Figuring out the audio in my Boxster

Purchased a 2006 Boxster S a couple of weeks ago. It has a Sony head unit that seemed kind of minimalist but then I looked it up and it had CarPlay ... The sound is kind of meh and yes I know its a convertible but I think it could be louder. Looking at figuring out what I have and determine options. I have the original window sticker and this car had SPP. Now it has the following: HU: Sony XAV AX100 AMP: Pioneer GM-D1004 Speakers: Unknown - if I had to guess they are factory. The amp is in the area of the frunk where the multiCD player was. I have not yet determined whether all 7 speakers are working with this system. The HU is a 4 channel output of 55w but I think it is using pre-outs only. There is one RCA pair that I see connected to the amp. It is a 4 channel amp - looks like 4 output pairs for speakers. Anyway, trying to do the detective work to figure out what is going on with this system and seeing if I can get some better sound out of it.

It sounds as if it only has one channel connected to the amp? What's on the outputs? GM-D1004 The GM-D1004 4-channel amplifier powers your front and rear speakers with a total of 400 watts (maximum power), which is nearly three times the power of a typical factory radio or aftermarket receiver. This compact amplifier allows you to amplify 4, 3, or 2 speakers by bridging or not bridging... www.pioneerelectronics.com Looking over the spec's it appears that the two channels are: 1 - Full range channel (10-40KHz) 2 - Subwoofer channel (10-40Hz) To me - that's a pretty useless amp. If they wired the subwoofer channel to the door speakers - the midrange speaker isn't seeing any signal, and the woofer is facing a signal that's WAY out of its league. The door speakers are about 8" speakers, not particularly impressive, but if they go below 80Hz it would surprise me - they might at -10db or so. That means most of the power from the one channel is wasted. The other channel is "full-range" - but it's likely being sent to the dash speakers, which are basically tweeters - with a 2.5" cone. They reject everything in the signal below about maybe 3Khz, and there is also no way they're making any noise at 20kHz or above. So most of the power from this amp setup is wasted. The stock speakers have filter capacitors to either restrict low frequencies (the mids and tweeters) or to reduce higher frequencies (the woofers - as such). Doing the same thing at the amp isn't going to make this better.. My immediate thought is to buy the cheap Aliexpress Android unit and toss all the stuff you have now.. but part of that decision is seeing how much the people who installed what you have hacked up the wiring harness. I'm guessing they hacked off the connector needed to make the Aliexpress "plug and play". I can report that the AliExpress unit has adequate power for the stock speakers (it's supposedly 40W per channel). I don't hear any amplifier distortion (clipping) at high volumes (I do have a bit of buzz on loud low-frequency notes - but that's likely a bad speaker - and I have replacements waiting for me to get around to installing them.) But again - before buying one - pull out the Sony HU, take a photo of what you see - and post it here. One can only hope it was installed correctly, not by butchers like the ones who worked on mine.. https://www.sony.com/electronics/support/mobile-cd-players-xav-series/xav-ax100 I looked up the Sony headunit - it actually appears pretty useful. Not as advanced as the Aliexpress, but they do claim "Maximum 55W output @4Ohms" which probably isn't awful (RMS power is probably around 25W). I think you actually might gain by eliminating the amplifier - unless the system is wired with the door mid-range speakers and dash speakers going directly to the headunit outputs, and then new wiring to direct the subwoofer output from the amp to the "woofers" in the door. In that case - it sort of makes sense. I think some exploring on your part is needed. Is the original radio plug still attached to the car's wiring harness or has it been hacked off? Are any of the speaker outputs on the headunit in use? More ideas as questions are answered.. BTW - how about dropping in on New Member Introductions and introducing yourself and your Boxster - people love pics, it gives us something to oooohhh and aaaaahhh over.. And welcome to Planet-9, the Friendly Porsche Forum..

Thanks. All true enough and trying to sehow I can see what I can see. As I am able to get into where things are connected I can see how they are connected. I took the center stack apart to remove the AC controller to change the rocker you switches. But I did not see where to get the HU out from there. The amp is a four channel amp at 400w but at a cursory look I only see one RCA (a pair) input connected. But 4 sets of speaker wires out. The HU says it has front, rear, and sub pre outs. if I were doing these components from scratch in some other vehicle I would connect front and rear pre outs to the 4 inputs on the amp and connect wires for the mids on the doors and the two speakers on the dash. but I don't know about any adapter harnesses or whether the Ask amp still exists or is in use - where is that located? thanks in advance I have been trying to search for these answers but sometimes someone to ask good questions for brainstorming is super helpful!

Okay a little more digging. I found all 4 input channels on the amp are being used.

Also near as I can tell only the 4 speakers in the doors are connected. Dash speakers are not. again I don't know what speakers are in the door my guess is still the factory speakers

The 400W rating on the amp implies 100W per channel - that's likely at something like 10% harmonic distortion and with the amp "clipping" - the actual specs are more like 45W per channel (X4 channels, so more like 180W total). Aside from that spec, just the size and lack of any cooling fins give it away... The photo of the amp install reveals what looks like a poorly done DIY installation. There is evident hacking of the factory harness in the photo, plus the use of 110V "zip" cord (the brown wire used for incandescent 110V desk lights, etc..), and the sloppy wrapped electrical tape all scream DIYer to me. Not that there's anything wrong with DIY - I do it all the time - but I used to do this sort of thing as a part-time job when I was young and I have some standards on what it looks like when I'm done. I wonder if, under the electrical tape, you'll find wires simply twisted together with no soldering or fastener used. Removing the headunit might also tell us what outputs were used - which could be useful information. If you can get unfettered access to the ends of the speaker wires, a 1.5V battery tapped across each set of speaker wires will produce a "click" noise in any speaker connected to the wires. It's a simple way to ID speaker connections if there isn't any tagging on the wiring. I'd also have a bit of concern about polarity on the speaker connections (they do actually have this) - you want them all the same so that one speaker doesn't try to cancel its twin out. If the headunit has a balance control these typically also allow you to adjust front to rear balance. Moving it from full front to full rear (with music playing) might reveal what speakers are connected to what outputs.

Agreed with Don. First off, use the balance/fader controls to see what is actually working. Use music so you can hear if there are frequency crossouts involved (either in the HU, amp, speakers or wiring). Second, it would help to get a sketch of how things are wired up. Paper sketch is fine, but it helps to know what's connected where. Check the switches for the filters on the amp as well... they may be on. As Don mentioned, using a 1.5V battery is a good way to test which speakers are where, and to test which ones are actually connected. It would be good to take a look at the speakers too, if you can. Too often people use high powered speakers because they "look cool" or seem like they'll be more powerful, but if you don't drive enough power to such a speaker, it underperforms a cheaper speaker. In other words, driving a 100W speaker with that 45W amp will make it sound terrible... wheras a 50W speaker would sound better, even if it's cheaper and looks less cool... I expect the HU is probably fine as-is, but that amp is probably pointless. Granted, it's a little more than an HU may be, but it's pretty weak. Lastly, anytime you see a tiny "amp" like that, you can pretty much ignore its power rating. You can't drive power with something so small... much less 4 channels worth of it. And marketing loves to claim "max" power as about 2x of RMS. This is a fallacy (by definition, RMS means that peak can only be 1.7x that value... but marketers love to lie). Ignore ALL "max" or "peak" power labels, and always stick to RMS (preferably "continuous"). You're on the right path... and we'll keep helping so let us know what you find!

The head unit has no fader or balance controls!

Oh wow. No equalizer with fader/balance controls? That's simply awful, especially since I'm sure it has outputs for front and rear speakers. It shouldn't surprise me though.. many years ago I bought a Sony 5:1 Dolby surround sound system to use with a new HD TV I bought (hard to imagine HD is that old - but it is..) and while it has worked fine for all that time, it has no front/rear/balance adjustments and NO TONE CONTROLS at all. When Sony misses the bus - it's often that they're not only at the wrong bus stop, but also in the wrong city. I think this is an example of them missing the bus bigly.

I have to retract that.. https://www.sony.com/electronics/support/mobile-cd-players-xav-series/xav-ax100/manuals The owner's manual on Pg 14 talks about the balance and fader controls, and frequency range controls for the outputs. You should be able to do the test described above.

I have not found balance and fader in the controls. But there is an EQ. And actually a fair amount of good sound controls with two levels of "Extra Bass" and DSP settings. Yesterday I had a bit of a roadtrip. I worked on the settings and also I found what I was REALLY doing wrong. If you want it louder, you need to keep turning the knob! The small volume knob takes more turns than you might think. I saw on the screen that the volume line wasn't very far across so I kept turning. At 80mph with the top down, within the margins of compressed streaming audio and my terrible hearing, it sounded pretty good. Definitely driving just the 4 door speakers.

Hi gang, Just a quick note per my two cents. I've got the Sony AX-150 here, which is pretty stellar for CarPlay on a budget. AFAIK, it's largely what you have there, but no volume knob. Yes, there are plenty of functions, but you have to dig deeply in the menus and manual. Before you do anything, dollars to donuts -- some of your speakers may be shot -- and surely they are if they're original OEM from 2006. Although removing the door cards may be daunting, it's not that bad once you get the hang of it. Check to see what you've got in there. If SPP (Sound Package Plus), you've got 7 speakers (2x per each door, and 3 on the dash). I did a whole thread on SPP upgrades and couldn't be happier. Your amp is surely better than stock -- so you should have power to spare. Put it this way. I have the stock and crappy ASK amp, and have more volume than I know what to do with it after replacing the speakers. I literally had the "beats bumpin" to the point where my ears hurt for about two weeks after a single day of test driving. Not kidding. Congrats on the purchase and yes - please do introduce yourself in the New Members area! Cheers.

Good find, Don.. yeah, there usually fader/balance somewhere... and like you said, it's often buried because Sony can be surprisingly clueless at times. It could also be hidden if certain settings are selected - for example, if the HU is set to two-channel mode (stereo) it may decided to hide fader controls, as they are not relevant in such a setup. On my Pioneer , they gray out, but you can still see them... which I prefer to full hiding, but some brands love to hide things to "help" users. I emphasize the quotes, because I find such things very unhelpful... grayed out is fine, but don't take it completely away. @blaster88 Glad to hear you found the volume can get up there, after many turns, at least! Again, some HUs have settings to make the volume more or less responsive. I think my wife's Jetta factory HU has a setting like this, which allows you to have each detent go +/- 1, 3, or 5 actual steps... something like that can help make the knob less annoying. You may want to dive into the manual and see what options you have, to make it more enjoyable to use.

Found the fader and balance. On the 2d screen there is a settings icon and then sound menu. So yes for sure only the 4 door speakers are in use. Larger lower speakers are the rear channel and the upper speakers are front channel. The head unit gave me the impression it was very basic because it's a grey scale screen with a few large not well designed icons. But it is actually pretty solid. The CarPlay and AndroidAuto are wired but they just work. I am pretty satisfied at this point. It's a DIY install but done well enough.

Last bit of detective work - pulled off a door card.

Last bit of detective work. The ASK amp should be behind the panel covering the tire tools etc. It is not there so that has been removed. I took off the passenger door card and found the following. The stock midrange has been replaced with a 4 inch Faital Pro 4F32 which is a 60W 4 ohm full range speaker. The stock 8 in woofer has been replaced by Dayton Audio RS180p-4 woofers which are 7 inch - and a wooden adapter was used. All of these pieces parts are budget oriented. But turns out that it does sound okay, and it has CarPlay and AndroidAudio. My only real complaint at this point is the screen washes out in the sun, but first-world problems. I think at this point I am going to leave well enough alone.

I see no signs of any crossovers for the speakers. They are wired as front and rear on both doors? You might gain some clarity with a high-pass filter on the 4" ones and a low-pass on the 7" ones. You can then balance them using the front-rear fader.

Just keep in mind, you have about 120W worth of speakers on that tiny Pioneer amp (45W IIRC?)... like I said, this leads to a setup that doesn't sound great at lower powers. While you can crank the volume, this means you're going to be working that Pioneer amp much harder to get decent sound quality and volume. You really need a more powerful amp to drive those speakers... I'd aim for something around 100W RMS, per channel (not 100W "max" like the current amp is). Of course, such an amp will be much bigger (and it should be, because if it's not, it's not RMS or they are lying)... so placement would be more difficult, but it looks like you have decent space wherever that Pioneer is currently... so it could work. I agree with Don, having crossovers would help, and having higher frequency speakers working (ie, the dash ones) would help a lot too, even if they are just stock. If you do this, beware of balancing the power between these speakers, and crossing them over - otherwise the dash tweeters may end up being too loud, and/or taking on more power, and burn out because of that... so just be aware if you go that way.

Ummmm.... I used to sell and design audio equipment back when I was poor.. a 2nd job. BACKGROUND: Speakers are rated in "Watts" as in how much power they can take before burning out or otherwise self-destructing. The actual output (sound power) per Watt is called the efficiency of the speaker, sensitivity is very similar. A decent description in Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louds...er#:~:text=Loudspeaker efficiency is defined as,is converted to acoustic energy . What that basically means is how much sound (measured in decibels aka dB) the speaker produces with a given input signal of a certain voltage (into a resistance) which equals Watts of amplifier power. A loudspeaker can be rated in "Watts" quite high, and yet be relatively inefficient, in which case a more powerful amplifier might be needed. The sound from a speaker at a certain input power (in Watts) no matter what amplifier is providing the power will sound the same (provided we're talking actual identical power at low distortion levels). Basically, 1 Watt of power driving a certain speaker will sound the same as 1 Watt of power from another amplifier (if the amplifiers are equal in distortion at the frequency of the signal.) One cause of audible distortion is amplifier "clipping" where the audio signal reaches and exceeds the power capability of an amplifier and the tops of the output peaks are cut off. In the days of tubes, the clipping was considered "soft" because it occurred gradually - with solid-state it became more noticeable since the clipping occurs quite quickly, squaring off the tops of the audio waveforms. So more than you ever wanted to know... the basics are - if the speakers can handle it - you can get louder sound by increasing your amplifier power. This is pretty much linear (double the Watts provided and you'll double the volume, aka 3dB) until the speaker starts distorting from being asked to move the cone further than it can without physically distorting (or burning up the voice coil). The rule is - you want speakers with a power rating EXCEEDING the power available from your power amplifier. In general, you'll be happier with efficient speakers in a convertible environment since there isn't a lot of reflective material helping to reinforce the sound when the top is open. If you have a 100W RMS amplifier, I'd suggest speakers rated for 1.5x that value. It gives you a margin of error. The amp you have is probably about 40W (per-channel) in RMS power (less than 1% distortion) so the speakers you have should be adequate. Higher "Watt" speakers may reduce the sound (decibels) you hear in the car since higher Wattage speakers typically tend to be less efficient (and as a surprise to many people - huge magnets on speakers do not improve efficiency - usually just the opposite - the voice coil resists movement due to the higher magnetic flux in the coil-gap. So to help with that - the speakers go to much bigger voice coils etc..) BTW - another game played in rating/advertising amplifiers is - the power measurement per-channel is often taken with only one channel "driven" (aka active) at a time. This means all the power from the power supply in the amplifier is dedicated to that channel. If the power was measured for all 4 channels at the same time - the power from the power supply would be split between the 4 channels, and would in all likelihood be much less per channel (aka all-channels driven.) A real audiophile power spec on an amplifier includes the distortion at full power, the full power output measured with a known load (ie - 4 or 8 ohms), and all channels driven to max at the same time. You will never find this on car audio equipment, even the Burmester systems (like in my Cayenne) which do sound quite good - they use fudge factors to come up with ratings like 2,000 Watts of amplification. DIVERSION: ------------------------------------------------------- There were some horribly expensive speakers made by McIntosh many years ago - that used 4 12" woofers per speaker (and a bunch of midrange and tweeters) - the magnets were HUGE on these woofers - and the frequency response was actually rather awful - until McIntosh made an active equalizer that boosted the low frequencies in order to flatten out the response curve. They need huge amounts of power (I was using 350W RMS/channel amps with them.) They sounded OK. Not spectacular though. Even the legends can make dogs.. ML4 was the model if you care to look it up. I now use flat-panel electrostatics driven with a high power amplifier - the sound is adequate. ------------------------------------------------------- WHAT I'D SUGGEST: ------------------------------------------------------- Cars are a particularly difficult sound environment since the shapes of an interior are all over the place, the reflectivity of the materials ranges from glass to carpet (high reflectivity to low..) and there are limits on the size and number of speakers you might have. Ideally - in this setup - I'd be looking to wire dashboard speakers (which aren't really "tweeters" but more a high-frequency driver - their audio frequency range extends below where a normal "tweeter" would be) to the front channel. The fact that these aren't connected (and perhaps aren't even there) limits the ability of the audio to create a "sound-stage" for the occupants (ie - drums and high-hats on the left, and bass on the right, or some other sound layout as you would hear in person. I'd then look at driving the door speakers from the rear channel connections, wired in parallel with the hi-cut and low-cut filters needed to distribute a range of frequencies across the two different size/type of driver. This ends up as a very basic system... but it can sound quite good if done right. That's how mine is wired up now, and using the front/back fader control I can get some decently flat audio (within limits - nothing much below 100Hz, and nothing much above 12kHz - just due to the speakers and sizes). The door speakers are wired in parallel, but use simple capacitor high and low filters to send the right frequencies to the right speakers (and keep the wrong frequencies away from the wrong speakers.) Or if you're happy with how it sounds now -- leave it alone and spend the money on other things. The thing is - even with a decent system, which can be quite loud and enjoyable with the top up, or parked in the garage - it's pretty much worthless when the top is down at 80MPH. Engine and wind noises are high enough to simply drown out the music so I question how much effort is really worth taking. I did add a kit from Suncoast that converted my rear-deck storage compartment into a full-range speaker setup using 4 small (4" full-range speakers) - and they're wired in parallel with the door speakers. They're not normally "noticeable" but if I disconnect them, their absence is noticeable. They're basically right behind the driver's and passenger's heads at ear level. I still have difficulty hearing the music clearly on an Interstate with the top down (it doesn't help that my wife is often telling me to slow down..) More than you ever wanted to know.. sorry, I get carried away..

A complete description of the audio as installed: It was originally was an SPP car. 3 dash speakers plus 4 door speakers, ASK amp, factory head unit and CD. What I inherited when I purchased the car: Sony XAV AX100 head unit Pioneer GM-D1004 amplifier 2 x 4 inch Faital Pro full range door speakers 2 x 7 inch Dayton Auto woofers HU pre outs for front and rear are connected to the amp front and rear inputs. 4 speaker outs are wired to the door speakers - 4 inch are "front" and 7 inch are "rear." (dash speakers are not connected) The amp is 400w max output, 45wpc continuous (yes at 1% THD). The speakers are each rated for 60w. Pretty well matched IMO. The speakers are each single cone so no crossovers involved. The amp has low and high pass filters for front and rear available at 80Hz. The 4 inch speakers have 90Hz-20KHZ response so leaving the filter off and setting it to high pass makes no difference. Setting it to low pass essentially turns it off. The 7 inch speakers have 35Hz-8KHZ response. Setting it to high pass definitely reduces the bass output, setting it to low pass cuts some of the "brightness" out. The speakers are all in the door with about a foot center to center, so it doesn't really add "separation" to put the low pass filter on. Sounds better with filter off front and rear. If I were starting from scratch with the stock system I would use an Android HU with adapters - I have done this in a couple of other cars and they work well enough and the integrations are nice. But that is not where I am starting from. So - for now at least - going to leave it as is. It's good enough. But, if I were going to upgrade I think that the following might be a good path: Replace the woofers with the Focal component system, putting the tweeters in the dash. Add the 987 Bose subwoofer shelf. As I understand it, this can be hooked up to a head unit with sub output - which my Sony HU has. That would require the least re-engineering and reinvestment.

I didn't read your whole thread so idk if someone has already suggested this but I went with crutchfield and there's a adapter for the fiber optic. The kit was completely self-contained and I like the result. I installed a Kenwood aftermarket deck. they were out of stock on the silver bezel so I picked up one from Amazon and it looks perfect. I actually need to pull out the deck and rearrange the wiring because it wasn't quite flush and I've been too lazy to fix it so far. it looks good! p.s. I chose that deck specifically because it is old school. I didn't want a touch screen.