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Aftermarket Car Stereos... Full Re-wiring!?!?
LifeVirusZERO
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
I have a 2002 Nissan Altima with the Bose 6CD in-dash changer. Recently the CD player itself stopped working and I've had several people look at it, and they all said that it was broken. I dealt with the radio only (which is terrible) for about a week, then yesterday I decided to get a new head unit. I ordered a Pioneer DEH-P6900UB stereo from Circuit City because it was on sale AND they were doing free installation. I went to the store to pick it up and get it installed and the guy there told me that there was no one there to install it and that I'd have to come back tomorrow.
I got up this morning and got to CC shortly after they opened. I told the guy that I needed to get it installed and he told me to pull my car around and I did. I walked in and he was talking to some guy on the phone and he said "Well there's good news and bad news. The good news is, we can do it. The bad news is, it's gonna be a little pricey" and he went on telling me that since I have the bose system, I'd need a full re-wiring and I'd have to replace the factory amp AND speakers too. I wasn't about to drop like $600.00 on all that, so I just said no thanks and left.
When I got home, I did a little research online. I'm also a member over at the Nissanclub.com Forums. I saw several posts there from people who had the exact same situation. All the replies were the same, they all basically said that the install guy didn't know what he was talking about. According to this thread, all I need is a mounting kit/wire harness. Should I just take this somewhere else and get it installed? Or am I really gonna need to get my entire setup re-done... Thanks in advance.
I got up this morning and got to CC shortly after they opened. I told the guy that I needed to get it installed and he told me to pull my car around and I did. I walked in and he was talking to some guy on the phone and he said "Well there's good news and bad news. The good news is, we can do it. The bad news is, it's gonna be a little pricey" and he went on telling me that since I have the bose system, I'd need a full re-wiring and I'd have to replace the factory amp AND speakers too. I wasn't about to drop like $600.00 on all that, so I just said no thanks and left.
When I got home, I did a little research online. I'm also a member over at the Nissanclub.com Forums. I saw several posts there from people who had the exact same situation. All the replies were the same, they all basically said that the install guy didn't know what he was talking about. According to this thread, all I need is a mounting kit/wire harness. Should I just take this somewhere else and get it installed? Or am I really gonna need to get my entire setup re-done... Thanks in advance.
LifeVirusZERO on
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Best bet is to just take a look at your new stereo, pull out your old stereo, and compare connectors. Just be careful, sometimes factory stereos are a little difficult to get out.
Your new cd player is an amp, but probably also has an unpowered line out. You need that unpowered line out to go to your car's amp (which should have a left and right in). Basically you have to look at the manual from your cd player, find which wires are what, and get to crimping.
Usually you buy a new cd player which has a bunch of wires coming out of it. Then you buy your car's adapter which has the right plug for your car's plug that joins up the speaker lines, and power lines correctly. Then you crimp your new cd player's wires to the correct wired places on your adapter and voila, all the power and speaker lines are connected properly. You don't need these adapters actually because you can cut off that car plug and crimp them directly, but they make it easier because your car often does not have the wires labeled which is which.
B.net: Kusanku
EDIT: on a side note, I played around with the display model of the one i bought at the store. It's really cool. I can plug my little USB powered external HDD directly into the head unit and play the songs right off of that. Basically I no longer need CD's because whenever I legally purchase (see footnote 1) a new CD, I add it to my HDD's music library right away. Sweet
1.
As far as wiring goes, the guy is retarded. An amp has four wires coming in - power, remote, left channel, right channel. Power you don't have to worry about. Left and Right channel are a matter of plugging them into your decks rear pre-outs (Check the Pioneer manual). The remote is how the deck tells the amp to increase or decrease it's volume. Again, check the manuals. If your car manual doesn't tell you which cable is which, talk to the guys on those forums.
Speakers are even simpler. Positive to positive, negative to negative. Any speaker will work with any source and Best Buy are cunts for telling you to replace Bose equipment.
I pretty much said what mastman did 3 posts ago. Meh.
Go back to CC and ask the guy what part of 'free installation' he is failing to understand.
The only reason you would need to rewire everything in the car is if everything went bad for some reason, which is just incredibly unlikely. The guy's trying to rip you off. Talk to his manager if possible.
To install an aftermarket stereo like that, all that's necessary is changing the connector that plugs into the head unit. This just means cutting a few wires and soldering a new connector on, nothing to it.
I agree with this. I wouldn't go messing with something I don't fully understand when there is a possibility that someone else can do it for free.
Well if I go back there, the guy is just gonna argue to the death that he is right and I am wrong. I'm really not the kind of guy to start trouble at places by asking for his manager or anything like that. Besides, he was pretty nice about it. I'm just gonna try taking it to a different CC
I learned everything as I went, and as far as I know we've always done that exact thing to customers bringing us Bose and Infiniti systems. Supposedly there's something about premium sound systems usually being powered with a factory amplifier, which requires an amp bypass. Or something.
I work with the installers and another sales guy that are all extremely knowledgeable about car stuff, and they all say it's truth. We don't work on commission either, so there's no point in trying to upsell. In fact, if any of us KNEW that we could install stuff onto premium factory systems, wouldn't it make sense to do so?
We lose customers by telling them, "Oh, you need to spend another $100 to install a subwoofer."
tl;dr
I'm a confused Circuit City employee that's been told and educated that Bose car audio systems are finicky things to work with and so it necessitates extra money.
I would raise about a hundred pounds of hell if I were you. You didn't fall for this but someone else might have. I tell you what; if I found out that I payed to have my shit rewired and didn't need too heads would roll. People don't work for money to piss it away and they shouldn't have to because that guy can't do his job properly.
Lets change the story a little. Lets say you wanted to replace a DVD burner in your computer and fire squad (or whatever CC's version of Geek squad is) were offering free installation. You went there to get installed and they said "Oh sorry this is a Dell motherboard, it won't work. We're gonna have to replace this if you want this DVD burner." What would you say then?
If the amp is odd, that's one thing, but the guy claimed he needed a full re-wiring and new speakers. Speakers are speakers. They have a positive and negative connection and current is passed through. And wires are wires. The guy didn't say amp-bypass, he said replace everything.
That is what the guy told me because he was factoring in the cost of the speakers and a new amp, wires, etc.
http://www.audiooutfitter.com/oea4/scosche/p75730.html
Can anyone confirm this?
I would head to a good stereo shop and ask the guys there.
He's right. Bose systems are fucked. They work completely different in car stereo just for reasons like this. As for the adjustable amplifier, LFZ, that would probably work. I did some installing at futureshop. Although I did work on comission, I gain nothing but feeling nice by helping you here.
Really though? I might be mistaken, but I do not think so. Talk to friends, personally, a friend of a friend of yours must know something, and if you can get someone trustyworthy to look at your car directly, it would be a lot easier to tell.
It doesn't matter if you do need a "full rewiring" for it. The fact of the matter is is that the deck you bought which is a boss which they know has a finicky system has a free installation. It isn't a matter of arguing who is right or wrong, they offered you a free installation so they need to do it.
Satans..... hints.....
$600 is still way too freakin' much though.
http://www.audiooutfitter.com/707551/metra/p70207.html
http://www.audiooutfitter.com/99-7418/aca/p70642.html
If you're going to be doing it yourself, take your time and don't skip any steps. Stereo wiring can be frustrating at times but if you stay focused and don't let the fact that you're upside down under the dash get to you, it's not that hard.
http://www.nissanclub.com/forums/car-audio-multimedia-ice/220817-bose-head-unit-question.html
"Yes, if you just rewire the Bose amp the speakers will still work, but not good. The speakers are on a six or eight ohm system. Aftermarket CD players (such as the Pioneer) operate on a four ohm system, making the factory Bose speakers sound horrible and lose longevity."
There are a couple of other guys that have some stuff to say, but they're at lunch right now. I'll give them a chance to talk when they come back.
It sounds to me like the guys there are trying to screw you over. Unless you got a really great deal on the deck, I'd just return it and order one from crutchfield. You'll have to wait a little longer to get it and do some easy work yourself, but at least you aren't supporting a company that tries to fuck over their customers.
When I bought it from the CC website, I got it for $239.99. I already ordered the parts from another site (they were fairly inexpensive). So installing a car stereo isn't as terrible as it seems? I'm totally up for it, but I just want to know how difficult it actually is. Of course I realize it varies from car to car, though. I know someone who used to do it professionally in case I need his help.
What's happening is that your new radio is going to degrade the sound quality of everything else. This whole time you've grown accustomed to the high quality sound; replacing the radio is going to make that sound terrible.
It's all about ohm loads. If you don't match them up, shit's gonna go down.
$600 for what they want to do makes sense, because that covers not only the labor and installation, but also the actual raw product (new speakers, new amp).
woo
That actually makes sense. And it ALSO means I will NEVER buy a car with a Bose system. I have never in my life seen a car stereo on anything but 2 or 4 ohms. 8 ohms is usually home theater systems. Honestly, that's some underhanded shit because Bose is intentionally making it difficult to do anything but either replace the whole thing or buy more Bose stuff.
I'm glad you said this stuff, man.
Well that's a good way to put it, thanks