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Yeah. I owned two prior S Classes (W220) with the Bose surround system and they weren't especially powerful but they were clean sounding. Just adding a powered Sub did the trick. The HK is a total nightmare by comparison.
I love the Focals but I'm hesitant to recommend someone spend $750 on a pair of speakers without hearing them in the car myself.
So what model(s) Focals did you use? I'm guessing you did the doors and left the other stuff alone, or no?
When I went to Focal dealer, I listened to a demo between the K2-series and the Performance-Expert series, I disliked the K2 because they sounded a bit flatter compared to the Performance-Expert.
I have:
-165 VB - Focal 6.5" Polyglass Components in the front doors and dash.
- PC 100 - Focal 4" in the rear doors.
- Two Kicker 6.75 subs in the rear dash.
- Keenwood Excelon DNX890HD
- 4 ch Clarion amp (plan on replacing later)
Lucky for me, the previous owner changed everything in the Stock-Bose system> removed the HU, rewired amp cables and everything.
It was just a matter of R&R.
Now the system sounds Epiiiiiiiiiiiiic , Pure SQ. No need to wake up the dead.
Originally Posted by Ingenieur
I'm glad they allocated budget to engine/exhaust over entertainment
Because to me engine/exhaust IS the entertainment
When I went to Focal dealer, I listened to a demo between the K2-series and the Performance-Expert series, I disliked the K2 because they sounded a bit flatter compared to the Performance-Expert.
I needed them a little flat to compensate for the factory EQ, which is bright.
Originally Posted by Razzy
fantastic post Mike. I will look into your recommendations. I am an audiophile and I cannot stand these no matter what I do all my songs at "higher" volume are WAY TOO HARSH AND SHARP. Like what were they thinking? The HK system in my S class was great and hell way back when in my 2002 7-series the system was better.
Now I have no quarrels with HK or even this system in general, besides the harshness. If I can get that fixed than I'm happy.
It's definitely fixable, it just took me awhile to figure out who the culprits were. In the meantime I stuck a 12v car audio equalizer in the glovebox and ran my IPod through it. That mod cost under $100 and made a huge difference. I'll dig up the post on that mod:
I installed some Focal KRC165 in my Harley, fabulous upgrade.
Bit spendy, but I think I may have a peek around for some for the car in the spring, the stock HK leaves a bit to be desired alright.
I needed them a little flat to compensate for the factory EQ, which is bright.
It's definitely fixable, it just took me awhile to figure out who the culprits were. In the meantime I stuck a 12v car audio equalizer in the glovebox and ran my IPod through it. That mod cost under $100 and made a huge difference. I'll dig up the post on that mod:
I am not much of a fan of the sound system either and noticed that there was really no bass compared to my old bmw. I went ahead and installed a 12 inch subwoofer in the trunk to wake it up ! sounds much better now
The S Class didn't get BT audio. We're stuck with a 3rd party adapter. I guess the C got it stock.
If you want to get a feel for how cutting the harshness of the midrange improves the sound without spending a lot, get the $2.99 AudioForge Equalizer app and experiment with some different EQ curves.
Here's one that would be a good starting point. Unzip it and then email the unzipped file to yourself on the IPhone:
The S Class didn't get BT audio. We're stuck with a 3rd party adapter. I guess the C got it stock.
If you want to get a feel for how cutting the harshness of the midrange improves the sound without spending a lot, get the $2.99 AudioForge Equalizer app and experiment with some different EQ curves.
Here's one that would be a good starting point. Unzip it and then email the unzipped file to yourself on the IPhone:
Thanks Mike for the help. For clarification, in my S-class i used the PCMCIA adaptor or whatever and played music off my SD card.
The C63 has bluetooth and an SD card slot as it is so I just play my music off my iphone connected through bluetooth. I've tried playing music from my iphone through aux and by using an SD card and it's still harsh.
If you do the speaker upgrade you'll be happy with the sound out of the raw files out of an SD card and any of the other internal COMAND sources. Until then, and to get a sense of what can be accomplished with EQ, you'll want to be playing off your Iphone via BT but using the AudioForge App as your default music player. Apple's preset EQs are limited and have nothing that specifically kills the mids. You can use the Apple EQs after the speaker upgrade but until then you need something a little more robust. Apple gave the developer of the EQ app direct access to the internal raw files, which is rare, so don't worry about sound quality. It's all still there.
The AudioForge has a deeper dynamic range for adjustment, and those dots that form the control points can be moved horizontally along the frequency spectrum..left to right = bass to treble. Once you're on a frequency you want to adjust, slide the dot up or down. It gives almost infinite and very precise control...exactly what you need when compensating for specific drivers or sets of drivers like the Alumaprenes.
If you look at that curve in the screen grab, you'll see how far down I had to drag the mids (that bowl in the bottom).
Starting left to right, there's mildly increased bass in general, and then two tight peaks that give the bass guitar, kick drum, tom toms and snare drum their power. In the mids where the backing instruments live...rythym guitar, keys, synths, strings, vocals, all of those have an aspect of high frequency that needs to be attenuated, The trick is not to attenuate it out to the degree the mix sounds dead and flat. You'll find a balance just by sliding the dot around and listening. The peak in the ultra highs is there to add back in some of the highlights and cymbal sounds that may have been lost when the mids were pushed down.
One thing you'll notice right away is that you can get a lot more power out of the stock system than you ever though it had in it, and it'll sound like music again, and not music that's been filtered through a tin can.
Play with it, load that S550EQ preset on to it, and let me know if you get confused about the interface. It took me awhile but I can get it doing whatever I want now.
Last edited by Mike5215; Nov 18, 2014 at 11:36 PM.
If you do the speaker upgrade you'll be happy with the sound out of the raw files out of an SD card and any of the other internal COMAND sources. Until then, and to get a sense of what can be accomplished with EQ, you'll want to be playing off your Iphone via BT but using the AudioForge App as your default music player. Apple's preset EQs are limited and have nothing that specifically kills the mids. You can use the Apple EQs after the speaker upgrade but until then you need something a little more robust. Apple gave the developer of the EQ app direct access to the internal raw files, which is rare, so don't worry about sound quality. It's all still there.
The AudioForge has a deeper dynamic range for adjustment, and those dots that form the control points can be moved horizontally along the frequency spectrum..left to right = bass to treble. Once you're on a frequency you want to adjust, slide the dot up or down. It gives almost infinite and very precise control...exactly what you need when compensating for specific drivers or sets of drivers like the Alumaprenes.
If you look at that curve in the screen grab, you'll see how far down I had to drag the mids (that bowl in the bottom).
Starting left to right, there's mildly increased bass in general, and then two tight peaks that give the bass guitar, kick drum, tom toms and snare drum their power. In the mids where the backing instruments live...rythym guitar, keys, synths, strings, vocals, all of those have an aspect of high frequency that needs to be attenuated, The trick is not to attenuate it out to the degree the mix sounds dead and flat. You'll find a balance just by sliding the dot around and listening. The peak in the ultra highs is there to add back in some of the highlights and cymbal sounds that may have been lost when the mids were pushed down.
One thing you'll notice right away is that you can get a lot more power out of the stock system than you ever though it had in it, and it'll sound like music again, and not music that's been filtered through a tin can.
Play with it, load that S550EQ preset on to it, and let me know if you get confused about the interface. It took me awhile but I can get it doing whatever I want now.
I haven't purchased the app yet (old itunes account and do not have mode of payment set up yet) so I downloaded a free app called MOD Equalizer. I can choose preset Equalizers or change it freely. there are a bunch of bars and sliders that you would see normally on an equalizer ranging from +15 to -15 on each slider. Similar to what you are doing with your app.
i tried it and it does make a difference. One thing I noticed was that upon deselecting the "boost" function in the COMAND system for BT Media, it decreases the sound/volume but also the harshness. What I also did was decrease my "volume" when connected playing the music through the car as that also makes the high frequencies less pronounced. Overall the system in the car is quite capable and like you said, you can really AMP it up when it comes to certain ranges of sound/instruments.
the stock Apple equalizer presets are decent as well as i can tell they are working at least lol. What I do notice is that when I'm in the sound options in the COMAND and changing the treble and bass levels, it barely makes any difference. I wonder if it is because I'm not playing it through a CD or if something is amiss. Also do you run with Logic 7 on or off? I find that with Logic 7 on I get more harshness.
Right. So with the Alumaprene speakers in place and getting the majority of the signal, pushing up the volume exacerbates their tone problem. You have to set the EQ to give you the mids you want at the volume level you typically like to use. It'll sound "dead" and flat at lower volume, but brighten up with more signal.
I don't have a BT boost function in the S since we don't have BT audio, but anything that adds gain will add brightness with the stock speakers in place. Logic 7 would put the 3.5" center channel dash speaker and the two 3.5" rear surround speakers more into the mix. Those are also Alumaprene and as small as they are they're going to sound really harsh.
If you're unable to get the mids pushed down enough on your app for the volume level you like, the next step is to set up an actual 12v hardware EQ in the glove box between the IPhone headphone output and the car's aux in. It's a mid step between a software EQ and the speaker upgrade, and it does sound really good.
I auditioned the MOD EQ and it serves its purpose as far as being able to knock down sliders 6/7/8/9 to cut the mids, and rolling up 1/2/3 for adding more bottom and power. The sound seems a little more processed and compressed compared to the AudioLogic. I guess that's what $3 gets you
Last edited by Mike5215; Nov 19, 2014 at 01:18 PM.
Right. So with the Alumaprene speakers in place and getting the majority of the signal, pushing up the volume exacerbates their tone problem. You have to set the EQ to give you the mids you want at the volume level you typically like to use. It'll sound "dead" and flat at lower volume, but brighten up with more signal.
I don't have a BT boost function in the S since we don't have BT audio, but anything that adds gain will add brightness with the stock speakers in place. Logic 7 would put the 3.5" center channel dash speaker and the two 3.5" rear surround speakers more into the mix. Those are also Alumaprene and as small as they are they're going to sound really harsh.
If you're unable to get the mids pushed down enough on your app for the volume level you like, the next step is to set up an actual 12v hardware EQ in the glove box between the IPhone headphone output and the car's aux in. It's a mid step between a software EQ and the speaker upgrade, and it does sound really good.
I auditioned the MOD EQ and it serves its purpose as far as being able to knock down sliders 6/7/8/9 to cut the mids, and rolling up 1/2/3 for adding more bottom and power. The sound seems a little more processed and compressed compared to the AudioLogic. I guess that's what $3 gets you
Sure thing. You C guys actually caught a break getting 4 6.5" woofers instead of the S's weird door subwoofers and an additional midrange. I'll bet that just swapping those 4 speakers and maybe adding a powered sub in the trunk would sound beautiful.
These are what I would have run if I could put 6.5's in the door. Don't let the price fool you...I had a pair of these in another car and they are amazing. Everything the Alumaprene speakers aren't...warm, full, hard hitting, great low end, tight punchy mid-bass, not power-hogs.
Yes, the price is actually $20.72 each when you buy 4.
For the sub, I recommend the Infinity BassLink. If the C has its amp in the trunk like the S, the speaker leads as well as power are right there. I've had this in two w220's and it's great for just reinforcing the very bottom. It has an internal 200 watt amp, one 10' subwoofer and one 10" passive radiator. It accepts speaker-level inputs and has an auto-sensing circuit that powers it off when the stereo is off. The power draw is low enough that you can tap into the car's existing amp power supply...no need to run a cable to the battery.
I'm interested to know as well. I've replaced every single car stereo system in every car I've ever owned but I'm on the fence on this once. It's "decent" compared to the crappy Bose systems I've had in previous cars yet it still leaves much to desire.
I think the problem with this setup is that in order to get a much better sound, you'd have to spend more money than normal because it comes with a "decent" setup. I don't think simply replacing the fronts/rears with anything less than a mid/higher end speaker will make it worth doing. Then, you'd have to look at adding aftermarket amps at which you would probably need to add some type of processor to cut over the signal from the headunit to the amps since these cars run fiber in the head units, from what I understand.
I have the H/k in my 15 CLA 250. Sounds good over all for factory. I put lots of time and research into this. Replacing the speakers bad idea they are very high quality. So I’m going with adding Alpine optimum 8 DSP and amp 50x6 and 300x2. This will wake up the H/K speakers and subs in rear deck. If the rear deck are still weak will replace with some Focal 10” subs back there with some custom fiberglass.
this unit integrates flawless with the factor system and the auto tune in DSP gives a great base line to tweak to your ear. Able to adjust with iPhone or laptop is great. With 6 presets can have one for different music types and even valet if so wanted. This is a great options for you all to consider.
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