Dan J.

Hi,

Yes, the L-shaped connector is routed to the amp, which is under the passenger seat for those cars that had it as an option. Maybe whoever installed your system just avoided the amp. I think the easy way out for my situation is to not use that factory amp and just wire directly from the new head unit to the speakers. I'd rather incorporate the amp if possible though.

Thanks,
Dan.

user 783003

I'm doing the same thing today. Same Alpine Head Unit too. Difference is, I didn't buy the special cable. Now I need to know what to do about that "Amp Wake Cable." What is that anyway? I've cut open the amp harness and have (so far) soldered and heat shrinked the 4 RCA cables to the center conducter of the yellow, green, white and brown coaxial cables coming from the amp and have soldered the commons together. Now I have the red and blue cables left and the shield. Where do these connect on the head unit? I'm assuming the shield should connect to ground on the HU as it was in the stock HU. What about the red and blue coming from the amp? One of those must be connected to the "Amp Wake?"

Thanks in advance.

deep_uv

The factory amp requires 12v switched to turn on the amp. The blue amp wake cable supplies 12v to the amp when the ignition is on. Not sure which wire on the amp it is as in my installation it's connected through the custom amp cable I bought. Hope that helps.

user 783003

I got it. It was the red wire in the cable to the amp that I connected to the blue wire from the HU harness. I'll post my amp cable findings later.

On another note, how did the alpine bezel work for you? Mine didn't fit very well and then it cracked. Otherwise, I am very pleased. The sound is so much better than before. I was beginning to doubt that the Infinity's and MB Quarts I installed this winter were lousy.

Thanks for the write-up. I even used the ashtray lamp suggestion. Just wish I had bought the cable harness. Going back to stock will be very difficult now.

deep_uv

Hi, I didn't have any major problems with the bezel, I think I remember having to fiddle with it a bit, though. Glad the writeup helped!

user 783003

First of all, if you're going to do something like this, I'd recommend buying the harness listed in this thread.

If you insist on cutting the harness, here's what I found. I did this last year, so I may have gotten it wrong, but my notes were still in my file.

raspberryroadster

nice install, and great head unit....but imo, investment in new speakers/head unit without replacing stock amp (which really is a weak unit and genuinely produces poor quality sound) is like taking bath with your sweatsocks on.

Rally Guy

Totally agreed. Further - for all you guys working on "adaptors" - I'd strongly recommend DIRECTLY supplying the HU with a 8-10G wire (fused) right from the battery. The routing of this cabling is a bitch in a 964 - but doable and the additoinal current will help IMMENSELY with the new breed of fairly powerful HU's - like the Alpines. That change ALONE can make a huge difference with power and bass response.

RK

964russ

I fitted that very same head unit last year with new comps and an alpine swd sub, sounds good now
I binned the fac amp, it is old and under powered. The alpine head unit is allmost twice as powerfull.