Audio Upgrade example 2025 - 987.1 - China Android - Speakers - Sub

Hi, I thought it would be helpful to offer a case study of one 2025 perspective of upgrading a 987.1 stereo system. My car is a manual 2008 Boxster S, 987.1 . It was equipped with the CDR-24 and SPP (Sound Package Plus with ASK Amp in frunk). It is NOT the Bose system . My goals were good solid (improved) sound, Modernized features such as CarPlay, BU Camera, etc, an OEMish look and to do as few non-reversible changes to the car as possible. I also wanted to get a good bang for the buck! The intention is not a tutorial, there are a lot of good resources out there. I wanted to consolidate information on the particulars of this variation in one place and offer tips, techniques, and parts for challenging areas. I will break this down into several pieces which are semi-modular and may be helpful to other variations. Disclaimer: While I am a technical person, I am not an expert in this area. I strive to post accurate info but none of it can be guaranteed. This is not a tutorial. The goal is to add some perspective on difficult areas, introduce some techniques, and try to consolidate some good related information. I am not affiliated with any related products or companies. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- On to the Head Unit I chose this head unit from CHSTEK. It fits a good size screen with and OEM* look in an 'Inexpensive Chinese Android' package. It has the features I needed. (I expect to mostly use the unit in 'CarPlay' mode, but wanted FM radio, BU Camera, etc) So far, the 4GB + 64GB seems fine for my primarily CarPlay use. The 7862 processor seems to have the broadest upgrade/support online. (??) CHSTEK Android Head Unit on AliExpress * *The first challenge is faceplate color. There is a history of confusion between 'Volcano Gray' (my car) and 'Silver' in these China purchases. Many of the Ads such as the one above do not even list a color name and have photos of various shades included. Despite contacting them in advance, sending the proper color name and photos of my dash, and saying it was 'NOT bright Silver', you guessed it... I got bright Silver! A new Faceplate should be here in a few days. I am not sure the solution for this, but I suggest doing a test communication in advance, and specifying as best as possible. I will say that CHSTEK has communicated relatively well (for mainland China) and has apparently sent the 'correct replacement part' There is no formal manual, so it takes some experience to put it all together. My unit was marketed variably as Android 13 or 14. As far as I can tell based on my research, it is really (SDK 29) Android 10 despite screens claiming 'fake' Android 14. (some reference info, experts can feel free to comment) On the positive side, my 7862 unit included 5 RCA pre-outs. (FR, FL, RR, RL, Subout). On the negative side, I have not yet got a useable signal from the green Subout connector, so I am currently using one of the rear RCA's for the subwoofer. The features and pins are close to what is expected when picking through the marketing material, but even the label on the unit itself is not 100% accurate. Final decisions should be based on the labels on the wires themselves. Here are some good references for the CDR-24/SPP system that I have gathered including some posted on P9 by deilenberger. This pinout matches my car though other diagrams show an inconsistent location of the 'switched out' pin. My switched out pin was indeed in pin A2 (on the CDR-24 to ASK Amp system), but the new C HSTEK H ead U nit ( CHU ) did not match. Detailed deilenberger Post I had two issues with getting the ASK Amp to switch on. Ultimately the Voltmeter and Continuity meter are your friend. The pin was in the wrong position in the CHU 'A' Connector Section. I had to remove the pin and relocate the CHU blue wire to the A2 location. The ANT blue wire coming out of the CHU Pin 19 connected as delivered would not ever offer me 12V Switched. Not sure if it is a defect or setting or design flaw. The solution is to tap into the ACC red wire from CHU Pin 18 to the CAN Box, and splice it to the blue wire running to A2. You can see that this connects to the cars A2 pin which has a BLK/RED wire that runs to the ASK Amp switched lead input. (there may be variations if not CDR-24/SPP etc. so check this area closely) I did also carefully cut away and insulate wires the other large block connector on the CHU harness that was not used for my 987.1. This saves space and clutter, and you can also harvest some pins if you like for switched lead etc. The Back Up Camera connection at the CHU was not too difficult. (More in BU Camera post). My wiring ended up in as shown in the images below, I used a speaker bullet connector to connect the orange 'Backup Trigger' wire to the wire coming from the backup light (terminates at BLU/BLK wire on taillight plug) in the back of the car along with the yellow video connectors. (note: the wire diagram is somewhat generic) There is a pink (reverse) wire from the CHU (Pin 20) to the CAN box with an inline connector. As far as I am aware, it is disconnected for the manual transmission option shown. It may possibly work to offer a CAN reverse signal to the CHU instead of using the 'backup lights 12v' for tiptronic or later (987.2?) models? I found these CHU Mounting rails online and 3d printed them, they worked very well to locate the CHU in the XY plane! CHU Mounting Rail - Printables Most of the rest of the install was straight forward... Generally the Head Units wiring harness is mostly plug and play for the speakers and power, etc. I chose to install the USB ports in the passenger footwell using this part. 90-degree USB cables are a good match. USB Port Mount I did find this microphone mount and printed and assembled it... but so far have not installed it. I am just using the mic in the face of the CHU. Microphone Mount At this time, I have not installed the 4G Antenna or the GPS antenna as I am using the phone/CarPlay for these functions. There is some good information out there on this stuff though. I found this video to be very useful as it is thorough and fills in most of the blanks in the access and installation. It is organized into Chapters. Ruslan Video Films - YouTube David

Door and Dash Speakers I chose the popular Alpine speakers for the door and dash. There are other good threads on this, but I will offer some tips, techniques, and parts. Alpine 8" Woofers and Tweeters Alpine 4" Coaxial Speakers I chose to have the tweeters in door and dash and can easily adjust to taste with the EQ. YMMV. There is an option to get 4" that are not coaxial but you may have spare tweeters and less $$. Alpine 4" Component Speaker I acquired some tools and made some wedges to try to get the door cards off 'nicely', but like many others, ended up mostly with the brute force removal. 8" Door Woofer Tips If your car is 17 years old like mine, your SPP speakers may look like this.... and I assure you they do not sound too good.... and didn't sound that good new IMHO! First thing I did was to cut away the connector to salvage it so I did not have to modify the cars factory wire harness... It gets hot-glued into the custom printed speaker adapter mounts. While soldering in fresh wire with a little slack. There are some similar speaker adapters out there. I started over on CAD and made one specifically for the ALPINES with a clean look and holes for M4 SMS for mounting the woofers. STL file for 8" Woofer Adapter I installed the woofer to the adapter with the other large mounting screws in place, but left the M4 sheet metal screws a few turns loose. This gave enough wiggle room to tighten the original factory outer mounting screws before tightening the M4 speakers screws. 4" Door Speaker Tips To use the factory plugs, I installed Dupont XH 2.54mm servo pin connectors on the speaker wires. To retain them I used dental floss between the wires and across. This is secure but easy to remove as needed. Typical Dupont XH 2.54mm Connector Set Typical good quality crimping tool The speaker mount lugs on the door card are on a different plane from the landing ring... so I designed and printed some TPU adapter ring gaskets to go between the speaker and the door card. There may be other solutions, but this used the factory mounts and provided a 'rubberized' seal. Porsche original screws and lugs were used. STL file for 4" speaker in door Dash Tweeter Tips I really did not do anything special here to install the Alpine dash tweeters. I used a paper clip with a bent end away from the windshield to remove the grills. I shortened the wires greatly while incorporating the Alpine Crossover. I used the same wire connector method as I did on the 4" speakers to interface with the factory harness. I removed ALL of the mounting parts to get down to the bare tweeter. I bent the metal factory clips in just slightly and they held the tweeters in place well. I drove the car some with just these speakers and the CHU... and it sounds pretty good and has some bass. Definitely improved from the factory SPP system. Not surprisingly, I still wanted a bit more for driving with the top down, so I moved on to retrofit a 987 Bose rear subwoofer/rear speaker system. References: Another P9 Speaker Install Thread You can also watch the Ruslan video in the first post. David

Bose Subwoofer/Rear Speaker Retrofit There is a lot of varying information on the internet on installing this Sub/Speaker as a retrofit with some even claiming it cannot work on a car that is not full Bose (not true). To me it seems fine... it has two small 'mid/full' range speakers that are driven directly from an external amplified speaker level source such as that in the head unit, and two woofers that are driven by a built-in mono amplifier. I am driving the small mid/full speakers from my CHSTEK head unit rear speaker outputs, and the Bose Sub amp has power, ground, switched in, and a single RCA signal cable that is currently from one of the head units rear RCA outputs. I bought my Bose subwoofer from E-Bay for a very good price delivered to my door. Its part number is 987.645.564.01. It is made in the same year as my car and was in good condition. I took it partially apart and the speakers were in good condition. This thing really does help fill in the sound. This is how the 987 Bose sub looks. Here are some diagrams. The hand drawn ones are by me and are hopefully friendly for the installation process. A plug is needed so the Sub can be removed for vehicle service, so I decided to design/CAD and make a 3D printed plug that is compatible with the one on the Bose Sub. Most of the E-bay units do not include the opposing wire harness connector. Custom 3D Printed Plug for Bose Sub The plug is printed solid from ABS. 1.75mm ABS filament is superglued into the 3 holes to strengthen the plug across layer bonds. I feel this is needed. The Molex pins are crimped (Same crimping tools as in Speaker post), heat shrink protected and installed as diagrammed. You probably won't be able to buy wire that matches the 'factory' colors, so make your own chart to map the colors you use. Molex Pin, Male & Female .093" 14-20 AWG If you need to remove a pin, a piece of (K&S?) brass tubing 5/32" OD, 1/18" ID can help with this! As I recall the wires to the head unit started at about 10 feet. The ones to the battery compartment maybe 13 feet. They got trimmed a bit eventually. Wires include: 5 wire 10 foot bundle for 2 speakers and amp switched lead. A single 10 foot RCA cable A two conductor Amp 13 foot amp power cable. I used a 12 gauge and stepped it down to 16 Gauge about 9" before the Sub connector to allow it to be crimped. An inline fuse holder for the power cable positive Some products for reference: Amp Power - 12AWG Copper Clad Aluminum Wire Signal - Subwoofer Cable 10 ft, Single RCA Cable Speakers and SW - 18 Gauge 5 Wire Cable 12 AWG Inline Fuse Holder The Bose amps switched power wire (BLK/RED) taps into the same ACC wire at the CHU ( C HSTEK H ead U nit) as the ASK amp does in the first post. The Signal cable has one RCA cutoff, and it is converted to normal 18-gauge wire about a 8" to 12" from the Bose connector. Toughen it up well with a couple layers of heat shrink and tape it to the other wires for support. Once you finish the wire harness install and remove the plug from the Sub several times to break it in... before installing it in the car. It is enough of a pain when it is broken in a little. I did a test of the speakers function before routing all of the wires.... Good sanity check. I did put a slit in the rear top carpet to fish the connector through. See some images below showing the harness going through the center console mostly along shifter cable into the dash. The power cable continues through the grommet above the gas pedal into the battery bay. To drive the small speakers, I tapped the newly routed speaker wires into the rear speaker outputs in the CHU harness adapter. You can also catch a peek at the backup camera wire joining the bundle through the center console. A little electrical tape is used to hold things in place till the console is re-installed. As noted, I have not gotten a workable signal from the Green RCA sub output on my CHU despite playing with every setting and screen I could find... So I am using one of the rear RCA outputs to send the sub Amp a signal and it is working well. David

Back Up Cam Notes I am pretty convinced there is no right or wrong method/install here. I narrowed it down to the 'remove rear bumper' and drill a hole and install it over the license plate option, and the license plate frame option shown below. There are some advantages to both... and I may even change it in the future... but for now, I am satisfied with the installation I have. I chose an AHD 1080 cam as it was supported by the head unit and offers very good picture quality. The unit I chose is linked here and it is fitting and working well. License Plate Backup Camera AHD I will just offer some specifics of what I did as this has been covered a lot. I fished the wire through the hole under the rear license plate through the grommet behind the left spoiler actuator, then forward past the shock holder, down the center console to the head unit. Getting through the grommet is a struggle and I was able to pull the grommet the 'wrong way' forward into the trunk, pass the wires, then reinstall it.... Not fun, but doable. If you have a manual transmission, be sure to wire all of the backup light connections per the diagram and test them before fishing to avoid doing it 2 or 3 times. The head unit connections are straight forward once you identify the correct wires. In my case it was like this. Overall, the picture is quite good with a good field of view. In the end, removing the rear bumper cover may not be as bad as it sounded to me, and could do an arguably better install. The one I did functions perfectly and I did not drill any holes in the car. Maybe comes down to if you are happy with having the dedicated frame or not. The look is fairly subtle in the real world and normal viewing angles. David

Android Info This stuff is basically optional. I don't have any depth of knowledge on Android or these Head Units, but I have looked into some of it. We can have some discussion on this and similar (FYT/7862 only please) units. Hopefully some experts come along as well! This CHSTEK 7862 is a uis7862/FYT Unit and has good platform support from the community. As I understand it uis7862 is the main processor/MCU. FYT is some combination of board or firmware maker... kind of a platform. Some of this stuff goes fairly deep, so do some research and backup before getting into the 'flashing' stuff. Wallpaper tip Wallpaper is not a 'major/deep' change. As I recall my wallpaper did not want to set in the CHU supplied menu, but I went into the file manager and chose my image, and there was an icon there to set as wallpaper... boom! I put potential wallpaper images in a micro SD chip in a folder called 'mycar' and was able to surf to it in the CHU file manager. (Yes, there is a working micro SD slot behind the 'SD' "button".) Here are a couple of images I found and modified.... they are 1280 x 720. I use the lighter one for BootLogo and the darker one for Wallpaper. You can make your own! Some other things I did do. I installed and app: HWGetInfo.apk HWGet_info on github This can dump a lot of information to get the technical details of you unit. For example, in the properties.txt file in the dump, it has a line: [ro.build.version.sdk]: [29] I understand that this indicates SDK 29 is installed which is Android 10... Despite a text field the mfg may edit to indicate android 14 or whatever. I found and installed and app: FytHWOneKey.apk FytHWOneKey on github This promises to let one edit the physical buttons . It seems to be targeting other configurations of android units.... But, I was able to fiddle around with it and get it to make the 'music note' button activate the app that runs CarPlay (carlink or CarLink 2.0).... so that button will take you to CarPlay... Nice! That was my main goal anyway. I didn't really get it to do anything else. I am pretty sure this is what did it. Configure the Media Button (is music note on CHSTEK HU?). set Start apk by package name -> com.syu.carlink Anyone got expertise in this area? Does not seem to be easy! ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Geek Out If you want to geek out, this thread on XDAForums has a LOT of info. Hundreds of pages to wade through but the first 5 and last 20 will get you started... lol FYT uis7862 thread on XDAForums The Q&A in post #3 is a good read! Q14 has some boot logo/animation info. I did the Backup as described in Post #5 and am glad I have it! There are flashing instructions that need to be followed to do certain kinds of deeper updates. Boot Logo and Animation .... It is very cool and gives it that OEM feel, but mine doesn't boot often. I guess it is a pretty serious thing, so backup first. There is a setting for the Logo only in the menu structure.... don't recall if this worked as I really wanted both! Some Data Files here, I think I used the data file ' boxster_s.zip ' which gets renamed 'bootanimation.zip' Porsche Logo and Animations by Erisin A sample from the site, the animation kind of changes light/glow and moves from one logo to the next. The path for BootAnimations once you go to the link is something like: ErisinES8559C/BootAnimation/silhouette_glow You can download various zip files.... Previews of some are the .mov files in the BootAnimation dir, but you can get the idea by looking in the .zip file contents as it is a bunch of stop motion images you can see! Some BootLogos are here, but you can make your own! by mashing up an image and making it 1024/600 (or 1280x720?) as a jpg, or use mine above! ErisinES8559C/BootLogo/Porsche Instructions here: Post #3 on XDAForum Thread The instructions per the XDA Forums are brief! You will want to read the first 5 posts of the XDA thread above for pre-cursors and context! The lsec6315update binary will be in your Backup. Q14: I want to replace my boot animation and/or boot logo. How do I do that? ​ uis7862: Copy the lsec6315update binary and your bootanimation.zip and/or your LOGO.bmp onto a clean USB-stick and connect it to your unit. It will only flash your bootanimation and your boot logo. ​ In this case, I used a USB Stick into the CHU USB ports ('A' as I recall) Look forward to some discussion, David

Great thread - adding to the library of knowledge P9 is known for.. I'm looking forward to hearing how CarPlay works out for you. AndroidAuto is great when it stays connected, but my experience with it is - it takes a number of hard Bluetooth connection redo's to get it to a stable state where it will stay connected. I'm not sure if that's a Bluetooth issue on the phone, or on the headunit.. perhaps better processing power may be needed. I notice it likes to disconnect when the unit is initially switched on and I do something like use the backup camera. Currently I'm plugging it in - hardwired - to the unit - but that made no real improvement. Dropouts occur frequently either wireless or wired. Is it AA or BT or ?? Both?? Thanks for your detailed posts! Great stuff - keep it coming!

Hi Don, Thanks. I have a few hours of use with the CarPlay WL and an iPhone 16 Pro in it so far. Worked right away, and No disconnects up till now. I also put an android unit in my wife's EOS a few weeks before this and it has been stable on CarPlay WL and it has some hours and medium trips on it. The wired option is there as well if needed. As I understand it the CarPlay WL uses Bluetooth to negotiate, then switches over to Wi-Fi for actual data... so it should have good power and bandwidth.... I am not as good with the Android and have not used Android Auto . On another topic... For the ASK in the 987.1 version. Do you happen to know if there is any crossover inside the Amp for the door woofers on center speaker??? (I know the Alpines woofers have a crossover on them... I forgot to look at the factory ones before trashing them.) I have not 'dealt' with my center dash speaker yet. Also wondering the same of the Bose Sub Amp has a crossover inside it? I do not observe any speaker level crossover on it. I have not heard of any others having issues with the Sub Out on these Head Units.... I may have to get the scope out one day and look at the RCA signals... Should not really be a gain issue.... as the sub volume has been tested all the way up with no observable sound from the Bose woofers (But it does quite well on the RR RCA for example. David

OK, The Volcano Grey faceplate came in today. I also installed an anti-glare screen protector while I had it apart (bought for Ipad gen 10 and cut it down to size). I think that it may be a net positive, but there is no getting around glare completely! I also have a spare faceplate and knobs and buttons in case I ever want to go guards red. lol I am a happy camper! David

Quick question. Does google maps work properly in Apple CarPlay without installing the gps antenna? I‘ve got this unit on order and honestly wont bother installing the gps antenna or the 4g antenna if I can use the navigation through Apple CarPlay .

Yes, google maps (app on IPhone ) works just fine via CarPlay without the head units GPS antenna. I did not install the Head Units GPS or 4G antenna and the CarPlay navigation and streaming apps work just fine. Obviously those items would be needed to run native Android apps and features, but I run mine primarily as a CarPlay unit so no need for them in that case. David

Since I resolved the issues I had with connecting via a hardwired Bluetooth connection (which then establishes the WiFi link between the phone and headunit) - and my AndroidAuto is working fine, I use WAZE and Spotify all the time, with no need for an antenna connected to the headunit, or for a telephone/wifi link to it (which is good since that isn't working right now.. gotta fix that..) BTW - the issues with the Bluetooth seemed to be processor power related. A new Google Pixel -9 Pro cleared the issues up immediately. Anyone interested in a Motorola 2 year old (2023 vintage) phone - let me know. I will make you a DEAL! And it's not locked to any cell company.

i think I’m going to go this same route as it is reversible with no hole in the bumper. How is the angle of the backup camera? You’ve been living with it two months now so any issues with it so far?

I had a similar setup and noticed a big difference after applying sound deadening. I used RCA cable system from resonixsoundsolutions.com and it really helped reduce road noise and clean up the mids. Made the whole system more enjoyable without needing to crank the volume. Definitely worth considering if you're already pulling panels and upgrading speakers.

Thanks for the feedback... sounds nice. I did not do much of that, but my car is not a daily driver, so I am not on the highway much. As I go back to it after being away, I will say the system sounds quite good, and I am happy with it. David

Question: what if anything did you do about the fiber optic/most cable previously plugged into the CDR24 ? I also have SPP/ASK and am putting in a cheap heregoes unit for CarPlay .

Can we assume a 987? Year? (you might look at creating a "Signature" - that would contain that info so we never have to ask..) If you have SPP/ASK - there is no optical cable. The optical cable was for the Bose system . My car had SPP/ASK - 2009 - and no optical cable to be concerned about. Have you checked the back of your CDR24 ??