[Pereze]

Hi everyone,

I am obviously new to these forums but have been lurking for a while reading up on BMW's while I searched for my car. I finally found one and am enjoying being a part of the BMW family.

What I have:

I have a 2008 E90 328i with the hi-fi system and professional head unit. As you already know, I have the 10 speaker system.

Side note: I had read about the rear speakers being considered a woofer/tweeter combination and being counted as 2 speakers but i thought it was just a co-axial speaker. I took the cover off last night and couldn't believe it has a seperate tweeter next to the woofer. Again, I am sure you already knew this, but I was shocked.

Why I am confused:
I have had "systems" in my previous cars and had always used a passive component system in the front. I was curious about going active, and was also very curious to try out an MS-8. I wanted to see how easy it is to use and what it could do with a stock system. I also liked the fact that I could build onto with a ton of flexibility.

What started my confusion was the fact that the front of the car is basically a 3-way, then you have the rears and then a sub. But the MS-8 only has 8 channels, so that was one thought. Ten after reading about some of the underseat replacement woofers/subwoofers I began to wonder if I even needed a subwoofer in the trunk.

So here is where I am. I have equipment I just pulled out of my old car:

• Alpine SPX-177a (6.5 doesn't make sense in this car but was thinking about using the tweeter with another woofer - maybe the Dayton Rs100? if i went active)
• Infinity reference 5012 (5.25 co-ax speakers)
• Infinity Kappa Perfect 10 sub
• Infinity reference 7541A - 4 channel amp (one channel seems to come in and out so wasn't sure if bridging the one channel for the sub would work or if I just need a new amp)
• Alpine MRV-100M mono

I was thinking about adding the sub first (since I already have the amp and sub) and then maybe putting more power to the front speakers and/or underseat speakers. I can't just go out and spend $1000, but I can buy things here or there as I build it out so not sure if that helps.

Thoughts? Things I should watch out for?

TIA!

[ctuna]

These are the speakers that fit in the sedan and wagon some won't fit
in the coupe doors as far as I know there is no way of getting around
it with out hacking up the car a lot(or buying or making custom car panels)

speakers that fit
http://www.e90post.com/forums/showthread.php?t=343673
genral info
http://www.e90post.com/forums/showthread.php?t=365866

Unless you are a Bass Head you can get plenty of Bass
by upgrading the underseats and amping them.

[cdgatti]

Start by getting the Technic harness to connect whatever amp and speakers you want to try. Your door and rear deck speakers are 4" woofers with 1" tweeters hooked up with passive crossovers. Treat them like a single coax.

[Pereze]

Holy cow CTuna,

Those are some awesome links that I did not find in my searching. I wonder why those are not stickied somewhere ( maybe they are and I missed it).

More reading in store for me.

[ctuna]

That I have been collecting over the past couple of years
We have tried to sticky some of the basic info ones before but no
one seems to respond.

[Pereze]

OK, on a related question:

I have read that the BMW's tend to introduce noise into a system and have a more advanced electrical system. Is the electrical system also more delicate from an amp standpoint?

The reason I ask is I have a friend looking to sell some Orion amps (Extreme series) but he mentioned they can pull a lot of voltage and it may require some upgrades to the electrical system. I think they are class A amps and might beat up on the alternator over time.

The last thing I want to do with my audio upgrade is cause other issues within the car.


Also, cdgatti, I am working on getting my posts high enough to be able to PM Technic.
TIA!

[ctuna]

As soon as you can get mail.
Its current you have to worry about.
There are some examples of people putting
some pretty big amps in the trunk nearly filling
it they never mention beefing up the charging system
or adding a extra battery.
From what I understand you have to begin to worry
at about 1.5 to 2k watts.

[Pereze]

Ok, here is what I am thinking for stage 1 of my system upgrade. I am not sure what I am missing but this seems like a relatively simple upgrade using equipment I already have. I am drawing up (I know, it is power point with is not ideal) the Stage 2 system with an MS-8 and a new center channel speaker added, and then Stage 3 would either be replacing the front component set or replacing the underseat speakers. I think that will depend on Stage 1.

Any thoughts? Issues you see with this? I am going to do some more searches about some questions I have before I ask them here. I don't want to be the "lazy" guy.

Thanks!

[ctuna]

It just doesn't have enough power for anything use full and it does have some
eq that you don't want according to most sources.
I sent you my favorites list for cars there are many system examples in it.
It should keep you going for a month or two of reading.
You could start out with a jl xd amp and add other stuff later if
you are on a budget.
Look at the technic posts he is good at putting together low cost systems
The ms-8 is for surround sound I haven't heard a system with it so maybe I shouldn't comment but it belongs before
any amps you have. So if you were going to go that route
I would start off with it. What I didn't like about it was the low value of the output channels and its totaly automatic you can't tweek it you get what it gives you . Although I have heard that's pretty good.