Welp...update.
Yesterday fucking sucked.
I decided to use a
MiniDSP CSP 8x12 DL in the car. I bought it three years ago and never had time to work on my own shit. It's great for those that don't know how to tune because it has Dirac that does it all for you with a simple mic measurement. I'm sure you guys have seen home receivers with Audyssey built in. Dirac is so much better with what it does.
You don't have to do shit but use the software to route inputs to outputs set up driver types for each of the channels you're using, and then use the mic to measure 9 to 13 positions where you're sitting.
Then you tell it the output curve you want (with a text file that you enter into the software) and it will automagically set time alignment, apply FIR and IRR filters, as well as set output levels and EQ for each driver for the desired output response.
If you're in an area without an installer or tuner and can use a computer, you can get great results with this.
There's a step-by-step write-up of the process created by some of my buddies here. It's the "Do this and you can't fail" write-up.
Unless you're me.
Did everything. Followed every step of the instructions. After the tune was done I was pissed with the way it sounded. No midbass and no sub bass.
I re-measured a couple more times hoping that I'd get a different result. No luck.
I talked to Nick and he told me to "just throw a fuckin' Helix in it. You can do a full tune with those in 20 minutes"
Yeah, that shit didn't work.
Fought with it as well. Made no sense. No midbass and no sub-bass.
I almost texted Nick and Cody and said I wasn't going.
At 1:48 I set an alarm for 4:30 and tried to sleep.
Cody texted me after fucking 2 in the morning "Let me know when you get up"
"I gotta get to sleep first." lol
We hit the road at 5.
I complained about the audio regularly. I was so unhappy with it that I had it low enough to be just background noise - over the already dumb amount of road noise a stripped xB has.
At 7:30 in the morning I said “I don’t get it. It doesn’t have midbass or sub bass. It’s almost like…”
…and then it hit me that even though the filters were off in the processor, that the radio may default to filtered output after power loss.
Sure enough, it defaulted to a 100Hz high pass on front/rear RCA outputs. I was using the radio's front output to feed signal into the processor and sending left/right channel information to each of the output channels. All with a 100Hz high-pass filter on it.
Being the smart (and tired) one I am, I turned the filter off.
I, ummm, am not a smart man.
Suddenly full output of the 3000.1 went to that SQL-15 in the parallel 6th. Scared the shit out of both of us.
So I was much happier. Did a quick tune by ear to get tonality sounding like anything other than garbage, made sure everything was centering properly, and dialed the sub in with the front.
Had one person ask “WHAT is in your dash? ALL midbass is above the dash.” Told them about the 6 1/2s in the dash and tweets in the pillars.
"No way!"
He extended his arms from pillar to pillar “It like a concert right here”.
Yup. That’s the point.
Just getting started. Unconventional installs can be fun.
Now that things are sorted and the problem my tired ass couldn't solve is sorted out, I'll get it tuned tomorrow and get it where it needs to be.
Cody and I on the way back today. He was on over 24 hours of no sleep and probably got about 25 minutes before we headed out.
So yeah, that was today's adventure. The setup that people said wouldn't work kicks fucking ass. It'll get better when I add the midranges to the doors. The stage will pull wider.
![0912221035_HDR[1].jpg](https://data.irate4x4.com/attachments/203/203849-e4a24fe538dc03968e0e4a55805de37e.jpg)
