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Quality?? and other basic questions

thunderkyss

Full Member
Joined
Jan 30, 2014
Messages
15
First question I have is what kind of specs are you looking at to determine the quality of the head unit you are looking for? For instance, the stock am/fm tuner in my Avalanche won't pick up AM stations from Houston but the tuner in my wife's Grand Cherokee will. We're 90 some miles away, so I assume the tuner in her truck is more sensitive than mine.

In the new unit that I buy, I'd like to get the best AM tuner possible, how do I find out what that is?

Secondly, what are the specs on the factory stereo? Am I "upgrading" if I buy a unit with 50 Watt max output & 22 Watt RMS?

Third, some of the units I've looked at have RCA outs, one front one rear/sub. Is this the same signal coming out of the wires labeled "front left, front right, rear left, rear right" but in a different format? The output to the individual channels are only labeled as "50 Watt max 20 Watt RMS" where the RCA outs are described as 2.5V  I thought line out was supposed to be either 4V or 10V

 
Your ability to pick up AM (or any radio frequency) is more about the antenna. The tuner simply looks at frequencies that the antenna reads. So one head unit will not be better than another at picking up AM radio. There are aftermarket signal boosters available, but I cannot speak to their effectiveness.

Without knowing what year Av you have, whether or not you have Bose, etc its hard to answer questions. In general though, a quality name brand head unit would likely be an upgrade.

RCA outs are used to send signals to amplifiers. All head units have standard LF, RF, LR, RR +/- two wire feeds as well. Again without knowing your truck's info, it's hard to give you more info. If you have a 2003 or newer, special adapters are required to make aftermarket head units work.

 
Snyder80 said:
Your ability to pick up AM (or any radio frequency) is more about the antenna. The tuner simply looks at frequencies that the antenna reads. So one head unit will not be better than another at picking up AM radio. There are aftermarket signal boosters available, but I cannot speak to their effectiveness.

Thank you. I have heard this before. I'll do more research.

Snyder80 said:
Without knowing what year Av you have, whether or not you have Bose, etc its hard to answer questions. In general though, a quality name brand head unit would likely be an upgrade.

Is that because AC/Delco puts out junk?

After doing more internet research last night, I figure most of the upgrading I want to do is about features, I want to add bluetooth, I want to read MP3/WMA/OGG, etc, I would like an SD Card slot, things like that.

But looking at one manufacturer, then another, if I'm looking for better quality do I just use price as the standard? The more expensive unit will be the better quality unit? That don't sound right.

If I stick to "known" brands (Clarion, Pioneer, Kenwood, JVC, Sony) is it then a matter of preference?

Snyder80 said:
RCA outs are used to send signals to amplifiers. All head units have standard LF, RF, LR, RR +/- two wire feeds as well. Again without knowing your truck's info, it's hard to give you more info. If you have a 2003 or newer, special adapters are required to make aftermarket head units work.

So to answer my question, the speaker out & the RCA outs carry the same information, just different formats. So whether I use the speaker out, or the RCA outs the fade & balance info will be the same.

Is there a situation where I would want to use both?
 
A few notes.. As to Brand... Go to a big box store or a few and try them out... Different units have had different quality builds and different types of accessories at different times. It really is a matter of user preference. And some brands have entry level head units and pro series units and others are all entry level and others may only have higher end stuff..

Used to be you could go with something like Alpine and always know you had good quality.

ACDelco is the same way. Some head units are better than others. Some of the GM stuff is junk and some is pretty good. Generally just depends on the intended audience. If you are sitting in a work truck with a cheap AM/FM deck and cheap speakers then it obviously is not going to be the same quality as a full blown Nav system installed in an Escalade.

Specs of the factory radio should have nothing to do with your choice of new stereo. If you are using the factory speakers you will find you will easily over drive them with most any aftermarket head unit. You are better off upgrading your speakers the same time you do the head unit. You should also make sure your truck doesn't have an external factory amplifier if you plan to reuse the factory wiring. (BOSE equipped trucks have an amplifier and subwoofer in the console.)

As to outputs... A high level or speaker level output is driven by an onboard amplifier and is what the rating on the head unit normally is talking about. Low level outputs or RCA's are generally signals before the amplifier built into the head unit so they generally have much cleaner sound. If you are using an external amplifier they generally have a cleaner output than the head unit amplifier so you want to use the RCA outputs.

Now about the RCA outputs... Last time I looked the highest output for the RCA's was 6 volts... What happens with the voltage is they figured out a while ago that the higher the lower level output the cleaner the end sound is. The idea is that if the voltage is higher then it is harder to pick up RF noise from the environment. With a lower voltage output any noise picked up will be closer to the full volume of the output and will be much more noticeable. 2.5 Volts IS respectable but better units will be 4 or more volts.  Much lower than 2 volts and you start hearing some of the RF noise it can pick up. The BEST RCA cables I have used were twisted pair wires. The idea with twisted pair wires is that the same noise gets picked up in both wires so it cancels out the noise. Simply taking two good quality stranded 14, 16 or 18 gauge wires and twisting them with a drill and using good quality connectors is better than some of the most expensive shielded RCA's.

Now I have seen radios with just 2 RCA's with one configuration being all of the audio and another being just the sub woofer output...  Problem with a 2 RCA output if full range is you have to use a cross over and since there are only two channels you loose the front/rear fade option. With a 2 RCA output that is just for subwoofers allows you to use a clean signal to run your subs on an external amplifier but then you are limited on your power to the non subs. You CAN pull the amplified or "High level" audio from the head unit but this is amplified by the somewhat noisy head unit amplifier first then you are going to try amplifying it again.

4 RCA outputs generally are just front and rear outputs. If you want to run subs you then have to run a cross over on the front or rear and then the subs are tied to that pair of speakers so if you adjust the front or rear fade controls it also affects the sub woofer.

The most flexible output from a head unit is 6 RCA outputs which allows you to run front, rear and a sub. This allows you to run without a cross over and still gives you front to rear fade.

So when you look for an upgrade you really need to decide what you want to do and do the whole upgrade at once... Are you OK with the normally whimpy head unit wattage or do you want to go with an external amplifier for all of your channels? Are you going to go with the head unit power and a self powered sub like a Bazooka tube or are you going to go flat out with a full system. You really need to figure out where you are going to end up so you don't keep upgrading the same equipment over and over. No one item should be the reason why you chose something.. Look at the over all picture and try playing with the unit at a local store before buying it.

Rodney
 
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