I'm new to this board and was hoping I could get some opinions on something. I'm not happy with the output I'm getting with my gear and I'm thinking I might need to add another amp. I have a Kenwood KVT911-DVD head with Boston Acoustic 5.5 Pros up front, RX67's in the rear deck and a C110 Competitor 10" sub in the trunk. I'm powering my (bridged) front & rears and sub off of an Xtant x603 3 channel amp.
In the past, I had a Kenwood Z828 installed and it sounded phenominal but since the 911 went in, things don't seem to hit very hard anymore. I realize the 911 head is only rated at 45 watts/4 and the 828 was 47 watts/4. This might be where the problem is but I'm not sure.
I'm thinking of adding an Xtant X1001 Mono channel amp to drive my sub only and dedicate my X603 to my speakers. Will this make any difference? I'm at wits end and really disappointed with my sytem lately. The shop I had my gear installed at, no longer does business with Xtant, so I'll need to go elsewhere to get this done. I'm hoping that by doing my homework first, the install should be less hectic as then it was to get the rest of my gear installed. ( I have changers, disc and keg, Satellite etc also.)
I replaced my X603 amp in November with another of the same type, is it possible that something just didn't get tuned right, maybe it's tuned a bit to conservative? The installers worked with Xtant Tech Support over the phone, so I'm hard pressed to think it's tuned and wired correctly.
I'm looking for suggestions, comments etc. Thanks in advance for your help.
The steroe power rating will have no effect on your system, your speakers are powered by amplifiers, not HU power. As for sound level, it is quite possible that the shop did not set the gains to the same level as they were set before. Would it be possible to purchase a four channel amp for the two seperate sets, and purchase a mono block to power the subs? If not, another option would be to run the front seperates off the two channals of the three channel, and power the sub with the remaining channel. This way you could purchase a small amp to power the rears. Is you amp a true three channel, or was it a four channel with one side bridged?
Thanks the feedback, TBone. My amp is a true 3 Channel Amp. I could probably look into just powering my components and my sub. The rears are pretty much fill anyway. Doing it this way, I could save myself hundreds of dollars, the X1001 sells for $1000 and I wouldn't neccessarily need that much amp for my rears. Great Suggestion!
You mentioned setting the gains to the same level, this is where I get lost... What exactly do the gains do for me? I know that when the manufacturer tuned it w/ installer, they mentioned that they tuned it to a safe setting (my last x603 amp had problems and it was originally thought it could have been how it was tuned). It's may likely be that they kept the output controlled to avoid problems with this new amp.
Do you think I should schedule an appointment with a shop that knows this amp? I've got alot of money tied up in my system but it's not worth much, if it sounds crappy.
Beth, the gains on the amp allow you to equalize the output of the amp to the level of prior components (HU). Yes, schedule an appointment at a mobile audio shop to fine tune your system. I would set it up like I mentioned, run the front components off the front two channels of the amp, run the third channel on the sub. This way, you can either use the rear speaker outputs of the HU, or purchase a small amp, and use them for rear fill. Let me know how it works out.
I've got an appointment on Saturday, 3/20/04, to have my system looked at. With any luck, it's as easy as just getting it tuned. Worse case, I'll get them to reconfigure my speakers as you suggested above. It certainly would be nice to be able to fade again!
While it's there, I'm going to see about getting the metal plate between the truck and the back seat punched out. The ski passthru is an option on my car, but it was not installed. It should give me a little more bass in cabin, at any rate.
Beth, you have good components and gear, so if everything is in working order and installed it should not take very long to adjust your system. I think that when you swapped the HU or amp, something was not adjusted back to the previous level, in the interest of the audio shop not replacing another amp. Also, I would have the shop perform a cut through from the trunk to the cabin, you definetly will gain lowend from this action. If you go the route of wiring the rear speakers seperately from the fronts, I would install some bass blockers on them to cut off the ultra low frequencies, that way they can mainly work at providing rear fill, not lowend, which will be drastically enhanced by the cut through. I would check around for some salvage yards for a wrecked vehicle like yours, and maybe you could purchase the cut through/ski storage stock panels to install in your car once the cut through is performed.
Went yesterday and had my system tuned. Didn't need to rewire anything. The installer said that all the gains were set too low. He tuned it and now, I have bass! It's amazing...
Since he turned up the gains (input and output) the volume controls are much more responsive. Before I had to turn the volume up to 28 to get anything. Now, at 20, it's extremely loud. I can hear my rear speakers again and my subwoofeer.
We decided to hold off on cutting out the ski pass. I have a great deal of bass now, I didn't really want to load the cabin with too much bass. I'll see how this works out for a couple weeks and then take it from there. I'm planning on doing custom trunk work anyway that I might just hold off and build this into that install.
All I paid to get this tuned was 20 bucks. This is the best 20 I've ever spent.... It was worth much more than that in my mind. I won't complain....