08 M3 Coupe Premium Sound BAD??

[ty50]

Im new to this forum and I guess an intermediate/novice with car audio.
I noticed some knowledgeable guys in here regarding car audio and specifically with the systems in these newer bimmers.
I'm a little puzzled because i have an 08 E92 with the $1900 option in the sound system but in my opinion it sounds like crap at best.
I'm wondering if i actually have the basic system or if there is something I'm missing here. Some people knowledgeable in sound claim the premium system actually sounds real good. Any ideas?

thanx
i bought my bimmer from the dealer however it had a thousand miles on it and a previous owner. ????

[ty50]

i apologize. i failed to simply scroll down a bit before i poted.
theres lots of info as some others dislike their systems too. my complaint is redundant.

[Technic]

Originally Posted by ty50

Im new to this forum and I guess an intermediate/novice with car audio.
I noticed some knowledgeable guys in here regarding car audio and specifically with the systems in these newer bimmers.
I'm a little puzzled because i have an 08 E92 with the $1900 option in the sound system but in my opinion it sounds like crap at best.
I'm wondering if i actually have the basic system or if there is something I'm missing here. Some people knowledgeable in sound claim the premium system actually sounds real good. Any ideas?

thanx
i bought my bimmer from the dealer however it had a thousand miles on it and a previous owner. ????

If there is an equalizer feature in your iDrive then you have the Premium Audio.

[808MGuy]

Originally Posted by ty50

Im new to this forum and I guess an intermediate/novice with car audio.
I noticed some knowledgeable guys in here regarding car audio and specifically with the systems in these newer bimmers.
I'm a little puzzled because i have an 08 E92 with the $1900 option in the sound system but in my opinion it sounds like crap at best.
I'm wondering if i actually have the basic system or if there is something I'm missing here. Some people knowledgeable in sound claim the premium system actually sounds real good. Any ideas?

thanx
i bought my bimmer from the dealer however it had a thousand miles on it and a previous owner. ????

Depends on what your definition of good and crap is.

[ty50]

thank you. yes it does have eq. perhaps im picky but some guys say theirs sounds good. mine sounds empty, lacking low end for sure among much more. i guess few agree and others seem to be happy. is there any other adjustments perhaps aside from the idrive settings? I have a handful of acceptable amps and some good speakers. I'm wondering if i could make things happen with an audiocontrol three.1 and a 4 channel pdx alpine. i have these things on the bench and would like to NOT spend another fortune on components.
any input would be appreciated thanx.

also is there two amps currently in this 08?

[808MGuy]

Originally Posted by ty50

thank you. yes it does have eq. perhaps im picky but some guys say theirs sounds good. mine sounds empty, lacking low end for sure among much more. i guess few agree and others seem to be happy. is there any other adjustments perhaps aside from the idrive settings? I have a handful of acceptable amps and some good speakers. I'm wondering if i could make things happen with an audiocontrol three.1 and a 4 channel pdx alpine. i have these things on the bench and would like to NOT spend another fortune on components.
any input would be appreciated thanx.

also is there two amps currently in this 08?

OK. Now we're getting an idea of what kind of audio person you are. Since you have that kind of equipment laying around, I assume you've had decent aftermarket systems in the past. It is not reasonable to expect the premium audio system to perform like an aftermarket one no matter how much the premium option costs. The design philosophy is just different. With that said, there are things you can do to improve on the system. Adding amps and replacing speakers on the premium audio system are well documented here. Check out Technic's install to give yourself an idea of what's involved.

http://www.m3post.com/forums/showthread.php?t=183025

The premium audio system is a little bit more difficult to upgrade than the base system because have to tap the signal after the OEM amp and you have to deal with the processing built into the system before you can input that signal into an aftermarket amp.

[Technic]

Originally Posted by ty50

thank you. yes it does have eq. perhaps im picky but some guys say theirs sounds good. mine sounds empty, lacking low end for sure among much more. i guess few agree and others seem to be happy. is there any other adjustments perhaps aside from the idrive settings? I have a handful of acceptable amps and some good speakers. I'm wondering if i could make things happen with an audiocontrol three.1 and a 4 channel pdx alpine. i have these things on the bench and would like to NOT spend another fortune on components.
any input would be appreciated thanx.

also is there two amps currently in this 08?

Only the PDX amp can help you out in the Premium Audio low end department, and only if you replace the OEM woofers by the SWS-8: https://dl.getdropbox.com/u/47031/BM...%20-%20PDF.pdf

To achieve better sound out of the Premium Audio without spending a fortune means that you have to deal with the OEM amp heavy processing and create your own. Other than that and you will be only amplifying whatever the OEM amp puts out. And when you think about it, that's exactly what you noticed that don't like about the Premium Audio.

As the link above shows, what I did was to remove first that processing with a dedicated module and then set my own EQ curve with another module... then amplify the result to the same OEM component and coaxial speakers and two SWS-8 underseat subs. I'm extremely happy with the result, and like you I used some left over equipment to acomplish this (the SWS-8, the DQXS and one of the PDX amps).

There is no need to replace the OEM 4" component and speakers, just the OEM underseat woofers.

Another option is to use a Rockford Fosgate 3SIXTY.2 processor instead of the Cleansweep/Summing modules and the Audiocontrol DQXS. That's one module instead of three...

The 3SIXTY.2 will be capable of summing the crossover'ed outputs of the OEM amp into a full signal, transform that heavy processed/EQ full signal into a flat/de-processed/de-EQ signal and then you can apply your own EQ curves to the front, rear, sub and center speakers.

One feature that this 3SIXTY.2 has that the other three modules combined do not is that you can time align the signals by distance, left to right and front to back. However, one requirement of the 3SIXTY.2 that the other three modules don't is that you need a Bluetooth-enabled PDA to set and adjust the processor features. No PDA, no adjustment possible.

So in paper, you can just get this 3SIXTY.2, a pair of SWS-8 and an extra 2-channel amp (a single four channel amp will not be enough to drive all 16 speakers, you will need at least 6 channels of amplification) and really improve your system to your liking.

I did not use that 3SIXTY.2 in my particular case just because I did use a 3SIXTY.2 years before in another system of mine and its reliability was simply poor, with two units replaced under warranty in less than a year. To be fair, that was the first year of the 3SIXTY, the third unit (it was a different version than the two replaced) is still working -AFAIK- in my old car and according to Rockford Fosgate there has been several improvements on this unit for the last 2 years. And when the sucker worked it worked great, with a impressive sound quality and clarity with its multiple adjustment capabilities.

[808MGuy]

Originally Posted by Technic

Another option is to use a Rockford Fosgate 3SIXTY.2 processor instead of the Cleansweep/Summing modules and the Audiocontrol DQXS. That's one module instead of three...

I did not use that 3SIXTY.2 in my particular case just because I did use a 3SIXTY.2 years before in another system of mine and its reliability was simply poor, with two units replaced under warranty in less than a year.

I was about to say the same thing about the reliability of the 3sixty.2. The bluetooth module has been known to take a crap on the unit which leaves you with no way to make adjustments. Because of that, the popularity of this unit has died off since it's release.

There are some other processors that are supposed to be released soon that might fit the application but nobody knows when these will actually hit the market. They are the Audison BitOne and the JBL MS-8. Both are 8 channel processors that can do speaker level input summing and DSP processing. Basically they are like the Audiocontrol DQXS with the addition of speaker level inputs, signal summing, and fully adjustable filter slopes. I had a chance to go through the manual of the Audison unit and it looks very promising but I heard the prototype models had some issues that need to be worked out before being released to the general public.

[Technic]

Originally Posted by HIS4

I was about to say the same thing about the reliability of the 3sixty.2. The bluetooth module has been known to take a crap on the unit which leaves you with no way to make adjustments. Because of that, the popularity of this unit has died off since it's release.

There are some other processors that are supposed to be released soon that might fit the application but nobody knows when these will actually hit the market. They are the Audison BitOne and the JBL MS-8. Both are 8 channel processors that can do speaker level input summing and DSP processing. Basically they are like the Audiocontrol DQXS with the addition of speaker level inputs, signal summing, and fully adjustable filter slopes. I had a chance to go through the manual of the Audison unit and it looks very promising but I heard the prototype models had some issues that need to be worked out before being released to the general public.

My second unit BT section went kaput within 3 months of use.

That MS-8 looks to me like vaporware, as it was announced 2 years ago and still is nowhere to be found. That BitOne looks like the perfect processor to the Logic7 and Premium OEM systems: http://www.caraudio-store.de/news/bitone1-0.pdf

[808MGuy]

Originally Posted by Technic

My second unit BT section went kaput within 3 months of use.

That MS-8 looks to me like vaporware, as it was announced 2 years ago and still is nowhere to be found. That BitOne looks like the perfect processor to the Logic7 and Premium OEM systems: http://www.caraudio-store.de/news/bitone1-0.pdf

One of the engineers for the MS-8 project is on one of the forums I frequent and according to him the project is still alive but they've had software issues so there's no release date in site.

[FStop7]

I don't think it's crap but IMO it does not live up to a $1900 price tag, not for an OEM system.

[Voltigeur]

Apologies in advance for the

My takeaway from the above discussion is that I should choose base sound on an E92 as it's easier to upgrade aftermarket. I'm thinking the same in going for 18s rather than 19s.

[ty50]

thank you gentlemen for the thorough reply. its greatly appreciated.
i just pulled a 3sixty.2 out of my old car so i may as well use that.

alot of this stuff I'm still learning so my next question is do you know anyone in the Phoenix area that is good at this in particular and in case i tackle this myself, i need to ask once more....i need two amps(pdx5, another 2chanel, the 2 subs, and the 3sixty.2?

thanx

[Technic]

Originally Posted by ty50

thank you gentlemen for the thorough reply. its greatly appreciated.
i just pulled a 3sixty.2 out of my old car so i may as well use that.

alot of this stuff I'm still learning so my next question is do you know anyone in the Phoenix area that is good at this in particular and in case i tackle this myself, i need to ask once more....i need two amps(pdx5, another 2chanel, the 2 subs, and the 3sixty.2?

thanx

You will have very limited choices in amps if you want to use the dedicated center speaker output of the 3SIXTY.2 to drive the OEM center speaker.

You will need at least 7 channels of amplification to keep the center channel working with the 3SIXTY.2. If you are not that interested in using that center speaker then a single PDX-5 is all you need to drive the front and rear OEM speakers (the rear 4 speakers have to be connected in parallel into two 2-ohm channels) and a pair of SWS-8 in parallel as well.

Because you have a 4 channel PDX already (either the 4.100 or the 4.150) you could also get an extra 2.150 and drive both SWS-8 in stereo with this amp using the center speaker output with the subwoofer output of the 3SIXTY.2 together as left and right low pass outputs. The other 4 channel PDX can be used to drive the front and rear OEM speakers.

[ty50]

ive been out of town and had to let this stuff go till now but im resuming my quest.

what did Voltiguer mean?

anyway, ur obviously knowledgeable and seemingly generous with info.

I'll try not to be redundant with questions as I value ur imput as well as everyones.

for now I'm in good shape but may have some more questions in near future. thanx.

oh, is a simple upgrade to the sw8 subs alone enough to make some difference? I figured I'd start there if so.

[Technic]

Originally Posted by ty50

ive been out of town and had to let this stuff go till now but im resuming my quest.

what did Voltiguer mean?

anyway, ur obviously knowledgeable and seemingly generous with info.

I'll try not to be redundant with questions as I value ur imput as well as everyones.

for now I'm in good shape but may have some more questions in near future. thanx.

oh, is a simple upgrade to the sw8 subs alone enough to make some difference? I figured I'd start there if so.

As found out here... http://www.m3post.com/forums/showpos...3&postcount=43 ... just swapping the Premium underseat woofers with SWS-8 cannot be safely done as the OEM impedance is 7 ohms and the SWS-8 are 4 ohms. So swapping those woofers will cause the OEM amp to eventually overheat if high volume/punding bass is sustained for a considerable time, which could cause internal damage to the amp.

What can be done is to add a separate amp to the SWS-8 once swapped, that way the OEM amp will not be abused and the bass improvement will be remarkable.

[ty50]

thanx again for the data. i appreciate your time.
very helpful stuff.

[dcstep]

Amazing. PencilGeek and I have almost the exact same settings.

I think most people will be pretty happy just using PG's EQ settings. I'm a pretty serious audiophile with my home system where I've got over $30,000 invested, but getting too carried away in the car just doesn't make sense to me with the Active Autowerke exhaust and V8 roaring most of the time. I just set the system so that vocals and orchestra sound natural, then everything else just works out fine.

My partner has a Mercedes AMG 55CLS. Talk about a stereo that sucks...

Dave