The door panels are going to be a pain, I assure you of that if you have a 997. There are several super incredible threads on several forums that have pictures in detail, step by step. You have to be real careful around the airbags. This is what I will do right after wiring my stereo and amps. I was going to do the subs last, but I think I will do the doors last. I'll post a link to a good thread tomorrow. I think the midrange size is around 3 inches or so, maybe four, and the doors are 6.5 inches but depending on your model they can accomodate 7 to 8 inches from what I can tell. I had pulled a report that the rears were also 6.5 inches but they aren't, more like 2 to 3 inches at most.
I can't remember how much room there was below the tweeters, I was just trying to get mine in. It may be there is more room. But from the link you have I believe but correct me if I am wrong, you would add the crossover where the midrange is in the door because the tweeters would be wired from the midrange to the tweeter in the door, ending at the tweeter. After I took the center channel speaker out I was amazed and dismayed at how cheap the material is. Some high end speakers have paper cones, fair enough, but these things reek of poor quality. The fact they have neodymium magnets is not very impressive when you look at these things. I have some polk audio marine speakers with neodymium magnets but the build is really good, as is the sound.

So far today I got pretty far. I removed the stock bose amp, the dvd navigation, the pcm, and found the portals to wire from the frunk to the battery compartment and into the cabin. I installed the gps antenna where the center speaker used to be so it's hidden and an unobstructed sky view. I also put the sirius antenna there but the instructions said to keep it away from the gps antenna which I did the opposite. I don't use sirius much so I'm not too worried about it, but if the gps is affected I'll move the sirius somewhere else or remove it. It was only $20 anyway. I got the double bin bracket installed and did a dry slide in just to see how it fits, it looks good! I put the bezel over the front temporarily and it looks good too, but it doesn't fit perfectly around the double din, but neither does the bezel that came with the double din. Odd. Maybe it will fit better when I really push everything completely in.
I took lots of pictures as I went along, but will post them next week when I'm done.

So tomorrow is a big day, amps, processor, wiring, hopefully speakers in the door, and the subs.
I already have my splash screen logo ready. [IMG][/IMG]

and while I have all this going on, I saw I could easily remove the temperature controls, so I may soon do the repaint on the control ***** that have become worn. Most likely I will not do it tomorrow.

I think by upgrading the tweeters with a crossover you will substantially improve the quality without much money or work. The hardest part I think is where to place the crossover, but I have a feeling that will be solved soon. For me replacing everything was simply destiny, but for others unhappy with the sound but not wanting to get too involved, it may very well be that replacing the tweeters with a crossover will make many Porsche and Bose owners very happy. The biggest shock was how the rest of the system sounded, and that is without crossovers. I'm sure with them it would be outstanding in comparison to stock.

 

How did you know? Right, I've got more in cable than one of the high end installs! But I'll leave my Jeff Rowland amps in the study...

I've spent big bucks on a car install before with very disappointing results. I could only imagine the 997 interior giving poor results even with a couple grand dropped into it. I'm most interested to find a reasonable drop in solution. The PCM is just too integrated into everything to replace in my view. Also, mine already has NAv TV and Tooki, so it is already "modernized".
Sound quality is really the basics:
Recording quality (if you don't know what recording compression is, check that out first)
Speakers
Room (car)
If your feeding uncompressed audio digitally, I think that's first. If you're not, that will greatly improve what you hear already.
The car is just a horrible environment and the 997 is loud. It's never going to be that good.
Finding a swap for the stock speakers will be the most bang for the buck.

THanks for the DIY for the door panel. Not easy, but not hard either. I wonder how the rears come out. Anyway, I would definitely try tweeters with attenuators and then matching separates. Maybe an installer would have spacers for the 6" drivers. Seems to be worth a shot. Amazingly through Crutchfield they have a 60 day return policy, pretty unheard of for electronics. If the separates don't work, they could always be returned. Not sure if I will be the Bose guinea pig, but I'm really looking for a $500 alternative that will simply make the sound better. It isn't going to be even good until one spends thousands and I'm not doing that. (I'm sure Focal Be's sound great in the car though!)

 

Comparing a car to home environment would be similar to comparing home to a concert or bar venue. Home amps are designed for the home, and proamps are designed for volume to over come outside noise and to cover more area. The sweetspot takes a back seat in those venues. But I have no problem listening to live music at a bar or concert, and I have no problem pumping up some jams in the car although it's not perfect for discerning listening. Besides, I'm driving and paying attention to the road not the nuances of the violins.

 

Granted. I didn't intend to compare the two really. Some cars are just a lot better than others. Had the premium sound system in my M3, the $1500 option. The car is very quiet and well insulated and the system was very, very good. A 991 with the Burmester might be justified, that car is quieter than ours as well. Not to say that a very good system will not be enjoyable in a 997, I'm just looking for an inexpensive option - a hack if one would call it that.

 

whew, not done yet, but making progress. Amps are power wired, rca's are run, blue tooth mic is mounted on A pillar with no wires visible, the processor display wired up. I have to wire the double din now, and the speakers. The thick 4awg wires are a pain to work with, and I had to get them mounted with fuses. I'm tired as heck, may wait until tomorrow to do any more. Now I see why they wanted over two grand to install. Not super hard, just tedious. Of course I could just be getting fat on the couch, and this is actually becoming somewhat fun.
One tool that I highly recommend other than the trim tools, is a plastic wire snake. I picked one up fairly cheap online and man has it really made a couple of tights spots much easier.

 

Any thoughts on where to hook up the illumination wire?

 

Got everything wired up except the illumination wire. Supposedly it goes under the rear seat, so next week I'll do that. It's hooked up behind the double din already, I just have to run the rest of the wire. It's only for dimming the unit when the lights are turned on.

The processor simply is not working, but I'm assuming I did something wrong. I checked all the wiring, it seems fine, the cd plays but does not make sound at all. If I connect directly to the amps it plays fine, so it's not the source. When I have the car running, the unit shuts down because of high voltage. Just so I can enjoy the fruits of my labor, I am running straight to the amps right now and will deal with the processor later. Disappointing though, especially as I feel I probably overlooked something.
I'm running stock speakers including stock subwoofer just because of time yesterday. I leave for a week but when I come back I will do my subwoofer enclosure, and the door speakers. Right now the system is begging and pleading for good speakers. Gasongassoff is right about the stock processing, as right now the overall quality is significantly improved but the sound isn't right due to the lack of processing and the cruddy stock speakers. But, it does sound better even without the calibration. There were some settings on the head unit which I played with a bit, but didn't do much.
The head unit is so far beyond stock that is laughable to me now that someone would want to put hundreds of dollars back into the stock unit for an auxiliary or bluetooth. I understand the resell value of stock equipment, but in this case one would be a fool to want the old unit back in there.
The Garmin is fantastic, much better. Ease of operation great, looks great, has my personalized background, and I'm just getting started.
I had an issue with my phone not syncing, but discovered operator error, I had selected on oem bluetooth option on setup which was incorrect. Anyway, Bluetooth in a Porsche, yeah!!! Now I can talk and drive! I also rerouted the wiring so that I can imput the address while driving, or rather the passenger can, and it will also play dvd's while driving too also for the passenger. Pretty cool, looks and sounds awesome, a must have for me anyway. I'm trying to see if there is a way to use an external hard drive to usb to play music, but I think anything other than a flash drive is probably too much.
I also added to the audio in aux the phono plug which connects to my phone's headphone jack, that way I can stream music from my entire computer music collection at home and play through the car. That is ALL my music, tens of thousands of songs and hundreds of cd's from my extensive collection. It won't play vinyl, but oh well can't have everything.

Once I put the unit all the way in, the bezel fit just perfectly. Overall the unit is slightly bigger so it protrudes a tiny bit, but hardly noticeable.

Thanks Gasongassoff, this thread is dedicated to you! You've been not only a great help but great inspiration that it can and if you want it should be done.

 

Hey there... I did an install in my car, but it was about a year ago. I'm trying to remember which color wire I used for illumination. There is a small wiring harness with I think 3 wires in it that runs into the center console. There's a very thin gauge wire (might be orange/white or red/white?) that runs back to the lighted ring around the cigarette lighter. With the trim panels removed next to the stereo/climate control, you can just get to that wire before it starts to run backwards toward the center console. I was able to separate just enough wire to get a wire tap on it.

I'll try to dig up some notes to find out exactly which wire it is - having a hard time remembering.

As for the MS8, I recently bought one and plan to add it to my system when I get the time. Processing is definitely needed to make this setup sound its best. But for you, I believe no sound will come out until you go through the setup/calibration process once.

Keep us posted!

 

Illumination wire update: Pretty sure you'll find in that harness that's running towards the center console that there are two thicker wires (12V power to the cigarette lighter) and a thinner wire that should have orange in it. That thin wire is power to the little illuminated ring around the cigarette lighter and only comes on when the lights are on. Tap into that and you'll have your illumination source.

 

Bump to see pics for that Bose substitute sub box! Sounds cool. Wonder how hard it would be to pull the box and swap in another...

I'm seriously contemplating a speaker swap without amps on the stock unit. Gotta save to increase the mod budget!

 

Time to sell those cables with the black boxes on the ends and spread some audio lovin' to the Porsche.

Two big challenges in the car are soundstage (esp with asymmetric speaker placement) and irregular frequency response (due to dominant standing waves from parallel walls). The good news is that both of these problems are fixable with a processor (time delay and automated EQ).

Pry tool.

Good luck...

Higher.


They actually do!

Give it a listen for a while. Then when you get the MS-8 up and running, you'll be like "woah, amazing!"

Happy to help. Post pictures!

Rye595 is right. The MS-8 will deliver no sound until you go through the setup/calibration process.

 

Higher? Yeah, that's what I was afraid of!
Funny, I'd love to understand the Bose amp a little better. I must be missing something fundamentally. I thought a speaker with a lower impedance is harder to drive, a 4 ohm speaker is harder to drive than a 8 ohm speaker. Do I have that backwards? Maybe I've forgotten already. Because then I thought if the Bose system has 1 ohm speakers, the amp must have the power to drive them and if we add 4 ohm speakers, the existing amp would have a very easy time driving them. I'm still thinking about taking the crap shoot and dropping in some speakers. Although this will not be that easy either, because I doubt anything simply "drops in" without improvised and/or custom mounting plates. Add 3 way components in the front and 4" coaxes in the rear. I took out the rears tonight and boy are those things cheap. There seems to be a fair amount of depth back there as well.

 

Well, I had to leave town for a bit but was able to thus far get my double din in, the subwoofers, the door speakers and am more than happy so far even without the processing. I tweaked the amplifier crossovers as well as the headunit setting for now and it sounds really good but there is plenty of room for calibration for sure.

The subwoofer tucks neatly behind the rear seats. I had to go with my really nice but inexpesive JBL subs because the JL's had the glue worn off the rubber surrounds. I think I can fix it, but that is for another day. Now I have really impressive clean chest thumping bass in a much bigger range than the stock subs.
The focal woofers in the doors came out nice. I thought making the mdf spacers would be difficult, but with a $60 home depot router it was a breeze. I was slightly sloppy so it's not fine craftsmanship, but it works!
I disconnected and removed the stock midbass, so I am just running tweeters, woofer, and subs. My wife was somewhat skeptical but she was really enjoying the heck out of Sirius Jam station, and the widespread panic on pandora, and the custom burned cd with all her favorite songs (nice little trick to get a wife to like a new sound system). She was amazed at the difference between old stock and the new system.

thanks for the info on the illumination wire. I haven't hooked it up yet but I will this week. I want to remove the temp buttons too to repair them and so will do both at the same time.

When I'm done I will try the ms-8 again. I read on another forum that it sometimes takes a while for it to register a signal. I kept getting a no signal when trying to run the setup.

I still have to run two speaker wires to the subwoofer, as the stock 18awg is just too small to safely handle it. It works for now but really needs a new set run.

I have to say the unit looks more amazing than pictures will show, far cooler than stock, and the options, navigation and audio are so far superior that there is not a shred of doubt that replacing the whole system was the best thing I could have down. I'm loving the car so much more now!

I took plenty of photos which will be posted shortly.

 

Look forward to the pics. Interested to see how difficult it was to mount the door speakers. Thanks!

 

the stock trunk showing the crapamp about to be replaced.