Okay I give up - why does my car audio setup sound worse than SR-60's?

[Computerpro3]

Well about eight months ago I did tons of research and spent tons of money and got what was supposed to be a kick ass car audio setup. It has the following componets:

Alpine IVA-W200
Focal 165 V2 Polyglass Componets
Zapco Reference 360.4 bridged to 2 channels
Cerwin Vega Vmax 12.2 wired to 1ohm sealed enclosure
Soundstrem Picasso Pic1-900D 900w 1ohm RMS
2006 Ford Escape Limited

In short, it sounds like a damaged Beyer DT770 on steorids. If I had to guess my system's EQ settings by ear, I would guess that the highs were on +10db, the mids were on -10, and the bass was +4.

The 6.5in woofers are mounted in the factory location in the doors and the tweeters are drilled and mounted into the a pillars at ear level.

I had the setup installed by the best guy I could find - he went to school for it and was a multi-time national finalist in the professional circuits. At least I thought he was good....

Anyway, my goal here was sound quality. I was afraid that my subwoofer was going to go boom boom and overwhelm everything, but it's actually surprisingly tight. The box was computer designed to have a nice slow rolloff and take into account cabin gain, and it is sealed. It's not bad at all.

What kills me - and I mean KILLS me- is the 100% unacceptable sound coming from the focals. With my headunit set on "defeat" so there is no EQ on, my ears bleed. BLEED! I use RS-1's and can listen for hours at a time. I think 325i's aren't that bright. But these focals make "s" sounds harsh enough to make me physically cringe. I have my headunit eq set on -4 treble and it's still not warm sounding. They just sound, well, metallic.

Not only that, there is roughly 0 midbass coming out of my 6.5in woofers When the sub is off, the only difference between the focals and the generic speakers is the level of detail and clarity.

I think there could be a couple of problems. First of all, there is no dynamat installed at all. Does this honestly make that much of a difference? Second, the focals are just mounted free-air. In the ford escape, there is just tons of air behind the speaker mounting holes. I think this may be causing some of the resonance - it's the actual sheet metal of the body.

I guess it's also possible that $250 speakers by Focal, a supposedly reputable brand, are just flat out terrible.

For a reference point, I'm going for the sound of my RS-1's Not in resolution and detail obviously, but I want rich, palpable mids, warm highs, and quick, tight, impactful bass. That's all I care about.

Is there anything I can do to salvage this moneypit or am I stuck with it?

 

[troymadison]

Car audio is frustrating...

 

[Computerpro3]

Seriously. All I want is sound comparable to a $70 headphone (SR-60's). I'm $1500 in and still not even close.

 

[troymadison]

Give up while you're ahead...

 

[003]

Cars SUCK for audio

 

[larryminator]

I would help you out but can't.

First of all, the car you're trying to make a good system in it is bad. Seriously, sound in a car depend a lot on the car itself, and having a bid escape isn't the best thing.

Also, If you can't listen to your speaker, sell them and try something else seriously before going nuts.

Focal is a great company. You can also try CDT.

Let me know if you find a solution.

 

[larryminator]

Hum, also, I also like to remind you that your radio, Alpine IVA-w200, is real crap SQ wise. Sell it asap and buy a Clarion DRZ9255. Seriously. This radio sucks badly. My friend got another one in the IVA series and the SQ is so bad for the price it's unbelievable.

 

[skyline889]

I can't say if you'd approve of the sound but I'm running an Alpine head-unit, 4 Rockford coaxials, a Rockford amplifier, and a 12" Alpine sub in a closed box and I'm pretty happy with the sound. The mid-range voicing is pretty darn decent and the Alpine combined with the Rockford amp provides really tight, deep bass. The Alpine can be tuned so that it swells the rear door of the hinges but if the SQ EQ is dialed to 0 and tuned with the dedicated Rockford SW EQ, the bass sounds awesome. The highs can be a little sibilant at times but it's nowhere near as bright as my HF-1s on the default treble EQ setting.

For the most part though, it depends on what you listen to. My car set-up sounds great with CDs but only decent on a couple of stations. If you're mostly listening to radio, you're never really going to get great quality sound because even though aftermarket head-units may be better in almost all aspects, radio reception for the most part isn't going to be as good as the stock unit. BTW if you're wondering what car I'm running it in it's a Honda Odyssey

so the cabin size is a little bigger than your Escape.

 

[jellybones]

What car should I buy to ensure my audio will sound best?

 

[no1likesme]

a van.

 

[Ampersand]

I'm sure you know this already, but since I made the same mistake....

'defeat' bypasses your eq as well as crossover settings, so make sure they're set on your amps.

Also, unless you've sealed your doors (with dynamat or really anything to seal up the holes), you're not going to get any midbass.

Regardless, it's hard to get car audio to sound as good as home audio at any price. I eventually gave up and just focused on home audio.

Wish you luck, though. Maybe you'll have better results.

 

[Rock&Roll Ninja]

Sell the Honda and buy a Mark Levinson equipped Lexus?

 

[larryminator]

Ok.

- Actually, the best sound comes usually from hatchback car. (Golf, Civic hatchback, etc.)
- Newer Alpine radio are really bad, all money invested in gadget we don't need and plastic button. Going for an older used alpine radio is actually 10x better than buying a new one.
- You can always make any car sound good, but it takes times and money.

 

[jbloudg20]

Car's are very had to get acoustically right.

Is your car dynamatted? You are not using kick panels for your fronts, And you say this guy knew what he was doing (given that you gave him a non-restricting budget)?

It also sounds like you may want to tweak the cutoff of your sub (amp).

 

[Sherwood]

There are a lot of unique challenges to car audio. One is the persistent noise floor whenever you're driving. Do you test the system while it's sitting, or while you're moving? My guess is that you'll listen primarily while the vehicle is in motion, so try and EQ accordingly.

Another difficulty is stereo imaging. Unless you have directable tweeters (which you might) your position in the vehicle is never in the "sweet spot". This affects imaging the most, but it also affects your bass and midbass with a kind of suckout.

Third is cabinet design. Most car speakers are literally just bolted into an aluminum hole and expected to perform. Dynamat will really affect the way your system sounds, as it is the only kind of cabinet tuning you have in car audio. Since you seem to have a problem with a very lacking midband and exaggerated treble, acoustic damping is exactly wha you need.

You can also employ a multi-band EQ, which is really quite useful for car audio. The EQ on headunits is woefully bad, so it's usually best to run them wide open and use a specific component to equalize for your listening position and vehicle.

Basically, you know the adage about speakers and headphones? You get ten times the performance per dollar out of headphones than speakers? That relationship is inverse to car audio. You might end up with about 1% of the per-dollar performance of headphones in your car. It's tough.