Morning all

I have a 1996 993 C4 which has the HiFi speaker and amp upgrade. When I bought the car it came with a SONY single CD / RDS tuner circa 1995 vintage so I'm assumming this was the original head unit fitted by the importer.

The sound is OK, nothing speacial, but the CD occationally jumps or skips . I do have the sport chassis and 18" wheels but I still would not expect this from a more modern head unit.

I have a limited budget but want something a bit better.

I am looking to upgrade the head unit first to an ALPINE one with MP3 and WMA compatability and have a number of questions.

1) Will a conventional new head unit just plug into the existing set up.

2) The current head unit is 4 x 20 watts (4 x 8 RMS) and the new one 4 x 50 watts (4 x 20 RMS) so will there be a problem with the (Nokia I think) Amp.

3) What speaker upgrade can I do at a latter stage if the sound is still not as good as I want? I would like to retain the original covers and tweeters.

Any imput would be appreciated.

Regards

 

Hello! I've just replaced a SONY headunit in my hifi 993 for similar reasons. I have had a few Sony head units - one in the 993, one (still) in my audi and another in a subaru - they are all prone to skipping excessively either due to small scratches on the CD or bumpy roads...

I replaced mine with a becker indianapolis sat nav / cd / mp3 head unit (blurry picture attached) and it is a great improvement. It looks like it came from the factory and has by far the best user interface of any car radio I have used.

There are a few things you'll need to do / check.

The Hifi amp powers all the speakers so the amp in the head unit is not required. My sony was wired in badly - the sound came from the speaker outputs on the head unit (amplified) and was then returned to an un amplified line level by an adaptor box and then went into the hifi amp. Terrible sound as a consequence.

You should see how your's is wired in - if it uses line level outputs from the current head unit, a swap is easy provided you get a new head unit with line level outputs (preferably +4v variety as the hifi amp is not that sensitive). If your's is wired up as mine was you'll need to make an adaptor lead to convert the line level from the head unit into an 8 pin DIN plug for the amp.

You can't buy these, but I can sent you a diagram of the one I made (after hours of experimenting - I got a diagram from somewhere here, but it was wrong!)

Also, I bought a pack of 8pin DIN sockets in bulk for a fiver from someone on ebay, so now I have 23 going spare to a good home!

Cheers!

David

 

David

Thanks for your post. Unfortunately I'm not a car audio expert so you lost me a little.

By line level outputs do you mean preouts?

The unit currently fitted (CDX4100) appears to has line out front and line out rear which then go to the power amplifier.

Does that make any sense?

Regards

 

Line out = pre out, yes.

If the current sony has pre outs then you are winning! Make sure the new head unit has the same connectors (usually RCA / phono plugs) as the sony and there will be no need for an adaptor.

My sony head unit had pre outs too, but they wern't being used?? They used the speaker output then converted it to a pre out signal?? Odd.

The pre outs on different head units can be different - some offer 4v pre outs which are louder than the standard one. The HIFI amp is not that sensitive, so with standard pre outs you can reach max volume on the head unit but the sound output at the speakers can be a little quiet. Looking for 4v pre outs solves this problem.

Re question 2. the preouts are not amplified, so it doesn't matter how much power the head unit has, as it is not being used.

 

Here's the back of my SONY 5100.

The yellow circle is the multiplug for power and speakers (a lead should go in here and then into the wiring harness)

The black circle is the pre outs - on your car leads should go from here to the power amplifier...

 

On my car leads came from the yellow multiplug to an adaptor box and then into the power amplifier - this was a real pain in the ***, resulting in the fabrication of a new lead.... So long as your setup is not as mine was the swap is simple!

 

So, if the preouts go straight to the amp I'm ok?

Are the ones you have photographed classed as 2 preouts then?

 

Yes, so long as your new head unit has the same plugs on the back.

The picture shows front left, front right, rear left and rear right, so four pre outs in total.

 

David

My current unit must be very similar to your old one, as they both have the same install/operating instructions.

I just need to know about the preouts. I'm assuming what I have currently is classed as 2 x preouts?

Regards

 

Sorry

You beat me to it, so I need a unit with 4 x preouts

I thought that one 2 channel pair would be classed as 1 preout though.

Regards

 

I've looked at the manual for my 5100. You are correct - it's the same manual for the 4100.

It seems to suggest that the 4100 has 2 preouts - i.e. only 2 plugs where the 5100 has 4 on the photo above. However the manual is not clear...?

You'll need to pull the unit out and see how many plugs there are in the area of the black circle on the above photo and then see how many wires are connected.

If there are 4 plugs and 4 connected wires - everything is simple.

If there are 2 plugs then things may be different.

Let me know!

 

David

I will have a look, but going through all the new head unit info for Alpine, Pioneer etc the most preouts any of them has is 3 (left, Right, Aux)

I may have to get the local car audio specialist to sort it.

Cheers