Quote:
Originally Posted by johnung
The HK amplifier is not a simple retrofit into a car that came with the HiFi amplifier. Harness and signaling are different so it's certainly not a plug and play option.
If you are just comparing amplifiers the Match 7BMW is superior. It's really two amplifiers in one. It's providing perfect power to the mods/tweeters, and much higher power to the underseat subwoofers. It's going to be louder and cleaner.
There's a lot of marketing thrown at BMW speakers, both Hifi and HK, claiming that they should be replaced. This is coming from retailers that want to sell expensive (mostly crap) speakers. Many guys install expensive aftermarket speakers and because they spent a lot of money, their brains tell their ears that the expensive speakers sound better. It's like a psychological placebo effect that the audio industry has been using to create sales for many decades.
The only BMW speakers that need to be replaced are the underseat subs, either HiFi or HK, with the Earthquake SWS-8Xi (2-ohm). Read the many posts by Billfitz about speakers and their specs. Bill's career has been spent designing speakers. The specs don't lie.
First install the Match 7BMW amplifier along with the Earthquakes and you'll be amazed how great your stock speakers sound.
Second, at that point you can also add a tweeter under your center channel dashboard grill. The bracket should already be there. And you can add tweeters in the rear doors. I would just get new or used HK tweeters for those three spots because you know they will sound great with the existing stock speakers.
I don't think I've heard of someone doing those things and then thinking that they need to spend more money on aftermarket speakers.
Hope this helps!
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Agreed with most of johnung above with couple small exceptions that might be personal taste.
I would say skip the rear tweeters and the center tweeter too. I wound up with all of them x-over at 3500 ish and turned way way down like -9 db to not fubar the front stage. Rear fill doesn’t need tweeters at all. Unless you ride in the back and have a driver! Lol.
I added the center tweeter but it was a waste of an hours time and ~$20 bucks (hint the e90 rear are same as f30 center and much easier to find on eBay). If you do one, it aims towards windscreen not back towards cabin. It doesn’t even get used with what I would consider my good tune. Messes up the localization L&R IMHO if you have full upper octave highs on the center. But others and yourself might differ in opinion so leave that for last.
What is and was a worthy upgrade for me is the HK center speaker grill. It is absolutely more acoustically transparent than the normal plastic one. Enough that that one change even helps stock system sound more centered and clearer in my experience. Worth the $20 on eBay for sure imo.
When you do the earthquake subs trim back the carpet 1/4” or 3/8” with a pair of heavy scissors or similar to not foul on the surround, you will see what I mean when you do it. the factory grills will cover the trimmed area no problem, and no reason to spend the money and not the extra 20 minutes to make sure the surrounds aren’t tapping.
Hope this helps, i often wish johnung and I lived close enough to listen to each others cars and tuning.
I will say this. With out tuning the match7 earthquake combo is as good as hk. With a “stock no t/a tune” from Fischer website slightly better. With a correct Time alignment and good tune the thing is massively impressive. I tell people I crammed a 10 in the dash, they believe it cause the bass is upfront in the dash, not in the butt or from the back… Until I tell them I’m kidding.
I can tell people I have (insert Random internet circle jerk brand like scanspeak) and they believe it, until I tell them I’m kidding… they are factory. Then they don’t believe me.
I don’t blame them. I’m massively impressed with this thing every day. And if I don’t count the 15+ hours I spent tuning every single channel individually, it was the easiest, fastest Audio upgrade I’ve ever done. I still want to go back and tweak the front left by a couple centimeters in the TA one of these days.
As far as crimping, if you are using most generic blue/red/yellow plastic crimps, the metal crimps and spacedes etc are usually fine, but imho you are better off taking the cheap plastic off and using heat shrink instead. You’ll get a better crimp with out the cheap plastic surround, it takes up much less room, and it looks nicer and neater and less pep boys.
A simple pack of red white black works fine and isn’t but $3-4. I used to do my speaker positives with red then do black over leaving just a ring of red showing. Always looked neat, and was easy to see which was which compared to everything being blue blue blue.