[Russbmw]

As most e9x owners will testify, the stock system is pretty pony unless you're lucky enough to find one with the top-end Logic 7 setup installed - which is about as rare as hens teeth.

So, courtesy of Four Car Audio, I ended up with new Rainbow custom fit components, subs and a Rainbow Beat 4 amp. So off I went to Car Audio Security again to have them install it properly. 8)

Arran sorted me out with the new door trim sections to house the tweeters - surprisingly cheap at £16 the pair.

Lots of pictures, but might be helpful for others to get an idea of what's involved, as it seems a bit of a black art when you try read up on similar installs online. Just to clarify, doing things this way (ie: if you have the basic or Business systems with no external amplifier) there is absolutely no coding required on the car. I got fed a load of BS from a local place when I first enquired some months ago about doing this kind of upgrade.

Lots of trim has to come out - namely, door cards, side sill trims, rear seat and side panels, both front seats and the entire boot trim. Because the seats need to come out, disconnecting the battery negative lead is an absolute must.

Without further delay, here we go!







Depending on the spec of the car, you may or may not have space under the boot floor panel. Mine has bluetooth and DAB radio modules, so all the space was taken, and Pav had to find somewhere else. The left corner of the boot was perfect, although the oddments tray was too deep to fit back in. However, there is another very shallow option (shown on realOEM) which should fit fine - so I've got one of these on order from BMW.



New fused power supply direct from the battery is run across the boot (will fit behind the trim when refitted).



Here's one of the stock door speakers



Passenger seat out and disconnected, here is one of the stock subs.



Sub out, new wiring harness adaptor plugs into the existing harness. This then gives an output which will feed the headunit signal back to the amplifier, and the other pair of wires will be the new amplified signal to the sub.



New cabling fed down the sills and combine back at the new amp location in the boot.



Stock sub - right. Rainbow sub - left Just a slight difference!



New sub in on the drivers side. The new subs fit into the existing enclosures without any modification, Newer LCI models 2010 onwards have the stock subs bonded in, instead of screwed in, which makes for a ballache of a job. Thankfully, mine is an LCI, but is on the changeover year (2009), so mine were still screwed in thankfully. The stock enclosures are a neat design to be honest, they utilise the entire sill as part of the enclosure.

As teh new subs sit slightly higher and fire upwards instead of down, like the stock ones, some of the foam on the underside of the carpet has to be removed. This is done simply by scoring the desired area to be removed and them peeling it off in chunks by hand.



Pav fabricated a mounting board which is fixed into the standard bolt holes that would usually hold the CD changer or TV module. Amp now in place.





New door speakers and tweeters mounted and doorcard going back on. The crossovers fit neatly using strong adhesive pads into a recess in the door card.







I'll get a picture of the boot when I have the new trim piece.

I've spent a while messing around with the settings this evening, and found that if I increase the frequency at which the subs come in, and raise the door speakers cut off, the overall sound is very good.

It's not considerably louder than before - and because it's using high level inputs, the gains need to be tweaked to minimise distortion - but the overall sound staging is vastly improved - much brighter sound thanks to the tweeters - as is the clarity and most of all the depth and range of the bass response. Inside the car, you can really feel the bass now - it sounds more like there is a large sub in the boot - very impressive. Outside the car, you'd never really know aside from some increased vibrations due to the subs forcing air and sound into the sills.

So, the question I now have is something Sam might be able to assist with. I have heard rumours that the business headunit can be re-coded to get rid of the heavily tweaked EQ and replace it with the flatter, cleaner Professional/Hi-Fi one?

[Sparky68]

Looks good, I bet that set you back a fair bit. Keep promising to sort mine out but, after 2 years still not got around to it!

[Soul_Glo]

Yeh can be coded... for the Stereo to HiFi coding to work l the outputs will change from high level to low level, and from the rear signal from high passed to full range.

[Russbmw]

Picked up the replacement tray for the corner of the boot.

Here's the difference!



If anyone wants to know the part number, here it is (as some dealerships might not have it listed for some reason, as I found out)

[Russbmw]

Having been listening and tweaking the system the last week, I have decided I'm going to add an Audison Bit Ten DSP to the system, as I want to eliminate the distortion caused by the headunit sending out an equalised signal - which is then amplified by the Rainbow amp. The Bit Ten should sort this out and provide the amp with a nice, clean signal.

I would re-code the system, but I'm not sure how the rear speakers will fare as a result - as they are powered off the headuinit at the moment, and I still need them to work as well as possible.

[Russbmw]

Just incase anyone is interested, I can get Audison, Hertz, Rainbow, etc kit at discounted priced through my contact at FourMasters.

So please get in touch if you're after doing something similar.

[makkan00]

Originally Posted by Russbmw

Just incase anyone is interested, I can get Audison, Hertz, Rainbow, etc kit at discounted priced through my contact at FourMasters.

So please get in touch if you're after doing something similar.

Have you considered ms-8?
It has built in amp and can power your rears and central speaker as well.

[Russbmw]

I did look into various options, of which the MS-8 was one, but don't have the centre speaker mate, and the rear speakers are the stock ones at the moment, just there to keep the little 'un entertained when she's in the car.

To be honest, the Bit Ten will give me options for adding another amp and reconfiguring the system if I decide to go off and do a balls-out install (which I am trying desperately to resist the urge to do in this car! LOL!)

[Russbmw]

Well, installed the Bit Ten this evening.

Easy enough to transpose the wiring from the amp to the bit ten. Power requirements are minimal for this unit, so I simply daisy chained the earth, power and remote from the amp.

It fits neatly into the cavity beneath the floor and is secured in place with some heavy duty velcro (like the amp was).





Well, after going through the somewhat confusing instructions to set it up and calibrate it (I've not messed about with the laptop and really tweaking it yet), the sound is honestly unbelievable.

So much clearer, louder and more powerful.

The only way I can describe it that people might be able to relate to, is if you've ever run a amp and sub, with the amp signal feed tapped off the standard headunit speaker inputs. It sounds good - better than stock, right? With the Bit Ten in, the sound is like you'd get if you'd ripped out all the stock stuff and installed a decent heaunit, with all amps running of decent voltage RCAs. It's that good. Difference is night and day.

Really happy with it, and best of all (once I finish getting it all set up and put the trim piece in over the amp and tidy the additional wiring up), the whole setup is completely stealth. 8) 8)

[nik patel]

How much did this all cost out of interest?

[AWBimmer]

Great set up mate and decent bit of kit there!! Enjoyed reading this!

[Russbmw]

Originally Posted by nik patel

How much did this all cost out of interest?

Wouldn't like to say

However, prices are:

Speakers £480
Amp £350 ish
Bit ten £300

[BMWChap]

Originally Posted by Russbmw

Wouldn't like to say

However, prices are:

Speakers £480
Amp £350 ish
Bit ten £300

Did you sample what the Alpine Kit sounds like first with L7's ? £600-650

I'm only asking because I almost went all out like yourself and was glad I didn't...

[Russbmw]

Nope, because I got all the above for substantially less.

[sparkymarky]

Originally Posted by Russbmw

Just incase anyone is interested, I can get Audison, Hertz, Rainbow, etc kit at discounted priced through my contact at FourMasters.

So please get in touch if you're after doing something similar.

Hi, just wondering how much you can get the underseats for? Be it hertz space 8 or the rainbows?

[Russbmw]

Originally Posted by sparkymarky

Hi, just wondering how much you can get the underseats for? Be it hertz space 8 or the rainbows?

I don't know, I'll have to ask (it's not my full time job!).

Drop me a PM with your contact email address, what car you have and what you're after, and I'll find out.

[makkan00]

Originally Posted by Russbmw

Sub out, new wiring harness adaptor plugs into the existing harness. This then gives an output which will feed the headunit signal back to the amplifier, and the other pair of wires will be the new amplified signal to the sub.

Read this thread in detail now. Sorry could not answer earlier. Yes, business nav can be coded to have hi-fi signals.

Just to let you know that your installer made a fundamental mistake there. +ve signals are going to -ve on your front drivers and vice versa. So technically polarity is reversed which may have negative effect on sound staging.

You can either correct it physically be reversing it. Or if you have bit one / ten, then changing the polarity via the software may help you.

[mob17]

Just seen this. I do like an audio set up with a dsp. People always say you don't need one but once you have one it's much better. How far into tuning have you gone?

As makkan has said play with the polarity. It makes a HUGE difference if one side is opposite polarity.

The process i take is the following:

1) play some well known music at a reasonable level
2) mute all channels except mids/tweets
3) switch polarity on right mid/tweet. If it sounds better then keep it. If not switch it back. Mids/tweets are now matched
4) repeat with subs only
5) assuming you have no more channels, now play all of them, and then switch both the sub ch polarity. If it all sounds better keep it, if not switch back.

Wrong polarity makes a great system sound shite.

[Russbmw]

I haven't tried messing around with the software yet.

Can you use it "live" as such, so you can change EQ settings and so on whilst the system is up and running?

A little confused by the comments about wiring, as the I'm well aware of how speakers sound out of phase, and mine sounds bloody brilliant, so I can't see how anything could be wrong to be honest.

If I can play around with it on the software, I can always check it out I suppose.

[makkan00]

Originally Posted by Russbmw

I haven't tried messing around with the software yet.

Can you use it "live" as such, so you can change EQ settings and so on whilst the system is up and running?

A little confused by the comments about wiring, as the I'm well aware of how speakers sound out of phase, and mine sounds bloody brilliant, so I can't see how anything could be wrong to be honest.

If I can play around with it on the software, I can always check it out I suppose.

Check 2nd photo of my thread

http://www.e90post.com/forums/showthread.php?t=837089

to your photo. See the cables and their allocation.

Yes, it may sound bloody brilliant....but I am giving you scientific fact and not BS. And I am only giving this as you appears to be a nice person and good fellow forum member.

If you still think that getting things right is not for you, then kindly ignore my comment and enjoy brilliant sound system

[mob17]

Originally Posted by Russbmw

I haven't tried messing around with the software yet.

Can you use it "live" as such, so you can change EQ settings and so on whilst the system is up and running?

A little confused by the comments about wiring, as the I'm well aware of how speakers sound out of phase, and mine sounds bloody brilliant, so I can't see how anything could be wrong to be honest.

If I can play around with it on the software, I can always check it out I suppose.

You're most likely right and its all set up ok, but no harm to check? If you follow the steps i listed then you'll be sorted polarity wise and may have a pleasant suprise.

On my DSP (helix p dsp) you can do it live and it switches immediately, which makes listening out for changes really easy. I'd be suprised if the bit one couldn't do that.

You done anything with your EQ on the dsp? If not just have a play on each band whilst playing music just to get a feeling of whats changing.

[Russbmw]

Originally Posted by makkan00

Check 2nd photo of my thread

http://www.e90post.com/forums/showthread.php?t=837089

to your photo. See the cables and their allocation.

Yes, it may sound bloody brilliant....but I am giving you scientific fact and not BS. And I am only giving this as you appears to be a nice person and good fellow forum member.

If you still think that getting things right is not for you, then kindly ignore my comment and enjoy brilliant sound system

Your second picture shows BMW plugs of some description.

Everything in my kit came with the Rainbow speakers. I can see what you mean about the wire colours and positions, and can see what you've linked out on yours, which would appear to be different to mine - which is odd, I admit.

Sam, likewise, I have a lot of time for you and your knowledge, and I value your advice - but sometimes you respond to stuff with an unecessary hostility like "how dare anyone question me".

I'm not accusing you of being wrong, and I also don't appreciate being spoken to like i'm a first grade numpty. I've been installing my own audio systems (subs, component speakers, crossovers, multiple amps, etc) in cars for the last 21 years, and I know what out of phase speakers sound like, and yes I do like things to be correct thank you.

This is the first ever installation I have paid someone to do, purely because of all the BS many installers feed the general public regarding how everything need coding and so on, making you think it's brain surgery. Having watched the installation progress, I have seen it is not complicated, nor is there any coding of any sort required.

The picture was just taken as the install was progressing, and as you can see nothing was connected to anything, other than those plugs connected to the original harness, I don't know how things ended up being cabled up finally.

For all I (or you) know, the installer (who has done many of these installs I might add) may have effectively reversed the polarities of all the new speakers and connections to the amplifier - so the only speakers that would be out of phase in the system would be the 2 rear quarter speakers that are still being powered off the headunit.

Now, admittedly I hadn't considered this nor checked it, because you can't hear the rears hardly at all anyway anymore. However, as I said above, if I can figure out the software (and any pointers with this would be appreciated), then I can reverse the polarity of various speakers and see how things sound.

Unless I'm mistaken, what you are suggesting is that the wiring arrangement would mean the 2 subs are out of phase with the door mids and tweeters? If that was the case, then yes you're right, the bass "thump' would sound crap as the subs excursion would be out of phase with the other speakers - and if that was the case, it would sound pretty apparent....which is what I said, it doesn't sound like that.

If the amp input signals were taken from the sub connectors, fed to the amp, which is then powering the subs and door speakers, then they wouldn't be out of phase? The only things that would be would be the rears, as mentioned?

Anyway, as I also said, it's something to consider and if I can figure the software out, I'll check it out and report back on here.

I might go have a look in the boot at what's going on at the amp end now, as it's bugging me now!