I'm frustrated with car audio

[mach999 10+ year member]

I'm not talking about this forum but the industry as a whole. I'm trying to find an amp and I went to the only two local shops besides Best Buy and Circuit City. One is a very reputable shop but after feeling pretty good about what the owner was telling me he tried to sell me a Sony Xplod amp. He said he could let me have it for around $225. I've seen it online for as low as $115. From what I know of Sony's home audio, I will stay away from this brand. The other store I went to sells Memphis Audio and I was curious about the price of their budget 4-ch amp. The salesman was extremely young and was literally reading off of index cards. Another salesman had to explain to him that the "4" on a 50x4 amp meant 4 channels. Am I expecting too much by assuming that those who sell car audio equipment should have more knowledge of the equipment and industry than me?

Way off topic but what should I expect to pay for the Memphis PR100.4? The guys at that shop didn't have a clue what they sold it for.

Sorry for the rant.

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[maldecido33 10+ year member]

order on-line

 

[flakko 5,000+ posts]

seriously, i ask what the RMS is on the OZ ME and the kid asks for his manager...

 

[mach999 10+ year member]

order on-line

I was thinking that but the only place I can find that sells authorized equipment is Crutchfield and I wanted to get a better deal than that. Also I won't be installing the equipment so I'm going to have to use one of these stores no matter what.

 

[mach999 10+ year member]

How hard is it to install an amp? I can obviously get the best prices online and I would like to get some hands on learning by installing the amp but I'm a little skeptical of doing it myself.

 

[Prowler573 5,000+ posts]

How hard is it to install an amp? I can obviously get the best prices online and I would like to get some hands on learning by installing the amp but I'm a little skeptical of doing it myself.

The most difficult portion (to me) of an amp install is routing the cabling. (Power cable from battery to wherever the amp is located, finding a suitable grounding position, running interconnects and remote activation leads from the rear of the head unit to the amp, etc etc)

Once all the cabling is run it's pretty much gravy, really. But then - I've installed an amp or three at this point so it's sortof second nature to me now...

 

[LoudCrownVic 5,000+ posts]

I love going to shops where people work on this stuff for a living and know more about their equipment than they do, find faults in their audio theories, and bullshit with the experienced installers about systems that I've/they've had in the past. It's kina sad that you can find it all online for like 1/2 the cost //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/frown.gif.a3531fa0534503350665a1e957861287.gif

 

[smd4life 5,000+ posts]

frustration comes with inexpierience, no offence, but as time goes on you'll learn more and they'll be less problems for instance, it becoming second nature to prowler means it's no longer that hard for him

 

[MBrock4u 10+ year member]

Sorry your having such bad luck out there. I am lucky that I live very close to a major city, and have access to good car audio shops. I was in Circuit City some time ago to look and some stuff and the guy who tried to help me was clueless. I mentioned a couple of things to him and he was like duhhh... should have been a stock boy, lol. I try to combine all the avenues I have to make sound decsions. The forum has been REALLY helpful. It cost too much money to make foolish mistakes. I have found a few shops around here with people that have been very helpful with some excellent knowledge who didn't try to talk over my head or down to me. Good luck in your quest.

 

[EXD 10+ year member]

Well, if I only bought stuff from ppl that knows more than me about the product I would have a hard time buying stuff. Well, it might be car audio that I don't break our local shop here were I live, the store manager is some kind of freak with 136 (yes one hundred thirty-six) 12" subs in his van... I tell you guys this guy is sick //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/wink.gif.608e3ea05f1a9f98611af0861652f8fb.gif

Anyhow, I would buy it online, as I do most of the time, even thou I live in Sweden. Installing isn't hard, not compared to what I'm used to install..

 

[preacher 10+ year member]

Most shops that I've been to are extremely irritated that you would cut their profit margins by purchasing elsewhere and won't give you their best. I can kind of understand that with so many buying garbage online and expecting them to make it sound good. Imagine some punk buying xplodes off the net for 20 bucks and throwing them at the installer and then being irritated when they don't sound as good as his buddy's JL system?

These guys are in it to make money and its hard to take time to remember the enthusiasts they used to be. Not only that the subculture is corrupt. Why is the industry stagnant. Why do we still mount headunits upfront instead of Just controllers. Unbalanced cable runs is a backwards approach considering the tech available and so cheap. $$$ you can charge more. (DA converters?; Firewire?)

Most specialty shops are conditioned to deal with idiots who should put their opinions down and trust the shop. They are too busy and not used to finding someone who knows something. Enough of my nonsense. I get frustrated too.

 

[JohnnyChuttz 10+ year member]

I went to two shops today to look for Battery terminals. 1) Audio Source, only had one on the shelf. It was a JL, only had 1 4ga in and 1 8ga in, Not what I needed. The guy said he would check in the back, came back and said they used a big wiring kit this week and thought there might be one or two laying around and he was going to give them to me! But No luck, Audio Souce FTW!

2)Audio Connection, I asked the young salesman if they had any Batt. Terminals. He looked puzzled. He lloked at several wiring kits and said "Oh a distro Block?" No, I ppointed to a lightning audio kit that had one in it, and said like this. He said " No we dont have any by themselves, but go check out Autozone they have would have one just to hook your battery up!