# New guy from the bay



## expiredtags

Hey Everyone!

My name is Kyle and I've been lurking here on the DIYMA forums for a little while now. Figured I should at least introduce myself.

I have a 2011 WRX hatchback and just recently installed a Pioneer 8000NEX. 

I'm looking to do a pretty decent upgrade as far as the other components of my audio system and happened upon this forum in my quest for research about various products and installation techniques. 

Everyone here seems pretty easy to talk to and appears to have a vast knowledge and amount of experience in car audio and what it takes to put together a quality system.

I don't know if I want to get into competitions or not but it is definitely something that has peaked my interests. My goal for the system is to be a kind of "high-end budget" build if that exists haha. 

Was kind of sold on the HAT clarus 6.5" components but after I finally tracked down a retail price I decided I might go for some image dynamics..... But who knows I'm really open for suggestions.

Pretty set on PPI amps just from everyone's reviews on here.

Also set on a MS-8 if I can find one on the used market to help make that purchase a little more palatable. 


Thanks for having this great community and tech resource!

Looking forward to jumping in this thing feet first and getting my hands wet soon.


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## damonryoung

Welcome Kyle! There are plenty of people up your way that are very knowledgeable and helpful too!


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## papasin

Hey Kyle,

I'm down in the South Bay and have used the ID XS comp set in an early incarnation of my build. Also used an MS-8 in an earlier incarnation and had decent results, as well as had PPI Phantom amps. Happy to share any experiences or chat about ideas car audio related. Just hit me up via PM.

- Richard


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## expiredtags

Thanks Guys!

Richard, I've spent the better half of this afternoon reading your build thread on your civic.
Very impressive!! Mounting the tweeters in the kick panels never crossed my mind but since I'm taller (over 6') I might just have to try that placement when I'm ready to add some comps. Maybe ill make some angled spacers to aim them a little more at an upward angle.

I know you ran the XS series comps but how do you think CXS would compare? I know I probably won't get the same sound from them but I am not sure what I would be sacrificing if I went with the less expensive CXS components.

After reading how well the MS-8 served you it makes me less worried if I have to purchase that brand new. I saw a video on the 3sixty.3 last night and that looked pretty user friendly but I haven't dove into researching that one yet. If you could do it all over again would the MS-8 be your first choice for a DSP?

Thanks!


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## papasin

Kyle, both the XS and CXS actually use the same tweeter. The difference is in the mid. The CXS mid bass per my understanding from a former co-worker that got me started in this SQ venture has better mid bass, but the XS has a superior midrange. Since the early portion of my build was a 2-way, I opted for the better midrange.

Regarding the MS-8, I regard it as the best auto-tune processor available, and I doubt anyone will dispute that as nothing currently available comes close. We had a competition less than 2 weeks ago where in one of the most competed classes, a fellow from AZ competed with an MS-8, and he placed 4th, but only a point behind the 3rd place car with the top 3 cars being tuned by some of the best tuners in the state. I had very similar results when I competed with the MS-8. My car did ok in the competition lanes, often mid-pack surpassing some of the competitors, and coming very close to the top cars. So in effect, the MS-8 gets you 80-85% there. But for me, I wanted the extra 10-15% and hence I ventured off to a manual-tune processor.

A 3Sixty.3 is such a processor, and one we use in our mini-van. The H800 is what we use in our two cars (my Civic and my wife’s Smart). What these give is an extra level of control to really fine-tune the EQ, T/A, and gain structure that the MS-8 does not. The MS-8 allows you to choose crossovers and slopes, and it’ll auto-eq and do everything else for you.

As for your question if I were to do it all over again, that comes down to what point of my SQ knowledge it would be. If you wiped my brain, then yeah, I would probably need to go back to an MS-8. But given what I know now, I would jump straight to a manual-tune processor. The ones that I have experience with are the H800, 3Sixty.3, and 6to8 and all three have their pros and cons, but would be my “go-to” processors given where I am in my SQ level.

Hope that helps.


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## Black Rain

Hey Kyle, welcome to the wonderful world of Audiophile lovers. There are quite a few good people on here that are in or near the Bay area such as Richard.

You should be a bit of research before you commit one particular front stage brand. Look at what their capabilities are and how that matches up to what type of music you listen to and what type setup you are desiring. Go to a few your local shops and demo some out and even go to some of the SQ meets around. 

There is alot of information on here, and plenty of reviews for many speakers, processors, amps and subs. Read some them and enjoy your ride and build.

-Juan


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## expiredtags

I completely agree Juan, I've been spending a lot of time on here to try an absorb as much as I can.

I've spent quite a bit of time in the home audiophile world. I have several higher end headphones, custom in ear monitors and a pair of mackie reference monitors that I absolutely love.

I also moonlight as a sound engineer on the weekends.

But coming over to the mobile car audiophile world I feel like my head is spinning with all the possible routes that can be taken. I'm used to a steep learning curve but this is nuts haha.

I would love to demo some cars at a meet or competition so I will try to make it out to one for sure.

Thanks for the words of wisdom!

-Kyle


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## expiredtags

Richard, 

That was exactly the kind of information I was looking for.

Thank you!!


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## Clenzer72

What's up?
I'm just up the street from you in Hayward
Might have seen my ride, few friends around there:

Hit me up
I'm about to install the two subs I got here soon and some other av stuff


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## Clenzer72

Pm me your e-mail or #, I don't know if forum is staying when site goes down


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## expiredtags

Wait... This forum is going away possibly?


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## Black Rain

No problem, you can hook up with Richard for info on shows, meets and GTGs in your area. Richard is a great guy and very helpful.


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## papasin

expiredtags said:


> Wait... This forum is going away possibly?


It's currently for sale, but I doubt it's going anywhere. My understanding, prior to Ant (the current owner), it was run just as well and I imagine if it does get sold it will continue to do just as well. 



Black Rain said:


> No problem, you can hook up with Richard for info on shows, meets and GTGs in your area. Richard is a great guy and very helpful.


Thanks Juan. 

Kyle, I'm working with a few guys in my team to host a series of possible clinics. I'll shoot you a PM when we get that stuff organized. You can check the MECA schedule and filter for CA to see the MECA comps we have. We have one almost every month. I actually have enough points already for finals, so I'm planning on taking it easy for the summer and may not go to as many shows (with kids and summer breaks and such), but feel free to hit me up if you ever want to just meet up and talk car audio or what not. I might pick your brain on the home audio and headphone front...that's something I'm also somewhat interested in.


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## expiredtags

Awesome thanks Richard! 

Let me know anytime you have questions my collection is a little on the small side but what I do have sounds incredible!


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## expiredtags

I'm beginning to think silver flutes might be a good starting point. People seem to be pretty happy with their performance especially with their price. I figure I could start with them and build a "future proof" system with the hardware to handle a next level front stage should I deem it necessary. 

Question I have though is will the MS-8 be able to tune them enough to make me happy? ( I know that's a purely subjective question so I don't expect a black or white yes/no answer haha)

I was reading one thread where they were great for jazz, acoustic, and vocal music but left something to be desired with rock music until they were boosted around 160, 175hz or so.

I know the ms8 can auto tune and then you can alter certain aspects of the tune. BUT can you boost individual frequency ranges with the ms8?

Or should I really be looking at a DSP such as the alpine/ppi/helix and just jump into this whole manual tuning thing bypassing the ms8 completely?


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## papasin

MS-8 has a 31-band graphic EQ that you can adjust after the auto-tune. The difference between the ms-8 and other processors such as the 360.3 or Helix for example is that those give you 31-band parametric EQ PER driver (so all 8 channels have an individual 31-band EQ with parametric capabilities - adjustable Q per band).


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## damonryoung

papasin said:


> MS-8 has a 31-band graphic EQ that you can adjust after the auto-tune. The difference between the ms-8 and other processors such as the 360.3 or Helix for example is that those give you 31-band parametric EQ PER driver (so all 8 channels have an individual 31-band EQ with parametric capabilities - adjustable Q per band).


I think someone once said "with great power, comes great responsibility"...


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## papasin

DRTHJTA said:


> I think someone once said "with great power, comes great responsibility"...



Indeed! Wonder who said that.


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## fullergoku

papasin said:


> Indeed! Wonder who said that.


I know who I know who!! Uncle Ben


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## papasin

fullergoku said:


> I know who I know who!! Uncle Ben


That he did!


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## expiredtags

HAHA!

Thanks for the info guys! I hope to narrow down my choices soon. 

After thinking about the silver flutes over the weekend and attempting to pair them with a nice sounding yet small tweeter I think I might just go back to the ID CXS comps or another ID that's paired with a tweet.

The recommended tweeters to pair with the SF look too big to mount in the factory sail panels and I don't think I'm ready to do TOO much custom work yet.

Is there a smaller tweeter that could be paired with the SF that would allow the same "low-ish" crossing similar to the vifa/Dayton tweeters?

I would like to stay around the size of the ID tweeter for ease of mounting in the sail panels.

Thanks again for all your continued help everyone!

-Kyle


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## simplicityinsound

haha i am routinely in newark having shaved ice at Tea Station

if you are ever in Milpitas, Feel free to stop by the shop 

love to see a fellow Subby owner 

Bing

p.s. one of our previous customers just changed up his install and i believe he has a ms8 thats in very good shape that will be up for sale


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## plcrides

whats up man,nice ride haha i have one too,i have a 2013 blue pearl hatch back the best car I've ever had as far as bass is concerned,i also bought the ms-8 I'm just waiting to buy a 4 channel amp hopefully in the next few weeks or so.welcome to the forum,lots of cool stuff here and lots of friendly people.oh don't you hate trying to clean those rims, i still haven't found a good way yet,to get in between the spokes haha anyways 
welcome, Lance.


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## expiredtags

simplicityinsound said:


> haha i am routinely in newark having shaved ice at Tea Station
> 
> if you are ever in Milpitas, Feel free to stop by the shop
> 
> love to see a fellow Subby owner
> 
> Bing
> 
> p.s. one of our previous customers just changed up his install and i believe he has a ms8 thats in very good shape that will be up for sale


Woah! That would be awesome! Can you please let me know when your customer is ready to sell? I'm finally ready to start pulling the trigger on equipment and would love to start with the processor.

I love that shopping center and used to work right across from it. I'm always going over to bamboo for honeydew milk teas, you should let me know next time you're in the area.

I actually REALLY want to get a side mounted box built and was hoping that I could get some more information from you Bing about what can be done with the hatch. Please let me know when you might have some free time to discuss.

Thanks!!
-Kyle





plcrides said:


> whats up man,nice ride haha i have one too,i have a 2013 blue pearl hatch back the best car I've ever had as far as bass is concerned,i also bought the ms-8 I'm just waiting to buy a 4 channel amp hopefully in the next few weeks or so.welcome to the forum,lots of cool stuff here and lots of friendly people.oh don't you hate trying to clean those rims, i still haven't found a good way yet,to get in between the spokes haha anyways
> welcome, Lance.



Thanks for the welcome! I'm soooooo ready to start building my system, the stock stereo sucks so much! It got quite a bit better with the NEX installed but still it leaves much to be desired. This is my 4th hatch back car and they have never disappointed me as far as bass and I have always been able to get away with little 10" subs and they rocked the house with anything.

One thing I'm worried about are the doors, I think they are going to need quite a lot of deadening to get them to stop rattling. I swear Subaru must not have put anything in there to keep them quiet, they sound so hollow.


Those wheels are a PITA to clean!

I actually picked up some Sonax full effect wheel cleaner, some wheel woolies and a couple different cleaning tools to clean them. The Sonax makes quick work of the brake dust and other contaminants on the wheel then I just give it a quick scrub with the wheel wooly and blast it down with my power washer.

I used to detail my cars with all hand tools but due to carpel tunnel in both my hands cleaning my car has become increasingly hard so I decided to bite the bullet on powered hardware, but the benefit of that is my cars look better than they ever could have with hand detailing. Once you have the right chemicals and brushes those wheels take only a few minutes to clean


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## plcrides

you said it bro,i have nerve damage in both of my hands too from blowing every disc in my neck.i used to always have black vehicles with polished rims,ha never again,i love this subie my last ride was a scion xb and those doors were a joke dude,actually the whole car is just a tin can on wheels,I'm pretty impressed with my WRX doors,i did the normal deadening ,inside and just covered the holes and pretty much beat on the spots i thought would be a problem and just did those area's and thats all.i had some boston pro's in the door and they play low deep beats really loud and it jammed,but i have kick panels in mine now and omg dude if you plan on ever doing that shoot me a pm ok cause i worked on mine for months.i knew a guy in the bay area named zack he also drove a black scion xb with a big logo of his company on the side,can't remember what it said,but super cool guy.well can't wait to see what your going to do with your scooby.
later LancE.


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## [email protected]

Just my .2 cents, but if you are a sound engineer you are going to want as much control as possible. I would look beyond the MS-8.
Almost all the cars we do are active installs, stop by the shop any time if you want to talk audio....


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## expiredtags

I am going to try and make it into the shop soon. Work is kicking my ass this week and I'm only 3 hours into my 14 hour shift today so I don't know what the rest of the week is going to look like.

Thanks for the input Joey and I agree that it would be better to have more control over the system than what the ms8 can provide. I've been researching the alpine H800 because it has a remote screen / controller that you can mount in the car to change the configuration on the fly. I would prefer to not have to plug in a laptop anytime I want to adjust the system.


I Hope to make it out to SIS real soon.

-Kyle


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## simplicityinsound

expiredtags said:


> I am going to try and make it into the shop soon. Work is kicking my ass this week and I'm only 3 hours into my 14 hour shift today so I don't know what the rest of the week is going to look like.
> 
> Thanks for the input Joey and I agree that it would be better to have more control over the system than what the ms8 can provide. I've been researching the alpine H800 because it has a remote screen / controller that you can mount in the car to change the configuration on the fly. I would prefer to not have to plug in a laptop anytime I want to adjust the system.
> 
> 
> I Hope to make it out to SIS real soon.
> 
> -Kyle


After hours meet at tea station.. need to get joey to try shaved ice haha

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I317 using Tapatalk


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## expiredtags

I'm down haha


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## plcrides

whatcha gonna do on those a/pillars dude ? haha anything if so i will watch yours first,hey at least i tackled kick panels and it was well not the easiest car in the world to do.
i am researching if and what a 3 inch mid would look like on the pillar alone,no tweeter but like i said I'm still reading and looking and seeing what your going to do.lol j/k
Lance


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## expiredtags

So I pulled the trigger late last night on a couple pieces

Idmax12
PPI phantom P900.4
PPI phantom P1000.1
Rockford fosgate dual amp wiring kit
And a schosche box off amazon

Should all be here by Tuesday and installed Wednesday

Going to see how far I can push the stock comps before I go active with some real components


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## expiredtags

plcrides said:


> whatcha gonna do on those a/pillars dude ? haha anything if so i will watch yours first,hey at least i tackled kick panels and it was well not the easiest car in the world to do.
> i am researching if and what a 3 inch mid would look like on the pillar alone,no tweeter but like i said I'm still reading and looking and seeing what your going to do.lol j/k
> Lance




Don't know what I'm going to do yet

Probably going to try and fit new tweets in the sail panels when I get new comps.

We shall see

Maybe ill ask SIS to fab up some tweet mounts on the A pillars

We shall see what the future holds.


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## simplicityinsound

If ur free today late afternoon we may have a 3 way sq.build u can listen to before the customer.picks it up


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## UNFORGIVEN

[email protected] said:


> Just my .2 cents, but if you are a sound engineer you are going to want as much control as possible. I would look beyond the MS-8.
> Almost all the cars we do are active installs, stop by the shop any time if you want to talk audio....


I agree. 
From what I've learned over the years is to do your research and buy exactly what you want with headroom if possible. I've installed, uninstalled, rewired and swapped out equipment like no other each time. :surprised:
Just upgrading little things here & there will be a pain. 
OK i'm done with my morning ramble :laugh:

Take up Joey & Bing on that 3-way demo today!! 
I wish I was a bit closer to you guys (i'm here in the east bay)

Welcome to the forum!


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## tjswarbrick

Wish I was free this afternoon to give that a listen.

OP - if you haven't decided on comps yet and want to hear the Silver Flutes - let me know.


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## expiredtags

simplicityinsound said:


> If ur free today late afternoon we may have a 3 way sq.build u can listen to before the customer.picks it up


What time are they coming to pick it up?

I work until 5:30 and get into Fremont around 6:15 depending on traffic / how much I speed haha


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## simplicityinsound

hey the car is still there actually, i am on a mini vacation but will be back in the shop sunday afternoon to meet a few people and then the customer is picking it up around 2-3pm. its an all customer supplied gear vehicle but still a decent example of a 3 way active setup. if you are free sunday between noon to 130ish, let me know and i can give you a demo and a tour of the shop 

b


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## shutmdown

simplicityinsound said:


> hey the car is still there actually, i am on a mini vacation but will be back in the shop sunday afternoon to meet a few people and then the customer is picking it up around 2-3pm. its an all customer supplied gear vehicle but still a decent example of a 3 way active setup. if you are free sunday between noon to 130ish, let me know and i can give you a demo and a tour of the shop
> 
> b


Bing,
is it the accord with HAT and Zapco? If so can I stop by to listen to it too?


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## plcrides

expiredtags said:


> So I pulled the trigger late last night on a couple pieces
> 
> Idmax12
> PPI phantom P900.4
> PPI phantom P1000.1
> Rockford fosgate dual amp wiring kit
> And a schosche box off amazon
> 
> Should all be here by Tuesday and installed Wednesday
> 
> Going to see how far I can push the stock comps before I go active with some real components


haha well i did the same thing today bro,i pulled the trigger and got the phantom p900.4 from SE and it won't go out until monday because of the holiday.


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## expiredtags

simplicityinsound said:


> hey the car is still there actually, i am on a mini vacation but will be back in the shop sunday afternoon to meet a few people and then the customer is picking it up around 2-3pm. its an all customer supplied gear vehicle but still a decent example of a 3 way active setup. if you are free sunday between noon to 130ish, let me know and i can give you a demo and a tour of the shop
> 
> 
> 
> b



Oh man that would be awesome. Unfortunately I am out of town for the holiday weekend and won't be back until Sunday evening.

Hopefully I can stop by soon when I have some time away from work



plcrides said:


> haha well i did the same thing today bro,i pulled the trigger and got the phantom p900.4 from SE and it won't go out until monday because of the holiday.



The 900.4 is awesome 

I got it hooked up last night and boy do the stock speakers love it.

Sound is so clean and distortion free even at high volume. 

I especially love the small footprint of the amp it can almost go anywhere.

And the 1000.1 powers the idmax perfectly 

You won't be disappointed with the 900

I am so happy with the way the system sounds it's hard for me to imagine what adding new comps would improve but I'm excited to find out


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## plcrides

haha thats great news bro,yea when i first looked at the amp it looked average size then i scrolled down and theirs a picture with the amp and a cd beside it and i was like oh wow well glad to hear its a nice amp mine should be here next week sometime.im looking at some speakers now,can't make up my mind on which 3 inch mid to get.


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## expiredtags

Build log finally started!!!

http://www.diymobileaudio.com/forum/build-logs-project-install-gallery/165260-2011-wrx-hatch-build-log.html#post2128578


Still has a lonnnnnnnng way to go but at least for now its sounding worlds better than the factory setup.

Can't wait to do more


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