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My 981 Stereo Upgrade

118K views 212 replies 66 participants last post by  Muu 
#1 ·
It turns out that my salesguy forgot to order me the Bose upgrade which-- even though it may not sound great-- is actually quite a deal for $700 as the standard system is only 50 watts in total (25 x 2) and uses cheap paper cone speakers.

So I went to a highly recommended guy here in Manhattan and he replaced the door speakers and dash tweeters with a Morel Elate 903 three-way component system (8"+ woofers) and installed an Alpine PDX-F6 600-watt amp (4 x 150) up against the front firewall, and now with a decent source the system sounds incredible without needing a sub-woofer (and is so capable that it makes horribly over-compressed satellite radio sound even worse than it does on a cheap system, lol). The only thing I didn't do was put in rear speakers using the grills behind the seats, but as the seats block those grills and muffle the sound anyway, I didn't think it was worth it or necessary.

It wound up costing me a lot of dough (around $3500 all-in, including an excellent installation job) but for the quality of the top-down sound it was well worth it. (Yes, the engine note sounds great but on a road trip I love listening to great tunes.)

So if you're thinking about upgrading your system, this is a great way to do it at a bit over half the price of a Burmeister (and it probably sounds better than a Burmeister), and due to the woofers in the Morels you won't even need a sub-woofer.
 
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#3 · (Edited)
I beg your forgiveness for my worthlessness. The first photo is of the amp against the firewall, the second is of the stock paper cone speakers and the third is of the Morels. (The Morel tweeters are in the dash replacing the stock ones. In all of my worthlessness, I once again humbly beg your forgiveness for not having photos of those.) Also, there's an output converter under the passenger seat. Again, please forgive the lack of a photo.
 
#6 ·
My only gripe with this install is -- why didn't you mount the amp in the middle??? You're ruining the balance of the car
No, this was intentional, as the six-pound weight of the amp is countered by adjusting the balance to pump a bit more volume through the speakers on the passenger side.
 
#100 ·
No way the BOSE system is incredible. HAHAHA I can't believe I bought a car, haven't seen it in person, haven't heard the BOSE system, yet I know that I just HAVE to tear the entire thing out of the car. -HU In all honesty I have never heard such horrible reviews of a car audio system. It's quite sad, either Porsche has an incredible financial situation with BOSE or it is their way of trying to short squeeze you into the Burmester!

My 2cents
 
#9 ·
Excellent choice on the Morels. They are one of (if not the) best three way component systems out there. Focal makes a nice set too but they are almost two grand on a good day. I bet that thing really screams now! On a side note, I am surprised by how big the side airbag modules are. Holy smokes!
 
#10 ·
Excellent choice on the Morels. They are one of (if not the) best three way component systems out there. Focal makes a nice set too but they are almost two grand on a good day.
Thanks, as I really had to trust a few hours of on-line research and the installer on this. By the way, although he sold them to me for $1875, the cheapest on-line price for this model appears to be $2300, so they're also in that $2000 or so range.
 
#11 ·
Fantastic installation
I bet they sound way better then anything porsche could install

I have the Bose and find them lacking in volume with your setup that would not be a problem

I had the three way focals in my 986 with MTX amp and it didn't lack in volume but did lack in bass I might go and have a look at a set like yours
 
#12 ·
I agreed with you that the BOSE option on the Boxster S is one of the best value there is for the money (beside the sport design steering wheel and the fire extinguisher :) ).

But your awesome Morel Elate 903 will make any stereo sound better as the most important part of a stereo system is the speakers ... and that Alpine PDX-F6 600 = NICEEEEE!

Very cool!
 
#13 ·
Wow, thanks for the kind words. This experience was sort of like buying the car itself, in that somehow my "bare bones car" wound up with $12,000 of options. I'd always heard that you can get a much better aftermarket stereo for the same or less money as the car's manufacturer charges, so not having the Bose I figured I'd get even BETTER sound for my $700. Well, whoever said that probably hasn't installed a car stereo system lately, lol.

By the way, I also installed a Laser Interceptor, mostly because the whole concept of it seemed really cool to me, lol.
 
#17 ·
None, in the mere hour or so I had to play with it. (I had to fly out of town for a few days but will have a lot more time with it this weekend.) However, I do have the simplest PCM system, with no navigation and no USB input. On the other hand, I'm not sure why tapping the output from the head unit could be a problem-- after all, once that signal leaves the head does it monitor what happens to it?
 
#18 ·
It wound up costing me a lot of dough (around $3500 all-in, including an excellent installation job) but for the quality of the top-down sound it was well worth it. (Yes, the engine note sounds great but on a road trip I love listening to great tunes.)
Wow, did they provide the lube or did you have do provide your own?

At least I'm hoping they lubed you up before raping you! :eek:

Just kidding, but I did my own install / upgrade for 1/2 that price. Granted it was slightly different. I added a headunit & amp, vs your speakers + amp. But I would think the actual parts probably cost about the same.
 
#19 ·
Wow, did they provide the lube or did you have do provide your own?
Well, I know the parts were priced fairly as I paid $1875 for the speakers and the Internet prices are $2200 to $2400, and I paid $575 for the amp and the internet prices run from $425 (at Amazon) to as high as $750 (at Crutchfield), so that's $2500 right there. The rest was labor, the various wiring harnesses, the output converter and NYC sales tax.

The real question is whether or not I could have gotten nearly equivalent sound for considerably less money... That I don't know.
 
#21 ·
IMHO, the problem doesn't lie with those prices, it lies with the SA who "forgot" a $700 option that you may have found quite satisfactory, leaving you to fork over an additional $2800 for a different choice.
 
#24 ·
No processor-- just the two-channel output converter.

I've now had a full weekend to listen to and play with this system, and here are my conclusions:

1) Parked with the roof up it sounds really AWESOME.

2) Parked with the roof down it sounds very good.

3) Driving on the highway at 70 mph with the roof down it sounds just "mediocre" (as opposed to the stock system which-- in those circumstances-- sounded AWFUL).

Apparently it's really hard (or costs a lot more than I spent) to make a stereo sound really awesome in a convertible with the roof down at 70 mph.

The caveat is that I need to spend some more time tweaking the gain and high-pass/low-pass controls on the amp. Right now both channels (one feeding the woofers and one feeding the midrange & tweeters) have the gain set at 50% and the filter crossover set at 60 hz. I'm wondering if I should play around with those settings with the roof down and see if I can optimize the sound a bit more. In fact, if anyone has any suggestions re. this I'm all ears. I think my biggest complaint is that with the roof down the non-bass notes sound a bit metallic/harsh, but this could also be because the speakers need some hours of break-in (just like the car, lol).
 
#31 ·
Ok so if you spend $1875 for speakers alone that price isn't horrible like I thought. It's ok.

You may want to raise the low pass filter from 60 to something more like 100 or 120hz. <100hz is mostly inaudible anyway.

You need big dedicated subwoofers for <100hz in my experience.

My front (dash & small door speakers) & rear pillar speakers set to cut off below 120Hz.

Then the large door woofers and footwell sub are used as woofers for the low range.
 
#32 ·
You may want to raise the low pass filter from 60 to something more like 100 or 120hz. <100hz is mostly inaudible anyway.

You need big dedicated subwoofers for <100hz in my experience.

My front (dash & small door speakers) & rear pillar speakers set to cut off below 120Hz.

Then the large door woofers and footwell sub are used as woofers for the low range.
Thanks... I've been reading up on this on-line (and just re-read the Alpine instruction sheet) and apparently if you're using the amp with a set of full-range speakers and no subwoofer, you're actually supposed to switch both the HF and LF filters on the amp to "off," so I'm excited to try that when I get the car out again on Saturday.
 
#33 ·
Generally the filters are high-pass and low-pass, not high freq and low freq. This matters because they work opposite of what'd you think if you call them by the wrong name.

A low pass filter will allow frequencies below what you specify to come through - you'd use this for a sub or a large woofer to keep the highs out. A high pass works the opposite, keeping the lows out of your tweeters (or the rest of your system if you have a sub).

Does anyone know the deal with the speaker grilles behind the seats? What size they are (I know they're empty on the base stereo)? It'd be real cool if a pair of 6 3/4" or even 8" subs could fit in there. Would get decent bass and a clean install.
 
#34 ·
Generally the filters are high-pass and low-pass, not high freq and low freq. This matters because they work opposite of what'd you think if you call them by the wrong name.
Yes, thanks-- I did mean to say it your way. I actually spoke with Morel and they also told me to set both filters to the "off" position if I'm not using a sub-woofer. As I think it through, this makes sense because the (nearly) 9" woofers in the Morels were fed two amp channels that I was cutting off above 60HZ while the mid-range crossover doesn't kick in until 300HZ. Therefore, I was missing out on ALL of the mid-bass frequencies from 60 to 300 that I should have been letting through to the woofers. I haven't had a chance to get back in the car yet but I will this Saturday and I assume that when I switch off those filters the system should sound great.
 
#43 ·
"But your awesome Morel Elate 903 will make any stereo sound better as the most important part of a stereo system is the speakers ..."

A common misconception, the most important part of an audio system is the front end and then tailor the system downstream. The media is key (WAV files are far better than anything else) and processed through a capable head unit gives you a good starting point, the preamplifier section is next, and so on..

Having been into high end audio my entire life I've seen and heard it all; I would much rather have a high end turntable or CD in a modest system than have a cheap front end feeding high end speakers. You can't fix lousy downstream, the musical qualities are preserved and delivered to the system from the front end. Garbage in, garbage out.

Finally, do keep in mind it is a system and synergy goes a long way, some components simply sound better together. And no, I'm sure not referring to Bose!!!!
 
#45 ·
The system in my tagline will embarrass a Bose system and is quite reasonably priced. Mind you, your friends will be more impressed with the Bose moniker due to extremely effective marketing from the good folks at Bose, "it's the best". Fact is Bose is lo-fi priced as a premium system, you can do much better at a reasonable cost. :banana:
 
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#46 ·
Actually most are not impressed with Bose like most are not with monster. However, it is better than standard and given its the only factory option available. Its like a home, only money and ideas stop what you can do.
 
#47 ·
I replaced just the head unit & amps on my 987 system, but left the Bose speakers in.

I also polyfilled the sub enclosure, and tweaks the crossover points, etc. very finely. But people are all amazed at the sound quality with the stock Bose speakers. (which most of them all have the same speakers, just stock headunits & amps)
 
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#52 ·
Question: you have a 4 channel amp and 6 drivers; how does that work? Are you running 2 channels to power the woofers and the other 2 channels split between the mids and tweeters or are you running the amp bridged so it is effectively 2 channels, one for each side powering all three drivers on each side? Why not just use a 2 channel amp? Sorry if the answer is somewhere in the thread and I just missed it.
 
#53 · (Edited)
You nailed it the first time: it's a bi-amp set-up, whereby two channels power the woofers and the other two channels power the mid-ranges and tweeters. [Edit: I originally wrote one channel powers each.]

Now that I've lived with the system for a while (and finally got it set up right by switching off the filters on the amp) I'm VERY happy with it. I had a chance to compare it back to back (using a great "sound test" CD-- Bowie/Queen doing "Under Pressure") with a friend's Bose in a new Cayman and while his sounded "fuller" (due to the rear speakers and perhaps the sub-woofers) mine sounded MUCH "cleaner." As he pointed out, if I added a sub woofer to mine (and perhaps a couple of high quality rear speakers) it would probably sound like a concert hall. Although I haven't heard the Bermester, I see that Porsche is now charging $6730 for it, and I suspect (based on what I've read) that it probably sounds even better than my current system (for almost 2x the price, though). If it had been available when I ordered my car, I might have even gotten it-- that's how much I enjoy a good sound system and hard it is to accomplish that in a top-down car.
 
#59 ·
Many thanks to Logicalthought for the info provided. I went to a local audio shop with some experiences upgrading Porsches, and was recommended the following setup:

Option A: (USD 1,000)
- Upgrade dash tweeters and door speakers with Morel's Hybrid Integra, and add a Local made Amp (2 channels)

Option B: (USD 1,600)
- Upgrade the tweeters and door speakers, and woofers (forgot to ask which speakers he will use)
- add Amps (4 channels) if I also add the woofers


- Install amp at base of the front trunk

He mentioned that there seems to be no suitable place to add the subwoofer, unless I let he cut a hole in the back, which I am reluctant to do. Any ideas or suggestions?
 
#70 ·
I consider the base system as being the flat six behind me.;)

It goes downhill when I turn on the base audio system, then one has to pay several hundred more to improve that to questionable sound and then a few thousand more to get to the Burmeister which I admit I have never heard.

In any case PSE with SC beats them all!:cheers:
 
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#61 ·
Well, the installation was done on Friday.

Shop that carried Focal told me that there will not be enough space to fit the Focal speakers, so only choice was Morel.

Instead of choosing Morel Elate, I went with Virtus which is probably not as good as the Elate series, but price was more acceptable. Instead of 8 inch woofers, Virtus came with 6 inch woofers ( 2 tweeters, 2 mid range, 2 woofers).

The shop recommended a 4 channel ( 4 x 75 W) local brand amp and installed in the front and put a carpeted wooden cover on top.

It sounded definitely better than the original speakers (2 tweeters and 2 door speakers), but I found that I had to tune down the treble to -1 and base to +3, and turn on loudness in order to get the sound that I prefer.

Here are some photos for reference:
 
#64 · (Edited)
Well, the installation was done on Friday.... Instead of 8 inch woofers, Virtus came with 6 inch woofers ( 2 tweeters, 2 mid range, 2 woofers).

The shop recommended a 4 channel ( 4 x 75 W) local brand amp and installed in the front and put a carpeted wooden cover on top.

It sounded definitely better than the original speakers (2 tweeters and 2 door speakers), but I found that I had to tune down the treble to -1 and base to +3, and turn on loudness in order to get the sound that I prefer...
The difference is the 6" vs. the 8" woofers. The guys who did my installation told me that with anything smaller than 8" I'd probably need a sub-woofer to get decent bass, so that's why I went with the 8-inchers. Re. your amp: Isn't the shop concerned that it might overheat if it's on the floor and covered like that? I think that's why my guys put it on the firewall, so it would be able to breathe a little even if I have luggage in the car.
 
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