3rd Gen audio upgrade issues

Hi everyone,

looking for some advice to try and get some better sound out of my 2017 tacoma non jbl.

I’ve had the truck to two different audio shops now and have sunk a fair bit of money and time into the system so far.

here’s the current setup:

Stock entune head unit
Arc Audio PS8-50 DSP + amp
Kicker 1200.1 amp
2x Kicker Comp C 10” subs in a slant box
Audison Ap1 tweeters in the dash
Audison APK 690’s in the front doors
Arc Audio X2 6.5’s in the rear doors

the main issue that I have with the system right now is that the tweeters are really harsh.. the high’s are so bright and almost painful at high volumes.

I also feel like the stock entune system is manipulating the sound and isn't being fixed by the dsp. I previously had a mazda with the bose system plus the 2 kicker 10’s and it sounded much better than this.

thanks in advance for any advice or recommendations

 

Just means they didn’t tune the DSP to your liking. The shop that tuned it should work on that to fit your ears

I can tell you the radio isn’t smart enough to be “manipulating” anything so don’t worry about that

 

Also, are you using the teeter that came with the 6x9’s AND an additional tweeter?

from a quick search, the APK690’s come with a tweeter, and the AP1 is a separate standalone tweeter. I hope you’re not using both

 

The APK 690 is the component system with a 6x9 component woofer, a 1” tweeter and a “crossover” that is just a filter module for the tweeter, it’s wired parallel.

The 6x9 woofer falls off around 5KHz, and the tweeter is high passed at 3.3 KHz 6dB/Oct. Attenuation is 0 or +3dB.

This is a 95dB sensitivity setup so efficiency is essentially unmatched with any other speaker system on the market, designed that way because the Prima speakers are meant for OEM integration, but also have enough power handling to amplify. In my opinion they sound incredible.

I have the AP690 component woofer matched with a Voce AV1.1 biamplified in my 4Runner so I do not know what it sounds like with the filter crossover on the AP1 but I have a friend with this exact setup (APK 690) in his 4Runner (he is also an audio professional) and his feedback is that they are not harsh, and sound really good.

I’d guarantee you need to set the filter crossover attenuation at 0 for starters. If you’ve done that and it still sounds harsh to you, you need to tune it using the DSP to your liking.

You didn’t say how you have these connected so IDK if you are running biamplified. Having done so, I can tell you that 50W on the tweeter and 50W on the woofer is not optimal. Mine is running off of an Audison AP8.9BIT, which is 35Wx8, but I have the AP690 woofer channels bridged to 130W so they balance with the tweeters better.

You may want to do something similar if you can:

Ch1: Left HF
Ch2: Right HF
Ch3+4: Left LF
CH5+6: Right LF
Ch7: Rear Left
Ch8: Rear Right

Use your output levels to balance HF and LF for each channel.

The Audison speakers are absolutely not harsh. It sounds to me like you have them entirely out of balance with the woofers.

It’s absolutely true that the back end tune in the OEM Entune radio is totally whack. You definitely need to work it in your DSP, not only channel balance, but delays and EQ from your factory stereo are not acceptable for a high end upgrade. Hopefully your ARC unit has adequate processing functionality to deal with this. I’ve never messed with one.

Ive used the Audison BIT for de-EQ, the Audio Control DM-608 for de-EQ (better) and this weekend I’m going to install a JL FiX 82 (fixes time delays in the signal) and go with a digital signal path. I’ll update my OEM integration thread when I’m done and have an opinion on which way is the best way to go.

 

As far as I know the shop installed the tweeter that came with the audison 6x9’s in the dash but without the crossover. It must just say AP1 on the bill, I’ll double check with them cuz it’s not clear.

The tweeters have their own channels on the dsp, I believe this means they are in an active setup and not passive or biamplified.

currently the channels are setup like this:

Ch1: Left Front 6x9
Ch2: Right Front 6x9
Ch3: Left Rear 6.5
Ch4: Right Rear 6.5
Ch5: Left Front Tweeter
Ch6: Right Front Tweeter
Ch7: Sub
Ch8: Sub

maybe moving back to a passive setup using the crossover that comes with them and bridging the 6x9’s would be a better option. I will say that the Audisons sound better than the previous Arc audio 6x9’s that were in the system initially. The first shop had installed a 2 way 6x9 and tweeters in the dash and it had all kinds of phase issues and was way too much high end.

Is it possible that the position of the tweeters in the dash are making them sound harsh? I see some posts on here where they have been relocated to the a pilar etc. It seems like the highs are bouncing off the windshield and then right in your face.

The Arc dsp does have an integration side where you can adjust timing and eq.. right now its all flat and hasn’t been setup. Is there any way to know what the Entune system is doing timing wise and EQ so I can manually undo it in the DSP?

 

If the output levels are not balanced and you have the amplifier channels all set to output the same amount of power this is the biggest contributor to your situation. If a shop set this up and didn’t balance HF and LF using an RTA, who knows how far off they are.

Regarding what I can see in the FiX, yes. It shows me the input delays as well as the sensitivity voltage offset between channels. I can look at that this weekend. Right now it’s pissing down rain and I don’t have a garage.

Regarding your amplifier channel output setup, yup, you are front stage bi-amplified. I’m interested on what crossover settings they chose. Also, I think you would see substantial benefit by having a separate subwoofer amplifier and setting your 6x9 speakers up on bridged channels if that’s possible.