AMG_Fred

hello everybody. My family is going to give me a stereo system for my car for my birthday . the problem is that i only have 400-500 dollars. im not sure how much they are going to give me but im willing to give the 200 thats in my pocket. ( already added in there, were not rich :\ ) but , the question is, what is the best i can get with this, and who should i go to get this done? will any of you be able to do it with good performance/quality? I will only need the 4 speakers and the headunit. maybe an amplifier if the price permits. or should i take myself to a shop? any competent ones around here? what would you recommend? oh and supposedly , my car is already set up for an amp and a sub iin the trunk... i dunno anything about that . thanks in advance.
-- Freddie

p.s. oh and please something not too far, i live in west covina and will be willing to drive an hour to get to wherever is needed.

AMG_Eric

i know the pioneer 7700 is about $250.

its gonna be hard to do a whole system with install for around $700. sorry to be the bringer of bad news.

gaww

i noticed that the speaker configuration in my 95 e320 is different than the one in the 89 300e. first off, i noticed that there are are two additional speakers in the front door panels. are there any other speakers im not aware of in the later years? im looking to upgrade the sound system in the car and would like to know the speaker sizes and locations in a 95 s.e. any suggestions as to setup? thnx

ashman

the mb stock speakers are all off sizes, meaning that you wont find many drop in replacements from most aftermarket brands.

In my coupe, I fit 6.5" in the door place, and put the tweeters int he dash spot. and fit 5.25" in the rear deck.

In the sedan, i think you can only fit 5.25" in the doors, but maybe you could do 6.5"

Personally I like the following brands.

MB Quart
JBL
Infinity

JBL has some great sounding stuff and very nice amps that have good power and look good and sound good.

Others have their own opinions on what sounds good too, so take that into consideration.

My sound system consists of MB Quart, JBL, and infinity speakers, JL Audio Sub, Fosgate Sub Amp, and lightning audio 4 channel amp for the speakers. I have my pioneer headunit which is my preferred radio brand to control my system.

My personal tstes this setup works great for me and sounds great to me.

Before doing anything to a car, my suggestion is to try to hear aftermarket systems in the same kind of car, as most stereo shop demo rooms will sound very different from how something is going to sound in a car with the car's acoustics.

Eric's sound system sounds very good too. I'm not a fan of sony amplifiers, but they work for his setup and his system is very clean, installwise and sound wise.

There are so many options and so many different opinions, that it is hard to decide on stuff when you have 100 people telling you what they think sounds best. your ears are the only thing that can make you decide.

AshMan

AMG_Fred

ok well yea, i am definately not an audiophile. i don't know where i would be able to find something like finding somewhere to hear how a car sounds with a certain setup other than to just try out the one2fours's cars. and i don't think ill have time for that ( the ladies are a calling ) but just some quality speakers such as jbl like you suggested would work great. since my price limit isn't much, maybe i can work in parts such as only putting in a pair of speakers and the headunit and the following pair later on... I will try and find out what the price limit is tomorrow without being rude. i hope its like 2 grand.. hahahhaa like that will happen... thanks for all the help guys

e320newbie

mb quart and ur set man..

AMG_Fred

oh yea, im sorry i forgot to mention, i would like to have the head unit to be capable of mp3 playback.... ill look around at the circuit city and best buy to see what head units they have

*update*

are this of poor quality??

http://www.circuitcity.com/ssm/Pione...oductDetail.do

and what are pre amp outputs?

Nick_M_51988

i have THIS one. it's pretty snazzy. has nice clear sound and lots of little features. i drop the faceplate everytime i take it out and it's still running. so that says slot to me . I'd go listen to it. plus the mp3 tag display is nice, the way it organizes everything. plus it comes with a remote when your too lazy to reach the whole 10 inches down. Oh and sirius ready

mhorn

If you decide to replace your speakers, be very careful when removing the trim around the speaker cover. An independant mercedes repair shop once told me that those parts are outrageously expensive.

AMG_Eric

ok here is the low down on exactly what i have. it has changed again since you all saw my car last. i had a little break in at the house.

i used to have a pioneer 7700. since that got destroyed in the theft i went a little bigger. the new headunit i have is the DEH-P80MP
http://www.pioneerelectronics.com/pn...014395,00.html both units had/have mp3 capability and i use my mp3 player to play my mp3's currently with my dell dj 20gb. additionally as you can see it has other toys like a remote and all kinds of goofy screen animated screen savers in the head unit for flash.

my front speakers are component mb quarts. its the middle line one i believe. if i recall there were 3 different colors on the labeling that denoted the model. i have the ones with a tweeter and a 6inch. the 6 inch is mounted in the doors and the tweeters are mounted in the dash. the rear tray has a pair of arc audio 5.25's i believe and my retray also has a free air mounted 12" arc audio sub. i have 2- 4 channel 1 ohm sony es amps that put out more then enough power. 1 amp is bridged 3 channel for the sub and the rear speakers. the other is bridged 2 channel for the front components.

keep in mind b4 i had all this redone in feb i had a sony headunit with cd changer and STOCK speakers with the 2 sony es amps and a cerwin vega 10" sub. it sounded great. the reason i changed it all in feb was cause i wanted to play my external mp3 player thru the car stereo. so in feb i had it redone for its 2nd time. additionally for its 3rd time in june it got a new headunit to replace the stolen one and i replaced all the rcas. now it sounds even better then it did in feb.

pics of my sub are available in these forums somewhere along with my amp install. if you want to keep your trunk space you may want to go with a free air sub and the current amp installation i have. if you dont mind about trunk space throw a sub box in the trunk and be done with it and save yourself some $$$$$.

Nick_M_51988

i was quoted $12 for blue ones at my dealer. i was lucky enough not to break them. are we talking about the same little plastic clips?

ashman

as I said everyone will havey varying opinions on what sounds good.

Like I said in PM, the headunit is the center piece of the system. go for a headunit first then later upgrade the speakers.

The headunit is what drives the system. get one that has the features and options you want. I myself would go for the best headunit you can afford to start

AshMan

AMG_Fred

amg eric... did you notice any performance gain between the 7700 and the DEH-P80MP?? if so.. about how much? i think i can deal with some 200 dollar head unit. if i want something better down the road, ill upgrade it. the price limit is still unknown. alon, did you talk to your friend about the prices of the speakers? and you didn't tell me about the price of your install. hopefully its not too steep. you can tell me anything you want over pm or on here. thanks a lot for all this info guys.

AMG_Eric

i cant say i saw a performance gain. it is for sure a feature gain. i know u get preamp out sub in both units but i think the 7700 is at 1v and the 80 is at 4v. also the 80 has the mute button on the head. the 7700 can only be accessed via the remote.

my 80 was installed for $400 which included the head unit. it was installed at a shop in anaheim hills called audio design. i might of gotten a break since 2 months prior i had all that other work done.

the 80 also comes with a bigger internal amp which i never use. i prefer all pre-outs to a amp.

on a HUGE side note i bought a 200w amp from walmart today for my pickup truck. it was 50 bux and i wired it to a 8" enclosed box. i think it is a jbl speaker. however the point i want to make is this amp sounds as good as my $500 a peice amps in my benz. i asked myself today why the hell did i spend soooo much on the other amps 5 years ago. i still dont have the answer.

AMG_Fred

^^ word on the amp part. personally, i doubt i will notice the sound difference between a $200 head unit and a $450 dollar one. when performing in band ( this year will have been my 7th year in band all trumpet ) i still don't know if i am flat or sharp and i am an above average player. So im thinking i will get jbl all around speakers and a decent pioneer/alpine head unit. lets see what alon will say...

CaliE320

Actually since you're not an audiophile you can get a pretty decent set-up for
$700. Get an Alpine MP3/Cd unit for about $250, Infinity Kappa 5 1/4" or 6 1/2" for the rear deck $175.
Infinity 4's up front $125. Audiobahn 4 channel amp $200. That way the head unit can power the 4's the four channel amp can run the rear 5's or 6's and when you get more money you can add a sub to the amp. That's a pretty simple clean set-up that you or a friend can do yourself in a weekend and save money. In my opinion that's money well spent intead of spending more money on an expensive head unit that you're probably not going to notice the difference anyways.

~Cali

ashman

He can go infinity or JBl both made by harmon audio anyway.

I think the kappa's are a bit bright but they do sound good. the JBLs are a bit softer, but to me ont he other end of the spectrum. The JBL's are clean more of a studio quality sound. the infinities are a bit more boomy and crisp.

Either way he cant go wrong.

I can get him wholesale maybe even less on JBL or infinity stuff.

I can get a JBL amp for like $250.00 that will do the speakers justice.

He can always add to the system. for now I think he should go with a headunit that he likes and has the features he wants that is within his budget, and shoot for speakers. then if budget permits, add the amp.

Remember the amp needs power cable of at least 4 gauge considering the distance from the battery and power cable is not super cheap nor super expensive, and good quality RCA's can cost a bit too.

If I were to start all over with my system, I would probably not change a thing. overall my most expensive part of my system was the headunit.

I can lay out what I spent on my system:

Pioneer DEH-P8500MP $350.00
Infinity reference 6.5" compoents $100
infinity reference 5.25" components $100
Lightning audio 300.4 Amp $ Free
Rockford fosgate Punch 800.2 Amp $50.00
12" JL Audio 12w3D4 Sub with small box $50
6.5" MB Quart components $ Free
2 Farad Cadence Capacitor $60.00

I replaced the infinity reference with the mb quart speakers. The 6.5" are going into the rear deck when I get a chance to make them fit. The 5.25" woofers are going into the dash when I get around to making them fit in there. The tweeters in the dash now will be moved out to the A-pillars. I will then be adding another amp to power the 5.25" speakers.

Overall I am not sure what the end result will be but I am looking forward to it.

With all the adjustments I can do with the headunit I can fine tune it to my liking.

The rest, will be running new 0 gauge wire to the rear, to a 2nd battery when I do the dual battery system, and the amps will draw off the 2nd battery with 4 gauge wires. the rest of the car will run off the main battery.

To me that is my end result when I get around to finding time to do it.

Now he does not have to go to this extreme. everyone has made good suggestions, and I am sure any of them will work great and sound good in his car.

AshMan

AMG_Eric

overall ashman and i agree on most things. however standard non-expensive rcas sound exactly like monster cable ones. ANY honest installer will give the nod to this as well. monster like most companies spend a crap load on marketing and charge way more then they should for thier product. gold plated ends are not different then others unless you put them to high end q&a testing which really has no place in the real world of driving a car down the road and listening to your tunes. if you have $$$$ to burn then buy the expensive $50 a run cables. if you would like a great sound and no headaches go with the $10-$15 ones.

i just redid all my rcas in my mbz and i used the regular midline non-high end rcas and they sound great. additionally this is true of video rcas as well. believe it or not component and composite cables are the same. some may or maynot have sheilding but that is about the biggest difference.

also ashman is dead nutz on with the power cable gauge. this is of course assuming you are putting a power draining hog in for you amps. bigger is better but only if you need it. i have 2 1ohm amps so i needed that and a distribution block. if you go with a single 200w you would be fine with a higher guage wire (remember the higher the # the smaller the wire diameter). in fact i just installed a wallymart amp in my truck and i used 12 ga or 10 ga i think. the reason i say this is the guy who helped me with my amp wires cars and makes harnesses for a living. heck he mostly does hotrods and high end off-road cars and he picked out the gauge wire for me.

one thing you MUST do is run the power down the passenger side and run the speaker wire and rcas down the driver side. running power and audio in the same run will give you all kinds of unwanted and avoidable headaches.

ashman

When i say good quality RCA's I mean not the high end over priced stuff, just stuff that is good quality, and not the cheapy thin as hell ones using like 20 g cable. LOL

I also have the feeling he wants to go bigger and better on amps later, so having the wire run already would be a plus. The more you take things apart the more chances there are at breaking something...

AshMan

AMG_Eric

heck then he should just run 0

AMG_Fred

wait... whats going to happen in my car??

Sam 325i

Not reading thorugh this whole thread as i'm LAZY, so you may have heard this already but it's good advice. If you go into amps and subs and headunits and stuff, make sure you alwyas look for RMS and not Peak or Max Power.

RMS=all the time.
Peak= what the unit will hit for one split second at the highest volume.

The day JVC or some of the other crap companies puts out something that gives 50 actual watts or whatever. HAH!

AMG_Fred

thanks a lot buddy. so when searching for a head unit... what should i look for the most? first... capabilities like mp3/wma/wav/aac and such. second would that be rma? what else should i look for?

in addition, what is the difference between the pioneer DEH-P7700MP and the Premier DEH-P770MP

so far i only see Automatic Sound Levelizer (ASL) the premier has it and the pioneer doesn't. and the same for Rotary Commander Operation Mode

YNVDIZW124

First don't look at price! I mean the higher the price dosen't mean better the quality. You should also spend your money on sound processors, eq, or crossovers. NEVER think that just the eq on the headunit is going to make it sound good.

I like pioneer headunits but i would just buy a cheaper pioneer one and help you make the cable for the aux input so you can use an ipod or flash mp3 player because it's better than burning mp3 cd's!

I can go on forever talking about what you need or get technical but i'm not.

RMS is continuous power. Which means power you can have all day without overheating the amp or getting it up to it's peak.

AMG_Fred

that is true. after alon installs this for me ( if my parents ever allow me, im dropping all the hints possible, and i told my brother that i want that the most ) would you like to help me put in the auxiliary input or whatever so that i can hook it up to an ipod? and also maybe the cross over or whatever. but first you gotta expain that stuff to me since thats just jibberish to me right now. what is a crossover?