First off, Hello all! I'm very excited to have found this site, and will probably be on often.

I own a '03 SE7 that is bone stock for now. I am looking to upgrade the stereo as I am completely unhappy with the stock one. That brings me to my question though, should the stock system with the component sets in the front and rear doors along with the sub in the back door sound good? Mine sounds worst then my old stock system in my '95 nissan pickup, and that thing was junk! I have done several full blown installs in my day, and am about to say #@&#^ it! and yank all of the stereo out and start from scratch. My only hold up is money and that I don't want to change the dash, so no aftermarket headunit. What are my current spec's on the radio. I don't think I have the Harmon/Kardon system, as it doesn't have their logo anywhere, and again the stock system is not anything to be impressed with. My fiance even complains that there is no "bump" and she usually doesn't even listen to the radio.

Please let me know if there might be something I need to fix, or test, as I'm not scared to start taking this thing apart, I just don't know what I'm looking for

I look forward to contributing as much as I can to the webpage.

Take care for now,

skrach77

 

Welcome to the forum.
The first thing is to pull the head unit and see if you have
pre amp outs that way you can plan your next move.
Or just up grade the speakers for now with one you can use
when you get more power.
You may find the old speakers blown.

 

check all your wires before you just go pulling stuff out. My factory system was pretty badass. I did replace all the spkrs/subs. But it has a nice lil thump to it.

 

My stereo sounds great, except for the low notes. There is almost no bass output whatsoever. I pulled the cover off the rear door last night and the two woofers(paper cones with foam surrounds) were everything but impressive. I didn't find anything wrong with them, so now I'm wondering if me amp is messed up....

I'll keep you updated as I find stuff.

later,
skrach

 

First off you don’t have to change your dash if you don’t have too, I installed a custom system in my Rover, and it Rocks!!! As for the speakers, it took me a while but I was able to find some speakers that work great for Rovers and they seem to match up pretty well. Alumapro speakers is what I installed in my Rover. http://www.alumapro.com/homepage.htm

Although you don’t have to change anything in the doors or even the tweeters, you do have to run the wiring for the crossovers. I had no problem installing these speakers and they sound great. The reason I went with Alumapro was mainly because it was the only speaker system that I found that would match up with the depth of the door area, and came with the teeters.

You mentioned that you don’t have a lot of money to spend on your system, and yes these speakers are a bit steep, but well worth the money if you ask me.

Not to brag at all, but I spent around $5,000 on my system and it was all custom done and installed. Even the deck did not require any thing too drastic.

I hope this helps just a little.