4gauge wires in the 800watt amp's connectors (ended up having to cut off like 2/3 of the copper) while my RF stopgap 600watt amp had not trouble fitting the wires in. Anyways, the lanzar was like dead fish compared to the RF 600watt amp... I would say produced about 1/2 the power of the RF amp (with both's gain maxed out... I know I know, not a good thing.)
I ended up buying a sweet RF 851S Power amp rated at 850watts rms used from eBay for $210 and hooked that up to my system. Gotta love craigslist, put my lanzar amp up there, advertised it as virtually brand new and pointed lookers to lanzar's website and their advertised specs and I ended up selling the amp for $150  . The new 2nd RF amp put out tons of power, gotta love RF's power line. Probaly put out 1000watts rms, so slightly overpowering the MB Quart's 800watt ratings. Man did it slam, and it probaly taxed the heck out of my car's system. It kinda got old after a couple days (as did the throbbing headache I got each time I got of my car), it was then I started getting sick of pure bass and started thinking my mids and highs were in need of upgrading since they got drowned out so easily.
Unfortunately, I only got to use my bass setup for about a week. One night my dad borrowed my car (I was living at home for the summer and we had a 03 expedition and a 97 F150 each averaging 11-12mpg incity and with the rising gas prices my parent's tended to borrow my car alot). around 8:45ish to run a errand to Home Depot. I guess he was in a hurry to get there before they closed because at one intersection he saw a green turn signal and mistoke that for a green signal... ending up running the red light around 45mph and on the oposite lane, there was a dodge dakota truck at started making a right turn. They both saw each other and luckily by the time they hit the closing speed was prob only 15-20mph. The truck had a guy, his wife, and kid, all thankfully buckled up. The truck was totally fine, everyone including my dad was fine (besides his pride), there was a only a small dent on the bumper. My poor car on the other hand had the grill totally pushed in, the radiator and ac heat exchanger thingy got crushed way in and my hook was all smashed up (due to the bumper height mismatch of the midsized seden and truck). Also, the airbags deloyed, some struts inside the engine compartment was crushed in and I am sure there was some minor frame damage. Well, I was insured with my family together so the insurance covered the other side's like $800 claim fine, it was just that due to my age and lack of money, I had it insured for bare minimum and so we were out a car. The car ended up getting towed back to our garage and I think my dad vowed to fix it up himself sometime this year and convert it to a delivery car for our business.
Since it was my dad's fault, he agreed to help me find a replacement car. I really had my heart set for a 2001-03 Infiniti I35 (basically a luxed up Maxima, but I loved the upgraded interior/exterior, rims, and maxima power). Unfortunately I never found a good car at a good price (private party of course, who wants to pay sales tax again for used goods eh?). Also, my parent's were very worried about how swelled up my head would get if I drove such a glitzy looking car (thats how they put it) even though it wouldn't be that expensive since it seems the I35 depreciated nearly to the maxima's equivelent price level since the G35s came out and the Infiniti's has the longer 50k/4yr warranty compared to the Maxima's 36/3yr warranty. Also was really close to buying a Saab 9-2x (found out about that deal from here and also our local newspaper, which ranked it 2nd in the top 10 lists of best new car deals for 2005). Unfortunately I found out about the deal too late and despite visiting 2 dealerships and calling about 6others all I found on the aero WRX like models were auto equiped (the auto btw, totally ruins the Aero's turbo engine, those 4speeds seriously was horribled engineered for that powerplant's powerrange. Then, miraculously, a couple days later I got a phone call from a dealer who said a long distance buyer backed out of a deal on a 9-2x and they offered my first dibs since I was first on their waiting list. It was a pretty silver Aero with just the cold package, so manual with only about 19k out the door. I talked them out of most of their dealer addon BS and so got the out the door price of about 21k. I was just about the close the deal and get my parents to cosign for me so I could take advantage of the 4.75% CU auto loan and it was at that night disaster struck.
While I had been looking for my car, my dad heavily encouraged me to get a suv and pushed the thought of getting a Hond CRV (bleh), Chevy Trailblazer, or new truck while I explored the new 05 Acura TL, TSX, Honda V6, Altima V6, Mazda RX8, Infiniti G35 couple (can't stand the look of the seden), WRX, used Lexus LS400 IS300, Honda V6 coupe, Acura TL type S (can you see where my interests were?). Anyways, that night I went to the dealership and checked out the new manual saab 9-2x, my dad went across the street to the ford dealership. I wasted an hour having the women (pretty too) salewomen take me out with my mom and teach me how to drive manual (never had a manual car, been taught how by my friends but I was super rusty at it). Anyways, by the time I got back after learning the basics of the Saab's sweet transmission, my dad had changed his mind. He originally same time I was looking for a car turned out to be looking for a new truck as well. Originally he was looking for a GMC Denali 1500 crew cab truck but apparently by that time, all the area dealerships were out of stock on the particular models he was looking for. Well, at the ford dealership my dad apparently took a real liking to the new 05 Ford 150 Lariet 4x4 supercab. Maybe he liked the matching look or something and so despite the attempted guilt trip I put on him, he declined to support my decision to get the saab, argueing the freaking car was too small and he was doing this for my own good. Bah Humbug! Anyways, I got steaming mad at him and man, I was petrified with anger two days later when without any announcement, he drove home in the new $42,000 white/arizona beige truck (matched same color and look as our expedition). I found about about his real reason why he refused to help me buy the saab from my mom later. Anyways, I pretty much didn't speak to my dad for about 2 weeks.
yes, I may be a bit at fault for reaching a bit above of means, but man... the primary reason I was so mad was at how 2faced my dad was, and the fact that I missed out on the deal of the lifetime plus the month/60ish hours I spent looking for a car under the assumption it was gonna be my car. For gods sake, a semi practical dressed up WRX wagon (I tht the saab was prettier too, and classier) AWD wagon for 6k below the WRX's price (or to put it another way, about what a used 03 WRX with 30-40k miles was going for). I even had a list of cheap mods I was gonna do to eventually boost the car's power to 280hp and make it run at BMW M3 speeds. And it wasn't like I was asking my parent's to pay for it, I had the downpayment ready and was more than willing to shoulder tha finacial burden of the payments. It was just that huge wasted oppurtunity, wasted time, and missed deal that had me so steamed.
Sigh, so I guess my dad musta felt pretty bad, so as sorta a apology, he let me drive his new $42k truck around for the last month of summer (even during those overnight stints where I was the designated driver for my acoholic party going friends). Then, once school started this august, he gave me his old 97 F150 truck to drive up from Phoenix, AZ to here in Provo, UT. Although my proposed AWD Saab woulda worked hecka lot better than my fat old 2WD F150 I am driving now. esp now I am getting like 11-12mi gallon on premium gas with gas hovering around the 3 dollar mark and having no where to go but up. (I need to use premium because I blew my saved downpayment on this truck and bought a superchip, CAI intake, sport exhaust (that combined with the 5.4liter engine and tons of torque kinda makes this truck feel sorta fast), the new audio system I am about to detail later, really bright and expensive HID xenon headlamp conversion kit, and new set of Ford Lightning rims/tires.)
Wow, sorry for going so off topic, I guess I still got lots of hidden anger left at my dad and so had to vent. Anyways, back to the discussion at hand. For the 97 F150 truck, I intended to get a upgraded audio system (if only for the 14hr drive going up to college) but moving my huge MB Quart 15" sub and amp to the supercab truck's small interior didn't seem too practical (esp since I was kinda fed up with all the exessive bass). Also, I wanted to upgrade my deck again, after I got used to the look, the Dual deck just didn't cut it in features, it didn't even have a seperate sub control, only bass and treble. So I ended up selling the deck on eBay with the wiring harness and dash pocket for like $135 and sold the MB quart sub, RF 851amp, and wiring kit for $425 locally.
I saw what looked like a good deal on the panasonic 9800 deck Crutchfield was carrying. It retailed originally for $400 but was discounted to $280 because it was a 05 model and the new 06 panasonic 9801 model was coming out. The 9801 was essentially the same, only difference was it had a slightly beefier 31x4rms, peak 70x4 internal amp compared to the 9800's 25x4rms, 60x4 peak amp. However, some 9point equalizer control, sweet looking high res lcd faceplate, 3 5volt preamp outputs and other high end features. Crutchfield also had the model in their 'scratch and dent' section (essentially its refurbished) for $240. I tht I would give Lucy a call and dialed up Crutchfield plus her extension. However, apparently she was off that day and I got another salesman. It was then I learned they made commissions on what they sold and since Lucy helped me out so much last time, I figured I am obligated to give Lucy my business. The next day, when I called her up, it turned out that they were all out for stock of the refurbished units. However, when she found out I coulda bought them yesterday but didn't since I found out about the commission thingy and so waited till she was working so she could get credit for me she put me on hold for a few minutes and talked to her manager. Then (again proving how awesome she is and how I will definitely again place my order thr her) she said in this special case she would sell me a brand new 9800 for the refurb's price of $240, she then preceded to add the $20 referral credit plus free shipping and because she couldn't stack the 20 mastercard discount with the special $40 discount, she placed a seperate order for a $30 8gauge wiring kit and it was shipped to me totally free. Not a bad deal at all. I essentially got a $470 (gotta count the free dash kit and wiring harness Bestbuy or any local audio shop woulda charged ya for) for $200 shipped.
Hehe, I then bought a used old school Rockford fosgate 600a4 4channel power amp for $85 shipped from a F150 online forum I was frequenting. I knew I was going to want stronger mids and plus, it sounded like the stock paper speakers on my F150 was already slightly blown, so I bought a pair of Infiniti 6x8 kappas (the kappas' tweeters are pheonominal, in a high end audio shop I visted, power by a 50x2 phoenix gold amp, I thought the sound was way better than JL audio's low and midrange speaker lines, MB Quart reference/premium, RF Power, Alpine Type Rs. I ended up buying a pair of infinit 6x8 references for my rear speakers and got both front and rear pairs online from eBay brand new for about $180. I then got a 2 10" RF entry level Punch Z subwoofers. I installed the panasonic deck myself but doubted I could get the wiring right plus I didn't trust myself on tearing the truck panels off to swap out the speakers so got it installed at a audio shop. Paid $150 for them to install the speakers, 4 channel amp, and pull out and rewire the 2 10s. It turned out the kappas have 2ohm impedence and my deck is stable only down to 4ohm so my front pair of kappas are powered at with front channels with the gains turned way down (since kappas rated at 100watts rms and I bet the RF amps, being power class and somewhat older, are putting close down to 200watts). The rear speakers were powered by two channels off my deck. I then bridged the rear channels together to power the twin 10s. They, combined with my iPod Photo made my roadtrip and drives around town very enjoyable.
Then, about a month down the road, i kindsa got sick of how my 2 10s are taking up my whole back seat since they are sitting up ontop of the seats so I started looking around again for maybe a single high end 12" sub. It was then that I found a local seller on Craigslist who sold me his JL Audio W7 10" subwoofer for $250 shipped. BTW, for anyone who isn't familiar with JL Audio, they make awesome subwoofers, especially notable for their excellent sound quality (SQ) while still having the capability for extreme loudness when needed and needing modest power. Their lines range from the W0 to W3 to W6 to W7, with the W7 being super power hungry, quite expensive, needing large enclosures but man do they put out more bass than anything in their class while having the characteristic JL SQ trait. The 10" W7 usually retail for like $500 so it was a awesome deal. It was also mounted in a sealed box. When I got the box, it turned out the sealed box was way too small, only had about .667cubes and JL recommends 1.34cubes, exactly double that. The W7 is rated at 500watts rms at 3ohms but that is extremely underrated because when I bridged my rear channels of my amp to the sub while it was in the small box, I figure about 400-450watts rms was getting to it but it sounded noticably weaker than my old 2 10s. I then ordered a custom made ported box for the W7, 1.5cubes just like suggested, made with good thick 1" MDF. I also simutaneously bought a used RF 451S Power amp, 1.2 farud cap, and new amp install kit for $140 bucks. The 451S will output about 600-650watts rms and really sounded good. I then later that day saw a newly posted eBay buy it now auction of a brand newly refurbished RF old school bd1000.1 Power mono amp for a amazing $175 shipped. I jumped on that and so now I got the RF 4x150 (putting out about 180x2 and 100x2 power wise I figure) amp powering my mids and highs and the RF 1000x1 (putting out about 900x1, since the 1000watts was rated at 2ohms). Man, gotta love the combination of crystal clear highs with blurring amounts of pure bass. Its amazing how much bass the W7 puts out, I would say its roughly equivilent to the MB Quart 15" sub I had in my old setup. Of course, now its much more balanced and pleasing sound. The mids and highs in my truck, while not exactly the best acoustic enviornment, compares to what I hear from my Senhieser HD600 audiophile headphones playing DVD-audio through my Audigy 2 soundcard, its that good.
Wow... I apologize about being so long winded here, I guess I just had alot to say. My kudos for anyone for waded through my disjointed and frequently off topic post. |
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