2nd Gen R60 Countryman Most liked posts in thread: Who's done an entertainment upgrade?

I got ride of my old wife and got the new improved version.......


Oh your talking about speakers, my fault.

 

Here's my slight upgrade.

 

Fan of JL Audio here. Am enjoying an 2 year old AlpineCDE-HD149 head unit with JL XD 700/5 amp for the front and rear speakers and a XD600/1 for the JL W7AE 12 inch sub. On a slow day just after Chrismas picked up some ZR525-CSi for the front and ZR525-CSi for the rear. Will be adding them soon.

 

A few options. The best upgrade you can do to any stereo is to give the speakers more power.
Start with a head unit. You would be surprised how little power factory systems put out.

If you have the hk. Then you either need to buy the hk enabler harness from the uk.
Or wire around the amp.

I would use the harness. A few reasons.
The woofers and tweeters are wired as separates. Using the harness, retains the amp.
Easy install. No running wires.

If you do not have the hk. Just replace the head unit. Most new heads average about 18 watts rms per speaker. Most stock is less than 5.

Try that first, and I doubt you will need to go any further.

 

Morel and Zapco FTW! I like your style sir.

 

I upgraded the audio in my MINI(r53) with polk DB's, mounted a kenwood xr-4s amp in a void under the driver seat and found a kenwood deck that matched the interior of the car. I recently upgrade the DB's to the polk MM line with the neo magnets. They have a better frequency response and better low end such that you can get by without a sub..... Amazon has the best price on either polk speaker series from what I've found. Crutchfield can be a little high but often has the buy one polk speaker pair and get the second pair half off....

 

Polk do does offer 4" speakers. They actually have a pretty wide Variety of speakers sizes. The rest depends on the type of music you listen to, how far you want to take the system, and what your budget is. I opted to run all new power and speaker wires and dynamat. You can always start with new speakers and a new head unit and go from there. I agree with a previous post that more power makes a big difference. Remember doubling the amp wattage increases speaker volume by 3db. The new speakers will increase your clarity and frequency response.

 

I wouldn't run aftermarket speakers with the hk amp.

 

Thanks for bringing up this topic again. I too am in the immediate market to make an upgrade to my speaker system and seem to remember a couple of our members having already done so. I'm sure someone will share before too long.

 

I like JL Audio for power and a Sub but Focal K2 components sound the best.
They are not for everyone because of the price.

http://wwv.crutchfield.com/p_091165KR2/Focal-K2-Power-165-KR2.html

 

I only used the speaker wires from the head unit and extended them to the outputs on the amp. I used an Alpine preamp only HU with RCAs to my JL digital 900x5 amp.

The door wires are fine for higher end speakers and power. Plus the molex plugs on the doors make is damn near impossible to run new wires to the doors without taking off the doors and drilling.

I ran my own power and grounds from the rear of the car and used a little larger wire for the rear 6x9's since I had the whole interior out of the car for Dynamat. :ihih:

 

What year and stereo do you have?

 

Ok. With that plan, here's what you want to do.

Replace the head unit.
Replace the speakers. Buy a decent set of comments for the front doors.
5 1/4 should fit. As far as depth, you are going to have to make speaker adapters anyways.

Then I would ditch the hk amp, and run a small 4 channel back where the hk is.

Then, you don't need the harness.

I would suggest maybe having a shop do the work, it is a little involved.

Or, go all out. Like I am doing right now...

 

Go to the amp.
All the twisted pairs are speaker wires.

The front doors are the same colors left and right.

Pop the speakers with a small battery to identify them.

 

I found this a while back. Not sure how accurate it is but I'll be finding out soon.

 

I found the door speaker wiring to be different.