From Becker to Blaupunkt - The Hills are alive...

It's been almost one year since I purchased a one owner 2003 Porsche Carrera from a nice Doctor in Atlanta Georgia. The owner was clear about the fact that the Becker CDR-23 didn't work and had been problematic during his ownership. Porsche had replaced the system only to have it freeze up again. I tried many "rennlist tricks" but nothing seemed to get it to operate properly. After looking at the cost of repairing it, I realized it would cost a small fortune from Becker and so I began looking into non-OEM alternatives. It boiled down to Alpine or Blaupunkt. I chose Blaupunkt because of the connectivity closely matched the Porsche's wiring schematics and the overall design was NOT "spaceshipish" (if you know what I mean). It really had a nice design. I ordered one from Crutchfield and began studying the schematics for installation. After studying the wiring scheme of the Porsche, I noticed that Porsche's "HiFi System" consisted of straightforward 6 channel system, Becker CDR-23, and Becker 6 Ch Amp in the frunk. Porsche would probably market it as a 10 speaker system since the dash and rear speakers are actually separate mid-range and high-freqency drivers that were wired in parallel, but still, a 6 channel system. Technically, here's my system: HU/Frunk amp Dash - mid/high freq Doors - bass enclosures Rear - mid/high freq Because of the lack of a direct wiring harness for Blaupunkt to the Porsche connectors, I had to hard wire the Blaupunkt connectors to the Porsche wiring. And since the Becker CDR-23 fed the frunk amp an optical signal and then the amp fed the speakers from the frunk, that meant re-routing the wiring from the HU to the frunk. I chose to keep the system simple in design. (at least that was my intention) Basically, the Blaupunkt HU would feed the dash and rear speakers and the amp would feed the sub-bass enclosures in the doors. Each wire was labeled, soldered, and shrink tubed (not taped) for protection. This was a painstaking task. Here is a pictures of the finished unit: As you can see, I chose a Blaupunkt Barcelona single DIN unit with 22W RMS/50 Watt max per channel with Blaupunkt amp is 200W 2 channel amp with sub bass crossover built-in. Overall, the sound is clean and powerful with a wealth of modern features (Bluetooth phone support, SD ram, USB, etc.) but the Barcelona suffered from two core problems, the tuner was weak and the EQ was limited to just bass and treble gain only. That was a problem since the Carrera's sports exhaust system would drown out the mid range. The system sounded great sitting in the garage, but with the engine started, the sound seemed to lose the vocal range. Oh, but the system would produce mind numbing bass to the point where you'd get a headache after a while, but I didn't want a boom system. I wanted a system with a nice, clean jazz feel where the vocals would jump out. I tried many different tricks messing with the amp and sub-bass output, but with only bass and treble gain, that wasn't working for me. After 9 months, I decided to upgrade. I still liked the sound of Blaupunkt systems and since I spent so much time wiring up the Blaupunkt connectors, I didn't want to change brands. And so, again, my quest for great sound continues... I read many great reviews on the Blaupunkt New Jersey and so I made the decision to purchase it. I'm sure many will ask why I didn't buy the touch screen versions with Apple Carplay or Android. It's simple, I want a radio to be just that... a radio. I don't need Navigation, Backup cameras, or an overly complicated operation system that takes you 10 steps when you just want ONE step. The New Jersey is an "old school" design with a modern sound and has more buttons and less menu operations so that you can keep you mind and eyes on driving, not flipping through menus. This meant moving the AC controller. Rerouting the AC control cables wasn't as easy as I thought it would be... I needed small hands the size of a dwarf to do the job quickly. Here's a shot of the AC moved to the lower slot. I ordered a bezel from Jim Ellis Porsche in Atlanta since the upper bezel doesn't work on the lower slot. Ok, now with the AC relocated and connected properly, I had to remove the upper bracket to support the double DIN radio. Fortunately, the Blaupunkt New Jersey comes with a mounting support bracket, and so I didn't need to buy an expensive adapter kit. Plus, the Blaupunkt is designed to take advantage of the full DIN space which saves me a little money having to purchase a upper bezel. Once, I got the radio installed into the Porsche mounting bracket, connecting the cables to the existing Blaupunkt connectors was easy. Here is the picture of it installed minus AC bezel. I'm just glad Blaupunkt didn't change the wiring scheme of the New Jersey's connections. They were the same as the single DIN Barcelona. yay!!! After testing it... hands down a major improvement. The tuner is leaps and bounds better in reception quality. The more advanced EQ capability is perfect for a car like the Porsche 996. I could tune frequencies across the spectrum with greater control of sub-bass to match the acoustics of the Cabriolet. Even at full throttle, you still hear the music without harmful sound pressure levels. Here is the final setup. I forgot to take a picture of the frunk amp. I think I might have some images of the wiring that went into this system but I think they may be on my computer at home. Anyway, I just wanted to share this with my Rennlist family... cheers!

Looks great, great write up! Will be doing an upgrade of my stereo probably in the fall or early winter....have the parts, but doing a kitchen gut job now! That comes first.

Nice. That's one of the only non-oem setups that I have seen that I would actually put in my car. Most of the single-DIN units look like 1980's retrofits, IMO. Now, about that in-dash CD holder...

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Priorities my friend! I'm kinda in the same boat... my wife is wanting to upgrade our bathrooms. It's gonna take a lot of money... Ouch! But gotta take care of the lady... she comes first. Thanks for the nice comment.

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Exactly! Why does all the single DIN manufacturers think it's necessary to design the radios look like a child's robot toy of some kind. I guess eye candy still sells these days. hahahaha... yea, who uses CDs anymore? I felt bad for that lil' CD holder and found an old CD of Talor Hicks (American Idol winner) and put it in slot #1 one. Oh well, at least I tried. ha! Maybe I'll get the center storage tray. The old one is for the lower slot and it won't work. I see Porsche sells them. http://www.suncoastparts.com/product..._Code=996intup

Nice mod. My OEM "kind of" gets AM reception in certain areas. It got wonky after I had the windshield replaced. Yeah, I know, who does AM anymore? I enjoy listening to Former Miami Dolphin Jimmy Cefalo's show - he covers local and world events. I replaced the CD tray with a storage bin thing from Pelican Parts so I now can stash sunglasses or such there.

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Amen! I love talk radio and most of those stations exist on AM. Fortunately, during the recession, many of the AM stations bought FM band radio frequencies and are now simulcasting. Better sound and range during the day. What is the Pelican Part number for that storage unit to replace the CD tray unit? Do you have a link? Thank you!

nice work - a stock look with USB + Aux... bravo!

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Is this the right part from Pelican? http://www.pelicanparts.com/cgi-bin/...uine%20PORSCHE The porsche part is 9965522530101C

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Thanks Tony! Yea, you can put your digital audio files onto a thumb drive and play back on the HU and it will automatically switch the next song and give titling info on the display. I also like to just use Spodify on my iPhone. It's links to the HU via Bluetooth with no problem and sounds great!

"nice work - a stock look with USB + Aux... bravo!" Well...not quite "stock look" but certainly close... Nice job! Seeing as you've got a CD player right there in front of you, it's kind of nice to have 4 CD's at the ready to pop in there...you really want a "cubby" to fill with junk?

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Thank you! It's function OVER flare for me. I'm not a big fan of all the menu driven "infotainment" systems nowadays. That's the big reason I like Blaupunkt. They understand that there are people out there that still like buttons and *****. ha! Yea, I almost bought one of the Porsche storage units to go in place of the CD holder, but at $50 + shipping for a piece of plastic, I decided to wait. Maybe I'll warm up to the idea in the future. I might keep the CD holder and combine a lot of my favorite songs on 4 CDs, but again, it's just as easy to pop in a thumb drive with the Blaupunkt.

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Yeah I'm sort of the same way, especially on cars like this where you should be more engaged in driving rather than cruising. Radio comes secondary but also need a more tactile approach so I'm not always looking at it just to do minor or simple things. It still sorta surprises me that a good portion of aftermarket car stereos still are coming with cd/dvd players. I can't remember the last time I played either a cd or dvd. Come to think of it, thumbdrive usage is going down too since we have the cloud and everything is streamed in these days. Having the unlimited Video/Audio streaming from T-Mobile also helps. Still waiting until my media server craps out one of these days. It's been doing some heavy lifting for awhile now.

Yep, there are still a few advantages to having it on CD. 1. You still have music playing if you lose cell service (e.g. mountains) 2. You can move it to a car that doesn't have modern iphone or ipod support 3. You can look like Jack Nicholson in the movie "As Good As It Gets" and have different mood versions. ha! 4. You can put it in your 1980s boom box with the CD adapter AND look retro! (Don't forget your parachute pants, Lacoste polo, and Reebok hightops.) 5. You can still look cool when your wife says, "Let's listen to Spodify", but the app won't launch for some stupid reason. 6. When you just love to hold round things that don't require a login and password.

I guess the difference in display color isn't that noticeable with the AC controls moved all the way down. I find it puzzling that quality manufacturers leave that functionality out when it probably costs next to nothing to add it. I would like to see an option for an external mic. How is the call quality with the internal mic?

I completely agree with you. They could easily design the unit to support changing the LED lights to match the car's OEM interior light color, but the Blaupunkt LEDs don't bother me much since they're white in color. If it were some radical pink color or purplish blue, that would be a different story. ha! Personally, I like a nice clean look over some of these aftermarket companies that sell to the hip hop outlandish crowd. I haven't used the phone yet, but conversation with the Barcelona was fine even over the Porsche loud engine. Of course, I'd turn off the sports exhaust when someone would call, but they'd say they could hear me fine. Their voices come over the system clearly.

I agree about the look of it and I love the USB functionality. I have a cheap Pioneer unit in my VW that works great but it looks like the circus has come to town.

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Queue Peter Gabriel "In You Eyes"

I was thinkin' more like "Prep Rap" by Russ Mason RUSS MASON PREP RAP - YouTube hahahahaha!!!!

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Hey Bill, I took a one hour ride in the 996 last night and my children called me. I was driving at around 60 mph when the call came in. Good news is that I could carry on a nice conversation with the sound of the car's motor and exhaust noises. They could hear me clearly. In fact, it sounded better than the Barcelona. I was listening to Spodify at the time, the unit muted the music, I took the call, and it automatically returned back to the music without having to touch anything on my phone. Nice!!! All the best!