Enhance or replace B&O sound system in 2020 GT

[gone_n_60]

The B& O with 1000watts is plenty good for me, but I drive with my windows open and rather listen to my 'active exhaust' 90% of the time. If I spend extra dollars it won't be on the sound system.

Yep. But as another pointed out if you want some of the other features NAV, safety stuff you get the B&O with the package, oof.

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[MCS]

So many ideas! I just wish Ford would have resolved the reverb issues in the passenger side door panel. I keep meaning to go to East Hamilton Radio and have them install dynamat. The factory stereo has more than enough boom for me. My days of dual 12s in the trunk of my Jeep are way behind me.

 

[socal2fast]

Nice!! Where did you get the sub enclosures...custom? I'm looking to do something similar to my GT.

Had it done at a local shop here in So.Cal.

 

[_zOmbIE_]

The B& O with 1000watts is plenty good for me, but I drive with my windows open and rather listen to my 'active exhaust' 90% of the time. If I spend extra dollars it won't be on the sound system.

If the B&O is 1,000 watts I'd love to know where it's going, because I've got a 50w x4 + 300w x1 KAC-D8105 with maybe $300 in speakers/sub in my Bronco that blows the B&O out of the woods.

 

[Evolvd]

If the B&O is 1,000 watts I'd love to know where it's going, because I've got a 50w x4 + 300w x1 KAC-D8105 with maybe $300 in speakers/sub in my Bronco that blows the B&O out of the woods.

It’s just clever marketing, peak numbers split between 11 speakers and 1 sub.

 

[Dinogirlsdad]

B&O upgrade is easy...

1.)
Get a Pac-Audio AmpPro AMP4-FD21 with the optical out add-in.
Get a DSP or DSP amplifier with at least 6 amplified channels and two RCA outputs and sufficient power on at least two of the 6 channels (90Watts+).
Get a good 3-way speakerset up front (f.e. Focal Flax Evo 3-way set).
Get some speaker adapters (no MDF adapters please!).
Get a powered or passive subwoofer and an amp (in case of a passive sub).
Get sound proofing and deadening material.
Get power, ground- and speaker cables and all the related materials.

2.)
strip the interior of your car, seats, rear seats, panels, door panels... everything.
Sound deaden/proof all surfaces.
Build an amp rack and fit amps on it and wire them correctly.
Route the cables to where they belong (Powerwire to battery, ground wire to common ground, speaker wires to the corresponding speaker location, remote wire to your Pac-Audio AmpPro, RCAs to your AmpPro, RCAs from DSP/DSP-amp to amplifiers etc.).
Fit speakers into doors and sub into trunk where it belongs.
Disconnect the center speaker.
Connect everything together.
Put everything back into the correct location in into the car (panels, mats, seats, everything).

3.)
Set basic crossovers in the DSP for the tweeter.
Measure polarity of speakers (did you wire them the correct way?).
Measure raw response of your drivers.
Set acoustical crossovers based on the raw measurements (you did have a basic crossover setting for your tweeter, right?).
Remeasure if the acoustical slopes align with your desired 24LR slopes.
Measure distance of each speaker driver to the tip of the stationary microphone.
Do the math and put in the distance either as distance or delay in ms into your DSP.
EQ each driver to your desired individual drivers target curve.
EQ each side to your desired overall target curve.
Remeasure several times that you didn't miss something.

If all of this is too much for you (and yes, this is just abreviated), go to a reputable shop in your area and let them do all of this for you.

I know this is old but this a wonderful write up. Thank you.

 

[RagmopInKona]

B&O upgrade is easy...

1.)
Get a Pac-Audio AmpPro AMP4-FD21 with the optical out add-in.
Get a DSP or DSP amplifier with at least 6 amplified channels and two RCA outputs and sufficient power on at least two of the 6 channels (90Watts+).
Get a good 3-way speakerset up front (f.e. Focal Flax Evo 3-way set).
Get some speaker adapters (no MDF adapters please!).
Get a powered or passive subwoofer and an amp (in case of a passive sub).
Get sound proofing and deadening material.
Get power, ground- and speaker cables and all the related materials.

2.)
strip the interior of your car, seats, rear seats, panels, door panels... everything.
Sound deaden/proof all surfaces.
Build an amp rack and fit amps on it and wire them correctly.
Route the cables to where they belong (Powerwire to battery, ground wire to common ground, speaker wires to the corresponding speaker location, remote wire to your Pac-Audio AmpPro, RCAs to your AmpPro, RCAs from DSP/DSP-amp to amplifiers etc.).
Fit speakers into doors and sub into trunk where it belongs.
Disconnect the center speaker.
Connect everything together.
Put everything back into the correct location in into the car (panels, mats, seats, everything).

3.)
Set basic crossovers in the DSP for the tweeter.
Measure polarity of speakers (did you wire them the correct way?).
Measure raw response of your drivers.
Set acoustical crossovers based on the raw measurements (you did have a basic crossover setting for your tweeter, right?).
Remeasure if the acoustical slopes align with your desired 24LR slopes.
Measure distance of each speaker driver to the tip of the stationary microphone.
Do the math and put in the distance either as distance or delay in ms into your DSP.
EQ each driver to your desired individual drivers target curve.
EQ each side to your desired overall target curve.
Remeasure several times that you didn't miss something.

If all of this is too much for you (and yes, this is just abreviated), go to a reputable shop in your area and let them do all of this for you.

That is a lot of work and gear for todays music that is streamed and compressed to hell in bluetooth form.
How is a great system going to make the junk sonic format sound better than the garbage the head unit is given to work with?
And bluetooth streamed audio sounds like garbage.
Junk in, junk out. How does spending thousands help when the source material is junk. it might be louder, but better sonic punch, db rise. from what?

 

[Cathul]

From the correct implementation of the system.
Fine tuning with DSP, correctly set gains in the amplifiers, higher quality of the speakers that can actually be run with decent power and very low distortion. Specific time alignment, driver specific equalizing, actually usefull dampening of sheet metal and interior parts to prevent rattles and vibrations and so on.
Even bluetooth can sound amazing, but yes, if the recording itself is garbage a good system will reveal that, but with good recordings (80's Michael Jackson Thriller album f.e.) you will be amazed about how good a correctly implemented system can sound.

 

[Evolvd]

That is a lot of work and gear for todays music that is streamed and compressed to hell in bluetooth form.
How is a great system going to make the junk sonic format sound better than the garbage the head unit is given to work with?
And bluetooth streamed audio sounds like garbage.
Junk in, junk out. How does spending thousands help when the source material is junk. it might be louder, but better sonic punch, db rise. from what?

You kinda went off on a tangent that wasn’t part of the original question. The OP specifically said he is a musician so I bet dollars-to-donuts he understands how recordings sound and how audio compression affects the intended sound. Streaming is not the only way to listen to music in the S550. CDs are still the best method unless you have FLAC or Apple Lossless recordings.
I installed over $10K worth of equipment and material into my car and you can bet all my recordings are lossless.

 

[RagmopInKona]

You kinda went off on a tangent that wasn’t part of the original question. The OP specifically said he is a musician so I bet dollars-to-donuts he understands how recordings sound and how audio compression affects the intended sound. Streaming is not the only way to listen to music in the S550. CDs are still the best method unless you have FLAC or Apple Lossless recordings.
I installed over $10K worth of equipment and material into my car and you can bet all my recordings are lossless.

That is great and all, but for the last decade or so. the record labels/producers, sound engineers seem to have said duck it all most will be playing this, streamed or downloaded file and through ear buds. The orinigal recordings are so muddy on much of the new stuff that even if you buy the cd straight from the bands web site it is hit or miss of if the bothered with the sound quality or just phoned it in.

 

[Cathul]

Well… while this may be true you still have to make a decision.

having everything sounding like garbage or having a decent system where good recordings sound good and the garbage recordings still like garbage.
I will always choose the second option.

 

[Evolvd]

Agreed. With that logic you might as well swap all your speakers for Walmart junk since it’s all garbage anyways

 

[mc68386]

That is great and all, but for the last decade or so. the record labels/producers, sound engineers seem to have said duck it all most will be playing this, streamed or downloaded file and through ear buds. The orinigal recordings are so muddy on much of the new stuff that even if you buy the cd straight from the bands web site it is hit or miss of if the bothered with the sound quality or just phoned it in.

That might be true, but a lot of people who care about sound quality are probably like me and are old farts who don't listen to anything less than 10 (or 15 or 20!) years old so we wouldn't have that problem.

 

[20ducks]

"Old farts..." Yeah, you'll go places on this forum with talk like that.

 

[Cathul]

"Old farts..." Yeah, you'll go places on this forum with talk like that.

Still, it's true... older people like me (approaching my 50th birthday soon) went the whole way up to a point where we can make solid recommendations from experience.
Yes, recordings these days are mostly shit, but i rather listen to a shit recording on a good system than a bad system, just to not have the system add even more shittyness to the sound than the recording already has. ;)
In addition we grew up in a time where not everything was compressed to hell and back as we actually used vinyl recordings back in the days which had to be mastered way different than for digital devices.
I even have some CDs from the 80's which were mixed top notch and whenever someone compares his 2nd edition remaster of Michael Jacksons Thriller recording to my original 80's compact disc he doesn't believe how good the old CD is sounding.

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