Frenchy
Well-Known Member
- First Name
- Chris
- Joined
- Mar 15, 2020
- Threads
- 164
- Messages
- 7,541
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- 10,751
- Location
- Elizabeth, Colorado
- Vehicle(s)
- 2012 Nissan Frontier, 1994 F150 XL, 2022 Ford Transit
- Occupation
- Field Service Technician
- Thread starter
- #1
I understand this is in my 2012 Frontier, but if not mistaken I believe the Lariats have a similar system from the factory and may have interest in this. That said I understand it may get moved to another section and that's ok.
So for my 2012 Frontier I replaced my Factory Head Unit with a newer Nav unit so I could have an actual Sirius XM Radio(yes there is a difference). After that I have always considered the idea of changing the Amplifier and Speakers to improve on the sound a bit. The problem I was running into was the fact my vehicle uses a 8 channel 10 speaker system. That system consists of the following: 2 channels for the dash speakers at 4 ohms, 2 channels for the front door speakers at 2 ohms, 2 channels for the rear doors with lower door speakers at 2 ohms and upper tweeters at 4 ohms and 2 channels for the subwoofers at 4 ohms each.
Now because of that system I was having a hard time finding a amplifier I was comfortable running as I didn't want to cheap out, but then again I didn't want to break the bank either. I also didn't like the idea of running more than 1 amplifier. I ended up getting down to a JBL or the Blaupunkt Amplifier. Eventually I caved and went with the Blaupunkt as the application for tuning seems like the right choice.
I found the Amplifier on Amazon for roughly $600 back in November and got it fairly quick. I also order a plug and play harness to make installation much easier. Unfortunately things got delayed and the install did not happen right away.
Finally New Year's came around and I made the plan for the install with my dad. We took about a day to do the install and I'd say that was the right amount of time esp for the tuning aspect. With my dad being a 40+ year industrial/commercial Electrician, he took pride in cleaning up the wire for the Amp.
After the install was completed and everything was put back together, we got to the fun of tuning it. The first thing that was done was making sure the head unit was set to neutral. I didn't want the Treble, Bass, Fade and Balance to be messed with if I didn't have to and I felt the amplifier should be more than capable of doing just that.
Once that was done it was time to open the program on the laptop. With the truck powered on and the laptop connected, everything went to life. The amp was set to 80% on the Master Volume. To say the least I turned it down to 1% as this Amplifier is extremely powerful and required such so I could use the volume on the Head Unit as intended. While figuring out the best setting for the Master Volume, my dad was having fun as a Sound Engineer messing with all 32 adjustments in each channel(yes there are that many adjustments available). This was before we figured out how to set each channel to a specific location with speaker type. Because of that I may need retune this again.
Once all of this was done I was very happy to say the least. The sound quality certainly improved to a level that almost makes you feel like you are in the concert halls while driving down the road! To say the least I found this to be a nice upgrade to say the least.
Put simple if you are considering an upgrade to the Factory Sound System, I would definitely look at replacing the Factory Amplifier with a good DSP Amplifier like the Blaupunkt BPA-HX80DSP. It is well worth the money and effort!
So for my 2012 Frontier I replaced my Factory Head Unit with a newer Nav unit so I could have an actual Sirius XM Radio(yes there is a difference). After that I have always considered the idea of changing the Amplifier and Speakers to improve on the sound a bit. The problem I was running into was the fact my vehicle uses a 8 channel 10 speaker system. That system consists of the following: 2 channels for the dash speakers at 4 ohms, 2 channels for the front door speakers at 2 ohms, 2 channels for the rear doors with lower door speakers at 2 ohms and upper tweeters at 4 ohms and 2 channels for the subwoofers at 4 ohms each.
Now because of that system I was having a hard time finding a amplifier I was comfortable running as I didn't want to cheap out, but then again I didn't want to break the bank either. I also didn't like the idea of running more than 1 amplifier. I ended up getting down to a JBL or the Blaupunkt Amplifier. Eventually I caved and went with the Blaupunkt as the application for tuning seems like the right choice.
I found the Amplifier on Amazon for roughly $600 back in November and got it fairly quick. I also order a plug and play harness to make installation much easier. Unfortunately things got delayed and the install did not happen right away.
Finally New Year's came around and I made the plan for the install with my dad. We took about a day to do the install and I'd say that was the right amount of time esp for the tuning aspect. With my dad being a 40+ year industrial/commercial Electrician, he took pride in cleaning up the wire for the Amp.
After the install was completed and everything was put back together, we got to the fun of tuning it. The first thing that was done was making sure the head unit was set to neutral. I didn't want the Treble, Bass, Fade and Balance to be messed with if I didn't have to and I felt the amplifier should be more than capable of doing just that.
Once that was done it was time to open the program on the laptop. With the truck powered on and the laptop connected, everything went to life. The amp was set to 80% on the Master Volume. To say the least I turned it down to 1% as this Amplifier is extremely powerful and required such so I could use the volume on the Head Unit as intended. While figuring out the best setting for the Master Volume, my dad was having fun as a Sound Engineer messing with all 32 adjustments in each channel(yes there are that many adjustments available). This was before we figured out how to set each channel to a specific location with speaker type. Because of that I may need retune this again.
Once all of this was done I was very happy to say the least. The sound quality certainly improved to a level that almost makes you feel like you are in the concert halls while driving down the road! To say the least I found this to be a nice upgrade to say the least.
Put simple if you are considering an upgrade to the Factory Sound System, I would definitely look at replacing the Factory Amplifier with a good DSP Amplifier like the Blaupunkt BPA-HX80DSP. It is well worth the money and effort!
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