[subhashnm]

My i10 Sportz came with a factory fitted music system with four door-mouted speakers. I only use my iPod through the Aux jack for all my music needs. I've been noticing the absolute inability of the system(or may be only that of the speakers) to handle the bass (and the clarity) of the type of songs that I listen to. I normally listen to the following:

- Classic Rock (Led Zeppelin/Doors/Dire Straits/CCR/etc.)
- Blues
- Hindustani classical (vocal & instrumental)
- Folk songs, and the type.

These normally don't demand the bass requirement of hip-hop and pop, but the system/speakers can't seem to handle these even. What can I do to make things sound better? Please don't ask me to change the HU; I can't afford even to think about it for the next two years :(

Can I upgrade only the speakers and get a better result? If yes, what speakers do the gurus suggest for my music taste mentioned above?
Any info is highly appreciated. Thank you all!

[wildchild4lyfe]

yes you sure can upgrade the speakers but even with that you wouldnt really be happy with the output after a point..!
i would suggest morels or dls for the kind of music you listen to..

[Mi10]

Nothing comes even moderatley close to a HU change.

When your 'Input' equipment is poor, no matter what you put as an 'output' equipment, the difference wont be very great

[NevGin]

Originally Posted by subhashnm

My i10 Sportz came with a factory fitted music system with four door-mouted speakers. I only use my iPod through the Aux jack for all my music needs. I've been noticing the absolute inability of the system(or may be only that of the speakers) to handle the bass (and the clarity) of the type of songs that I listen to. I normally listen to the following:

- Classic Rock (Led Zeppelin/Doors/Dire Straits/CCR/etc.)
- Blues
- Hindustani classical (vocal & instrumental)
- Folk songs, and the type.

These normally don't demand the bass requirement of hip-hop and pop, but the system/speakers can't seem to handle these even. What can I do to make things sound better? Please don't ask me to change the HU; I can't afford even to think about it for the next two years :(

Can I upgrade only the speakers and get a better result? If yes, what speakers do the gurus suggest for my music taste mentioned above?
Any info is highly appreciated. Thank you all!

I have the same problem when I plug an external player through the Auxillary jack. My experience is as follows:

- A better quality connector improves the sound
- Recordings of Zepplin and the like are older. The mp3 recording quality will also matter.
- The CD used to rip the songs sound much better when compared to playing them from the external player.
- Also wanted to mention that my driver door speaker has gone kaput and needs to be replaced. There is this terrible torn sound that it emits even when there is no bass. Once done, I go straight and replace the speakers with after market ones.

Trust this helps.

[wildchild4lyfe]

totally agree with Mi10..

[Mr.Bangalore]

i too own a sportz, yes i totally agree with the fact that HU is a decent one.
What i thought was fitting an external equalizer to control the music since the HU does not come with pre equalizers in it. but still not able to find a decent place to fix it :(.
changing the speakers is not a good idea.

[subhashnm]

Originally Posted by wildchild4lyfe

totally agree with Mi10..

Darn! :( There goes all my hope. Anyway, I think I will change the speakers sometime down the line and live with that slight improvement till I can go for an HU change.

[Mi10]

Originally Posted by subhashnm

Darn! :( There goes all my hope. Anyway, I think I will change the speakers sometime down the line and live with that slight improvement till I can go for an HU change.

First, Draw up a budget. You need not get everything at the same time. Go in for a phased approach.

First change your HU, see how it fares with your current set of speakers. There will be a noticeable change, IMHO. A decent HU starts from 4K onwards - Try out Pioneer / Kenwood / Blaupunkt / JVC (Search around the T-bhp classifields, you may get some good deals)

If you are happy - Live with it, else, see if you can upgrade your Front speakers alone to preferably components (if on a tight rope, a coaxial would do) - A pair of good Compos (4K-7K) else a pair of good Coax (2K-4K) should serve the purpose.

Total budget including installation would come to 10K minimum, you can always go phase by phase

[wildchild4lyfe]

step by step is the way to go..all the very best!!
i suggest your first buy should be a head unit.

[Mr.Bangalore]

Originally Posted by Mi10

First, Draw up a budget. You need not get everything at the same time. Go in for a phased approach.

First change your HU, see how it fares with your current set of speakers. There will be a noticeable change, IMHO. A decent HU starts from 4K onwards - Try out Pioneer / Kenwood / Blaupunkt / JVC (Search around the T-bhp classifields, you may get some good deals)

If you are happy - Live with it, else, see if you can upgrade your Front speakers alone to preferably components (if on a tight rope, a coaxial would do) - A pair of good Compos (4K-7K) else a pair of good Coax (2K-4K) should serve the purpose.

Total budget including installation would come to 10K minimum, you can always go phase by phase

but the look what it has now will not be achieved with the new HU, since it is a 2 din mp3 player it will surely look odd with the new one.

[greenhorn]

strongly suggest you get better speakers, and more importantly, get them installed by a professional. I think speaker upgrade > HU upgrade

[prince85]

Originally Posted by Mi10

First, Draw up a budget. You need not get everything at the same time. Go in for a phased approach.

First change your HU, see how it fares with your current set of speakers. There will be a noticeable change, IMHO. A decent HU starts from 4K onwards - Try out Pioneer / Kenwood / Blaupunkt / JVC (Search around the T-bhp classifields, you may get some good deals)

Completely agree with you Mi10 on the HU upgrade part. but the problem for all sportz/asta owners is that the car comes with a dash integrated HU and one cannot install an aftermarket HU in place of the OE one. To do soo, one requires to buy the dashkit of the ERA/MAGNA (which has provision for an aftermarket 1din/2din HU) which i have been trying to procure for a long time now but in vain.

Im told that the magna dashkit consisting of the a/c blowers/hazard switch/clock/2din slot costs a whopping 8k from hyundai. I am okay with that but then too they have not been able to get one for me. One more thing, I am not sure if the internal HU/hazard/clock wiring for the ERA/MAGNA is similar to the SPORTZ/ASTA. It would be great if anyone could shed some light on this aspect.

[kspv]

My views are a bit contrarian.

Before trying out anything, please check the bit-rate of your MP3 recordings. The genres specified by you are demanding, and anything less than a 128 bit recording will be a pale shadow of the original stereo recording.

Secondly, check whether you are ripping & encoding the music to MP3 format on your computer, or simply copying the music in the MP3 format from one folder to another (or to the pen-drive). Copying involves transfer through the sound card of the computer, and ripping involves bypassing the sound card. If you involve sound-card by way of simple copying, then the quality of the recording will be poor.

If you are satisfied that you have taken these precautions, then check the speakers, more specifically the way they are installed. These things matter a lot in getting the right sound in your car.

Only then, you should consider opting for a different head-unit. My feeling is that the car's in-dash player would not be of such poor quality.

Go step-by-step!

[Ravi Nandrajog]

Originally Posted by NevGin

I have the same problem when I plug an external player through the Auxillary jack. My experience is as follows:

- A better quality connector improves the sound
- Recordings of Zepplin and the like are older. The mp3 recording quality will also matter.
- The CD used to rip the songs sound much better when compared to playing them from the external player.
- Also wanted to mention that my driver door speaker has gone kaput and needs to be replaced. There is this terrible torn sound that it emits even when there is no bass. Once done, I go straight and replace the speakers with after market ones.

Trust this helps.

Here what i see is , the output and the quality of music very low through an aux input when compared with audio cds.
If you dont want to change your head unit, no problem .Your solution is 'REQ 5' by Mi-tech industries. Its a high to low line out convertor which also has a remote auxillary input which actually allows you to regulate the output of your external mp3 player or an ipod. it also has a seperate sub out.

[subhashnm]

Originally Posted by prince85

but the problem for all sportz/asta owners is that the car comes with a dash integrated HU and one cannot install an aftermarket HU in place of the OE one.

This is the main issue why I don't want to change the dash-integrated HU. It will just spoil the look of the dash, even if fitting an aftermarket one were possible.

Originally Posted by kspv

Before trying out anything, please check the bit-rate of your MP3 recordings. The genres specified by you are demanding, and anything less than a 128 bit recording will be a pale shadow of the original stereo recording.

Secondly, check whether you are ripping & encoding the music to MP3 format on your computer, or simply copying the music in the MP3 format from one folder to another (or to the pen-drive). Copying involves transfer through the sound card of the computer, and ripping involves bypassing the sound card. If you involve sound-card by way of simple copying, then the quality of the recording will be poor.

I should check out the bitrate of the files I have. But I can right away say that I use files of mixed quality; most of the old Hindustani vocals have got not-so-great sound quality while most of Zeppelin/Plant/Doors are of really high quality. I think I should buy a new CD or two of Hindustani vocals and check out the performance of the player.