So I went to my local shop today.

[i2ain2thunder 10+ year member]

I would be pissed. We DMM, scope and/or RTA a car before it leaves. You get what you pay for i guess.
So when u say they switched from active to passive xovers, r u saying they connected passive xovers up instead of leaving it active?

Not to mention most car speakers downfalls are their ability to reproduce midrange frequencies without a dedicated midrange speaker, typically boosting these frequencies will lend to poor performance in the higher registers.

Nope, I meant they passed all the active filters on the HU, and just used the Passives built into the amps.

 

[i2ain2thunder 10+ year member]

I found this, and thought I'd share.

http://audio.tutsplus.com/tutorials/mixing-mastering/8-easy-steps-to-better-eq/

This had some really useful information for me. Also helps to reaffirm some of the things I thought to be true, like how it is more important to cut, and EQ should still remain relatively flat whether you are cutting, or boosting. It makes sense that you would want to raise in a wide Q and cut in a narrow Q, so as not to raise one spot to a steep higher point then everything else. I suppose the peaks in an area are generally narrower so you would want to cut it down sharply to blend it in, and if something is too low you would want to raise it up, but while blending it into the rest of the spectrum with a wider Q.

 

[calebkhill 10+ year member]

Tuning is a long process. I've been tuning mine since I put it in.

Sometimes it means swapping drivers, speaker locations, amps, etc.

The secret is research, and experiment.

 

[whitedragon551 5,000+ posts]

Its never right to boost frequencies. It introduces clipping into that area. You should always cut. Second your subs should never play up to 120Hz. Thats midbass.

 

[DARKHART 10+ year member]

Nope, I meant they passed all the active filters on the HU, and just used the Passives built into the amps.

You are still running active, amps don't have passive crossovers, they're all active. As was stated earlier you don't have to use a scope to tune a vehicle, especially if you've been doing it for a very long time and most shops no matter if they are high end or not are not going to use a scope to set up the average install. You take a installer that's been using a particular brand of equipment both amps and headunits and I assure you that if they are worth their salt can setup a install without any scope or dmm.

I don't know many shops that will tune a vehicle for only $27.00 either, that's gonna take a lil bit of time and I don't see $27.00 covering the time at least not my time....

 

[i2ain2thunder 10+ year member]

I"ll admit they know how to make a system that will not fail, they set everything conservativly. But I'm not looking for conservative, I want the max I can get without clipping/distortion.

Also if they are so experienced, I would think they would know cutting is a better method than boosting on an EQ, or at least the general idea that it is better to boost wide and cut narrow.

 

[calebkhill 10+ year member]

I"ll admit they know how to make a system that will not fail, they set everything conservativly. But I'm not looking for conservative, I want the max I can get without clipping/distortion.
Also if they are so experienced, I would think they would know cutting is a better method than boosting on an EQ, or at least the general idea that it is better to boost wide and cut narrow.

You just need to learn a little more.

 

[J31Rob 5,000+ posts]

This post gave me cancer.

 

[J31Rob 5,000+ posts]

I'll go ahead and give my 2 cents.. if you know what they did wrong and you hate the job they did then learn to fix it yourself. You're here already. Quit making crybaby posts and do some research instead.

 

[black05alti]

I'll go ahead and give my 2 cents.. if you know what they did wrong and you hate the job they did then learn to fix it yourself. You're here already. Quit making crybaby posts and do some research instead.

I gotta agree that it'd be best to do it yourself since you're already on a forum

 

[i2ain2thunder 10+ year member]

You just need to learn a little more.

like? teach me

 

[i2ain2thunder 10+ year member]

I'll go ahead and give my 2 cents.. if you know what they did wrong and you hate the job they did then learn to fix it yourself. You're here already. Quit making crybaby posts and do some research instead.

obviously i did some research, yes the point of this thread was to complain. **** happens, if you're not happy with a product or service, it is good to let others know, and I did fix it myself. So you need to research the thread more, maybe the cancer is slowing you down.

 

[kmanian 5,000+ posts]

Honestly, I set SQ systems by ear 99% of the time. but I highly doubt they have hit the mark with what you have described. I would also say that what you have said your settings were must have sounded on the heavy side of crappy also.

Just saying.

 

[i2ain2thunder 10+ year member]

You are still running active, amps don't have passive crossovers, they're all active. As was stated earlier you don't have to use a scope to tune a vehicle, especially if you've been doing it for a very long time and most shops no matter if they are high end or not are not going to use a scope to set up the average install. You take a installer that's been using a particular brand of equipment both amps and headunits and I assure you that if they are worth their salt can setup a install without any scope or dmm.I don't know many shops that will tune a vehicle for only $27.00 either, that's gonna take a lil bit of time and I don't see $27.00 covering the time at least not my time....

Hadn't heard that in all my research I've done so far. Most of the time when read about active crossovers, it has been explained as being a preamplification filter that requires a power source. I guess I mistook preamplification to mean prior to reaching the amplifier? I understand you can tune a vehicle any way you want. You can tune by ear all you want, an oscope is going to tell you for sure how much clipping/distortion there really is. I also totally agree that installer that has been doing this for years is probably experienced enough to do things by ear, just saying this shop didn't do a very good job by ear in my opinion. I did think 27$ was rather cheap, so since it was i figured heck why not try it. I just thought shops would do things a little bit more technically I guess.

 

[DARKHART 10+ year member]

an oscope is going to tell you for sure how much clipping/distortion there really is. I just thought shops would do things a little bit more technically I guess.

I agree, and me personally, I like to use a scope to set the deck and amp to where they both clip at the same time which is the way it's supposed to be done, simply matching the output of the deck to the input of the amp so as they work in unison but I know a lot of people on most forums set their amps gain control to were the amp puts out x amount of power.