koke

I just got my cd player put in but now its like sounds so ****ed up...pardon my language but its ****ign retarded I got no bass at all I know there isn't much to begin with but wtf theres none now so little I recall someone saying something about a stock amp????

but perhaps that was for the new models.....anyone got any ideas???

also me and a buddy are gonna put my 6x9's i nthe rear now what do I need to remove and anyone got any instructons as to how to properly put them in, oh its going in a 93 4runner.....but yah stockys just arn't doing it for me so yah tere gonna go in I was gonna buy the boxes for the 6x9's but to me I don't like usefull space to go to waste (ie. the side wall where the stockie is) but yah if anyones put theres in the wall or has pics or hints all help would be great

(BTW) bwhahahahhahahaha <---I think this is so funny

midiwall

Ummm.. some questions for you...

• What brand/model of deck did you install?
• Does it have the capabilites of running biamped or does it have separate outs for a sub-woofer amp?
• If so, then does the deck have a setting for a highpass filter? If so, then is it on? If you're not running a separate subwoofer amp, then it shouldn't be. If the highpass filter is on, that can cause this symptom.
• Does the new deck have a built-in amp? If so, are you using it? (i.e., are you using the speaker outs from the new deck?)
• Did your previous setup (the stock Toyota one?) have an external amp? If so, are you running the _speaker_ outs from the new deck into the old amp? You shouldn't be - that can cause this symptom. You should be running the speaker outs straight to the speakers _OR_ run the line outs from the new deck to the old amp.
• What speakers are you using now, the stock Toyota ones? Did they have more bass response with the old deck?

If I had to guess, I'd say that you have a highpass filter engaged. You should be able to find a reference to it in the manual. It may be "disguised" as a reference to "if using a dedicated subwoofer, then set menu option ____ to ____".

A highpass filter is something that will only let the higer frequencies of a signal pass through. You would want to use this with a subwoofer so that the normal speakers don't try to reproduce the real low bass. That just ends up robbing you of power that can better be spent in clearing up the low mids and creating crisper highs. The filter-out lows are then handled by the sub.

If this is turned on, and you're not using a sub, then you'll get the symptom that your describing.


Hope that helps!

Mark

david in germany

if you have one speaker wired out of faze there will be no base. check all the wires to see if the + is to + and the - is to the - terminals.
a quick check if it is a 2 speaker sysem is switch the wire on either speaker and listen. if it improves that is the problem.
David

midiwall

In a clean listening environment, this is true. Out-of-phase signals from the L/R channels will cancel each other out, with the effect being most predominant in the lower end.

But... it sounds like what he's hearing is pretty dramatic.. The listening environment inside of a vehicle has a lot of irregular shapes that will tend to act as bass traps and reflectors, so I don't know that phase would play quite this major of a role.

It's another something to check though!


Mark

david in germany

I have done alot to my celica an it is crazy what one out of faze 4" mid will do to reduce the range of frequencies, then causing you to increase the volume to get everything up to par witch causes one to drive the signal to clipping.
but couldn't ask for a better group to debate this topic!
David

sp

You are correct about speakers being out of phase. An easy way to check is to adjust the balance all the way to the left, then to center, and then to the right. If it is louder,cleaner, and or noticably more bass on either side than when centered, then you have one speaker out of phase. Just flip the plus and minus speaker leads on ONLY ONE of the speakers.

Citykid

Wires are crossed or misconnected. That is too dramatic of a difference. It's not the stock speakers. Also, like everyone else said, check your settings. You could have an attenuator on by accident or filters on. Forget about the origional amp. Any aftermarket head unit has more power that the stock amp. Personnaly, I ripped mine out to make more room in there. If I ever get XM or Sirrus, that's where I'd hide the unit.

ssbogger

What about the stock amp not being used by the aftermarket CD player he just bought. I had to get another amp for my stock speakers since my CD player could not utilize the stock amp.

Vato Loco

When I had my 2nd gen, I had 2 6x9 Pioneer speakers in the rear cargo area on the side panel where the stock speakers go. For 6x9's they were very good, but expect a lot of rattling from the outside Sorry don't have any pics.

Ducky

I put in a Sony CDX-M750 with the stock speakers and they sound ok, I am not using an amp... I did adjust the bass on the deck itself...

it was ok, then I installed subs... but still using stock non-amped speakers.


Ducky

midiwall

So... do you like the sound you have or are you asking for help in triming it out? I have the same deck in my rig and I have mixed emotions about it.

The 7-band EQ is just brittle and not very musical at all. The center freqs are "wrong" for the bandwidth that they're running at.

When you rigged the sub(s), did you use the sub-out from the deck or do you just have them wired in parallel with the main speakers?

If you have them wired-in with the mains, then you're not getting anywhere near the performance that you could be. Investing in even a low powered amp for the subs will help immensely. Depending on how you wired the subs to the mains (parallel or serial) you're also either losing power or running the risk of blowing the amp in the deck.

If you're not running a dedicated amp, then once you are (hint! ) make sure that you spend some time with the low pass and high pass filter settings on the deck to help trim out the sound. One thing that I will give kudos to on the deck is that it gives you a lot of control over how a sub interfaces with the system.


On other thing in general... If you're finding that everything sounds brittle, (CD's especially) then check the "DSP" settings on the deck. Try different ones... some of them (I think it's #3) sounds just gawd awful to me.

Also remember that there are two EQ settings - one each for the tuner and the CD. So, if you setup a custom EQ curve for the tuner, then that does _not_ automatically get set for the CD.


And OH! OH! OH!!! Ditch the factory speakers with your next paycheck. You won't believe the difference!


Mark

Ducky

Uhm yea... I have never really messed with anything except setting it to "techno" =)

So i have no clue how to do it...

I have the JL 10"w6's on the subout to its own 225x2amp.

the facotry speakers are not amped... I do have a 160x4amp for them or other speakers, just lazy i guess... I also have MB quartz speakers too, DKC169's and a set of DSD216's... all this came out of my old car... but with the non amped speakers and the amped sub, it doesnt sound too bad, true it could be better, but i dont want to run wires through the doors... it was bad enough running the subs.. and not to mention the big gauged power cable... ugh...

So yea i could use instructions or "best" settings for the filters on the deck... just dunno what to set them at...


Ducky

jimrockford

The stock speakers just plain suck. They are totally inadequate for the size of the vehicle. Sound system and underpowered engine - my two biggest 2nd gen complaints...

I installed an Eclipse CD player with the stock speakers and couldn't believe how awful it sounded. I installed a pair of Polk 4" drivers and Eclipse 6x9s from my wife's car and that improved things a bit. The 6x9s really made a difference.

I added a single Punch 10" driven by an Alpine sub amp to finish things off.

It's a pretty low end system - the sub is the only amped speaker in the rig, but sounds pretty decent anyway.

Bottom line: The stock speakers have to go. Replace the front speakers with the highest quality aftermarket speakers you can afford, and throw the pathetic 5 1/4 (or 6 1/2 - whatever they are) speaker enclosures away. Replace those with a pair of 6x9 speaker boxes and a sub if it's in your budget.

midiwall

Hi again;

Sorry for the slow response...

Okay, here we go...

I wanted to start by talking about lowpass and highpass filters (lpf and hpf) first just for some background. I dunno what you know up front, so don't take this the wrong way. I'd rather give more information than not enough.

In general, a HPF is an electrical device that will block all frequencies BELOW a certain point... So, the High Frequencies are Passed.

A LPF is a device which will block all frequencies ABOVE a certain point... So, the Low Frequencies are Passed.

You have both available to you on your deck. And, if you're using the internal amp, then you actually have two HPF's, one for each of the front and rear amps.

You'll want to use the filters together, the HPFs and the LPF will compliment each other.

Starting with the LPF:

• From your remote, hit MENU
• Use the UP or DOWN arrow button until you get to "Sub LPF"
• Press ENTER
• Note that using the RIGHT arrow, you can cycle through choices of 62hz, 78hz, 99hz, 125hz, 157hz and OFF

When you pick an option from this list, (besides "off"), you're saying "send all frequencies BELOW this point to the subwoofer. Everything else will be cut off." If you pick "off" then you're saying "send ALL frequencies to the sub woofer".

Picking the "right" option here will have a lot to do with a number of things.

The main thing is that you'll want to look at the frequency response of the sub. In my experience, given a 10" sub, I would pick 125hz as a starting point. This will get you the low bass thumping along with a touch of the lower end of the low-mid range. The 10" will help clean up some of the definition in the low-mids.

You don't want to feed a lot of highs to the sub, since as the size of the speaker grows, then you're asking more mass to be moved through the air to reproduce sound. A 10" speaker is "small" (compared to a 12 or a 16) but at the same time you'll have speakers in the doors that can handle the mids on up a LOT better. It's best to let the sub focus on just the bottom end. Asking a 10" speaker in this environment to move 2,000 or 4,000 times a second is a waste of power. (though it sounds "warm" in a guitar amp!)

There's a science here to picking this frequency number, and that will come from the size of the box that the sub is in, the type of box, the volume of the air space in the box, where the sub is located in the vehicle, if you have groceries or the dog laying on it, etc. But unless you're looking for competition level sonics, a lot of that goes out the window. Setting this at 125hz is a good starting point. I'll talk more later about shifting this aorund.


Now move to the HPF:

• From your remote, hit MENU
• Use the UP or DOWN arrow button until you get to "Front HPF"
• Press ENTER
• Note that using the RIGHT arrow, you can cycle through choices of OFF, 78hz, 99hz, 125hz, 157hz and 198hz

When you pick an option from this list, (besides "off"), you're saying "send all frequencies ABOVE this point to the Front speakers. Everything else will be cut off." If you pick "off" then you're saying "send ALL frequencies to the Front speakers".

I would set this frequency to one notch BELOW what you set the sub LPF to. This is to help be sure that you won't end up with a dead spot in your audio. So, given my suggestion of 125hz for the sub, I would set this to 99hz.

Go back to the menu and for a starting point, set the Rear HPF to the same value as the Front HPF.

Now hit the menu again, and cursor down to EQ Tune, and press ENTER. To start with, I would suggest setting this to OFF. It's important that you listen to what you have going on with JUST the speakers before you start working in an kind of EQ.

There's one more thing to set before you start tuning. Grab your remote again, press the SOUND button repeatedly until you get to "POS" and use the RIGHT arrow to select "ALL". This option is "weird" and has to do with where the "primary listener" is in the vehicle. In my experience, I'd rather basically disable this "feature" and do relative level tuning elsewhere.


Find a CD that you know - it can be anything, techno, rock, Frank Sinatra... It doesn't make a difference as long as you REALLY know the tracks. The reason being is that you don't want to be caught up in the music as you're doing listening adjustments. You want to be able to block out the wanna to dance in your rig and really _listen_ to the track.

Ideally, this step is done with a meter and a special test CD, but in the end, it's all about what you hear, not what a meter says.

Start the CD, and kick the volume to a MODERATE level. Not LOUD. This stage can take a while and the louder the music is, the quicker your ears will get tired. When your ears get tired, they will start rolling off the high frequencies and things will start to sound flat.

At the same time though, you want enough volume to fill the air space in the rig. That's a sideways view of looking at the physics of what you're doing, but... Also, it's best if you do this outside of a garage and with the windows in the "normal" driving position for you. Up or down, or just driver's down, or sunroof open and driver's cracked... etc. Any changes in the window position will affect what you hear.

Now, listen to the CD. Really open your ears and listen to the tracks. When a kick comes in, is it muddy or solid? Is it too loud and overpowering for the whole track? Do you not feel it enough in the seat of your jeans? The answers here will be representative of how you want to set your sub.

Listen to a guitar lick... Most rock guitar solos will cover the mids to high mids. This will affect EQ settings, but also affect the balance between the front and rear speakers.

Listen to the snap of a snare hit, this will cover the low end of the highs, and cymbal strikes will cover the upper end of the highs.

All around you're trying to isolate JUST one section of the audio range at a time, and work on that. Any "blending" will come in later.

Lets start at the lows...

If you're not really feeling the low end kicks as much as you'd like, then DO NOT start with the EQ. Start with the level of the sub itself. Grab your remote, hit SOUND repeatedly until you get to "Sub". This control is the level that the deck is putting out to the dedicated SUB output on the back. Start turning up (or down) this level until you're feeling better about what you're feeling in your jeans. If you get this level any higher than about 3/4 of the way, then move to the sub amp itself, turn up the level THERE, then turn DOWN the level on the deck.

Now try to just focus in the next frequency range up...This will be tom-tom's on a drum kit and rhythm guitar. Are the toms clear? Does that hollow sound from an "open snare" have any definition? If not, then you need to move back to the EQ section on the deck. Grab the remote, hit SOUND until you get to EQ. Hit ENTER. Cursor RIGHT until you get to CUSTOM, hit ENTER.

You're now looking to set an EQ curve on your own.

As you look at this display, there a number of "bands" from left to right. Each band has a "center frequency" which you can cycle through using the LEFT and RIGHT arrows. You can set the level of each band by using the UP and DOWN arrows. I didn't note what the bands are, but I think they're 62hz, 125hz, 250, 500, 1000, 2000, 4000, 8000 and 16000.

Each of these bands controls the level of just a portion of the overall sound you're hearing. For example, since we're talking about the tom's and rhythm guitar, then you're looking at the three bands covering 500hz - 2000hz. If the tom's are "muddy", then you might want to raise the level at 2000hz a bit, that can add clarity. Or, it's sometimes better to LOWER the level at around 500hz. That can reduce the mud, but it can also have affects on the upper bass regions not being so defined.

You'll want to make your changes in small intervals.. Make a change of 1-2 DB, listen to the results, back up the CD over the part and listen again.

Remember to keep the volume levels moderate here, and try to only focus on one block of the audio range at a time.... It can be hard to do, and it takes a lot of patience.

Once you get the low-mids and mids worked out, move up... 2000-4000hz is around the area of the SNAP! of a snare along with lead guitars. The synth leads in most techno tracks are in here as well.

Past that, 8000hz and 16000hz are cymbal crashes and "sizzle". BUT!!! This is the area on this deck that drives me nuts. The audio energy available up here in a vehicle is eaten alive by upholstery, carpet and poor speaker placement. It's VERY hard to use an equalizer to fix any issues here. The best bet is to try to fix this with better tweeters mounted up high on the door panels.


(continued next message)

midiwall

Are we having fun yet???



Okay... Blending...

Once you make a couple of passes through the EQ section, then kick up the volume a bit, and listen to how a whole track feels - not so much sounds, but feels.

What you're looking for here is the blending of sounds across the board... In a goa track, listen to when the track moves from just D&B to a swisshy synth undertone... There's a LOT of energy in that undertone... Can you hear it? is it stomping on the D&B?

This is when you'll want to go back to the EQ section on the deck and make VERY SMALL adjustments to _related_ bands. So... If that undertone is overpowering, then try kicking DOWN the 2000hz band by just 1db, and bring up the 500hz band by 1db. There will be some spillover between the bands - especially in THIS eq on THIS deck ("argh!"). What you're fighting here is something related to the "slope" of the bands, and I've already babbled WAY too much here to explain it.

This is a time for "messin' with it until it sounds good".

Okay... Now, back to the HPF and LPF settings...

If you find that you're making more than 3-5db worth of an adjustment to the LOW EQ ranges (62hz and 125hz) then you might want to do a couple of things... One, adjust the LEVEL of the sub woofer and then return the EQ to 0db (no changes), and/or change the cutoff freq to one step higher or lower. This can add (or take away) energy into the sub.

In general, you want to adjust things in this order:

• Levels
• Cutoff frequencies (the frequencies of the LPF and HPF)
• EQ

Past that, the most drastic measures are changing the speakers in the doors (but this is HIGHLY recommended!) and adding dedicated tweeters up high on the doors.


Ummm.. okay... I've kinda' lost my train of thought during the time it took me to split this into 2 messages... I think I was pretty much done though.

Dude, I really hope that helps.

I've left out a bit and skipped over some science things but hopefully I've given you enough to figure out what's working with what and how to control it all.



Running wires through the doors for what? You should be able to use the stock wiring unless you're looking to upgrade it.


Later!

Mark

2001Millrunner

mark, what's the RMS for stock decks do you know? is 27Watt RMS/60Watt Max. going to make a difference for stock speakers? What speakers are you running for front/rear?

midiwall

I think the stock premium systems peak at about 17W per side, the standard system is 8-10W peak. I don't know what the stock speakers are rated for but they're not too impressive. I'd bet that you'd smoke 'em with 60w peak.

I have Kenwood KFC-1738's in all doors. They're a decent middle-of-the-line speaker that's heads and tails above the stock stuff and won't break the bank ($70/pair). I also replaced the tweeters up in the pillars with JBL P-23t's, but have since disconnected them - they ended up being VERY bright and by the time I toned them down with EQ, they ended up not doing a lot for the sound.

Something to note, the 1738's are 6 3/4" speakers, and they fit fine in my 96 Limited without any sheet metal mods. But...

I recently talked FunRunner (99 SR5) into replacing her speakers, and ordered her four Kenwood KFC-C1739ie's (the new version of the 1738's) which are also 6 3/4" speakers. The front ones went in without a hassle, but I had to do some sheet metal work on the rear doors to get them in. It wasn't a lot, maybe 3/4" from each of two sides in the opening.


If you're on a budget, then I'd suggest replacing the front speakers first, then the head unit, then the rear speakers as money allows.

Have fun!

2001Millrunner

haha do you remember me telling you "i was plannin to blow them out" at out first 4ROC meeting? looks like that will happen afterall...........one of the thing that sold me about my new deck is the built-in V-drive(power connected directly to battery) for higher output. BTW are you selling the tweeters? call me stupid, but i love ear piercing noises