Both the wife's and father-in-law's cars have the Harmon Kardon system. I drove the civic back to back with the wife's e46 yesterday, and I have to say....there's nothing special about that H/K stereo. If you're local I'll give your a ride in both of my cars and the wife's, so you can see for yourself.

 

Those days are long gone for me, back in 98/99 I had a loud stereo in my Accord using big amps and a bandpass enclosure. These days I was just looking forsomething that sounded "fuller" than stock, nothing fancy, nothing crazy, nothing too loud.

I took a gamble on some sony/pioneer stuff from walmart and it worked out for me. If this stuff blows/breaks down the line I will post it up so others don't make the same mistake.

 

Hey I even went to Walmart. My G-Ride didnt come with ANY radio and only two speakers in the front. So I put in a Dual XDM7510 Head Unit.
http://www.dualav.com/receivers/xdm7510.html

and then I took out the stocks and put in four Sony Xplod 6.5" 4-Way Speakers
http://walmart.scosche-cars.com/prod...ductID=4541646

I blast them everyday and I never had a speaker go out on me. Even with the speakers being more powerful than the head unit. Dual may not look that good, but its a decent system, Although there is a short in the CD player. But it doesnt bother me because I always have my head unit on AUX cuz I play off my Ipod. CDs are for old peeps.

It is a bad mix, cuz I didnt know about Watts and all that. So The speakers arent really putting out the potential. Also I have a home theather sub box in my back seat behind the passenger on the floor for temporary bass until I buy subs and amps. Also i want to take the radio out and put in this:

http://www.dualav.com/indashvideo/xdvd8185.html

Don't doubt the lil people in the electronics world. Sometime there are good quality products that noone knows about but because they aren't big name like Sony and Pioneer, noone gives them love.

 

Also He just went to Walmart to buy the stuff. Its the same as you would buy it anywhere else. Look at the names on the list Sony, Pioneer. Nothing on that list is cheap. Price wise yes, quality wise no.

 

I say if you buy anything but head units from pioneer, you're a damn fool. every pioneer sub i've see maxed out for more than 4-5 minutes sounded like it had the runs lol. In car audio, you get what you pay for. Remember that the next time you take a trip to wal-mart. you'll save more money buying sumthin expensive and having it last longer than buyn sumthin cheap and having it break

 

As I mentioned before I rarely listen to my music with the volume cranked. I was just looking for a little bit of depth in the sound, not trying to have all my passengers FEEL the bass. But it is true that time will tell how much of a bargain this buy was.

As for an update, I noticed that the rear sony 6x9's seemed to be much more efficient than the pioneer 6 1/2's up front (running just off the head unit). So I swapped the fronts for some sony 6 1/2's that I got from walmart....much better. Now I just need to run some wire to power the fronts off the amp and I'll be all set.