Why Is Sony Crap?

[Low Rider]

:confused: everyone seems to say that sony make shit speakers and headunits.

i just bought some 230watt explod 6x9's and 200watt 6inch speakers and i love em. i have heard pioneer, clarion etc speakers and i dont think they sound any better than the xplods.

mind u the alpines sounded a bit better but then again u pay much more for them.

so whats so bad about them? i buy my new sterio that i am pleased with, then people come up and tell me that xplod are shit....?

is it quality or just sound or both?

i agree with the headunits though, i was going to go all sony with my sterio but bought a nice kenwood headunit instead.

so can anyone tell me whats wrong with there stuff? and what are there amps and subs like?

cheers

[TurboVS]

I don't reckon their speakers are too bad, or their head units, but their subs suck. They sound boomy and totally crap. I have heard many sony subs and they all sound crappy.

[Low Rider]

fair enough,

maybe u could help me then. im running the xplod speakers, a kenwood 2020 headunit and i plan to run an amp hooked up to the 6x9's and some sort of 12inch subbys (two of them)

what amp would be best in your opinion and what subbys? like i dont have a huuuuuge budget but not a small one, i will spend a bit of extra money for better gear.

thanx.

[teK]

I've never liked Sony speakers because they had a harsh tinny sound to them, they just sounded... Sony. I haven't heard their subs but everything from the grotesque 'look at me' cone designs to their marketing campaigns are enough to turn me away.

Their head units are OK once you reach the mid range, the only thing I liked about them was the rotary volume control. Forget fumbling around while driving for a couple of up/down buttons, just grab the knob and twist ;). A lot of people say the rotary control doesn't last long but maybe they just twist their knobs too hard.

I suggest you run the 6x9s off the head unit since it is more important to have more power up the front. By a small amp of 2x50WRMS to run the front speakers, and I'd recommend a dedicated sub amp if you are going to run 2 12s. The Coustic range are excellent quality and value, I just bought a 4x40 myself and I'm very happy with it. Their 2x60 sells for about $250 and I would look at their D class mono amps for your subs. ($700-$1100 range) Buy the biggest one you can afford and then run 2 4Ohm subs in parallel on it to suck some big power.

If you don't want to invest in a D class amp you could always get one of their 4x60 amps for $400, bridge it into 2x240@4Ohm and still have enough power to drive medium power 12s.

For 12s in the $200-$300 range you would be looking at Kicker Comps, *maybe* CompVR if you can get a package deal, JL 12W0s, Orion Cobalts, etc.

[2FarDown]

Low rider if it sounds good to you then you have nothing to worry about. Everyone thinks sony is shit, but when you ask them why they come up with shitty excuse, basically they are just jumping on the bandwagon. I must admit though i had sony explod 6" in my old commodore running off a new sony explod HU and they sucked arse. But I have heard some 6x9's that sound really good.

Bottom line is everyone has different tastes and im sure i wouldnt like the sound of every Alpine speaker there is either. If it sounds good then who cares.:cool:

[Tex]

Speakers are personal preference purchases really. If they sound good to you, buy them. Don't worry about people coming up to you and telling you they're shit.

I personally wouldn't buy Sony because the higher up you go in the model range, the more hideous their speakers get (appearance-wise). In this day and age where cars get broken in to a lot I'd have thought the stealth approach was a better one, and it also makes it hard to build an interior with any sense of class if you have these huge red and grey plastic monstrosities everywhere.

Having said that, I love Sony consumer electronics, I reckon they make some of the best stuff around. I must just about be a candidate to be their poster boy. I think the only appliance left in our house that's not Sony is our toaster. But apparently they've got a kick-arse new model coming out soon with a memory stick slot in it. :p

Tex

[Cplus]

I used some SONY XPLOD ES series subs a while back and they sound absolutely nothing like the current subs. They have a cast frame and positively massive voicecoil and magnet. These babies arn't "crappy" at all. I guess like all companies they do have some bad eggs. Just more now than they used to I guess.

[tomee]

ive installed and owned a pair of sony xplod speakers.... imo they dont sound too flash, and the speaker surounds are made from a weak floppy material wtf??? not rubber or foam but a material???

as far as ive installed and heard them, they sound very flat and distort more then my standard full range speakers... they were even distorting running off the head unit at moderate levels where the stocko wouldnt.

as for the head units i have heard sonys xplod top of the range unit, the one with the no button face, and it jsut sounded muffled as if somehting was blcoking the speakers. have heard this unit in both two diff cars and it sounded the same.

i havnt heard their subs before but have heard good things about them and some not? so i cant comment on these
as for the amps again have heard maninly good htings about them.

[Kinks]

As people have said, if you like your system then ignore what everyone else thinks.

When I autitioned sony, kenwood, pioneer, polk, boston acoustics etc, listening to the sonys made me wince... the kenwood and pioneer were ok, but nothing special. the polk speakers seemed really bright and the bostons didn't make much of an impression on me at first, but I kept on gravitating towards them for some reason and listening to them again. Then I realised that they simply sounded better than anything else i'd heard, so I bought them. $360 for 4" splits might have been an expensive way of finding what I like but I don't regret the purchase by any means :D

[TurboVS]

Low Rider : EDXR6 has 2 Blaupunkt 12's cost 189 each and they sound absolutely rank. Lanzar amps are pretty cheap and will give these subs plenty of power. If you check out hifidirect.com.au you should get out of it for under a grand easy. Try to get an amp which will put out over 150wrms at least.

And also a friend of mine has 2 Sony 12's in his VR SS, facing forwards and in a tiny box and they actually sound OK. I think they just like really small boxes and a fair whack of power, but I would def go the Blaupunkts over them any day.

[EDXR6]

Yeah my Blaupunkts are pretty tough for the price. I run em off the Blaupunkt MPA-4. Not bad, but they thrive with some more power than that amp can do.

When I first got the splits, I listened to Sony and immediately thought they sounded tinny and crap, but that was on the sound wall, could have been better mounted properly (which many people say is the only way to know exactly how good a speaker will be). I ended up going for the Pioneer Bullet Splits anyway, as a matter of interest.

That's my 2c, but yeah definately try the blaupunkt subbys.

[tandy ass]

Why is Ford crap?
Why is Holden crap?
Why is Nissan crap?
Why is Mitsubishi crap?
Why is <insert manufacturer here> crap?

Love how some people go on about something they have absolutely no knowledge of, whatsoever, and yet throw in their completely uneducated opinion and attempt to pass it off as fact...

[Kinks]

Bozz, I reckon you could lead me into a car audio store blindfolded and I would be able to tell when you've got xplod speakers playing (the normal speakers, not subs). If I could easily tell the difference 3 years ago I'm sure I can now!

[TurboVS]

Nice one Kinks

[Forg]

I think the issue is that Sony used to be great for electronics, but now they're not better'n anyone else. Yet some of their gear is priced as though it were.

Added to that; the Japanese just can't make decent speakers. So Sony may be "crap" in terms of speakers, but so're Pioneer ... and Alpine & Kenwood are Japanese too aren't they? I'd happily buy a Sony or Clarion or Alpine or Pioneer deck (maybe even Kenwood in a pinch), but I'd be listening VERY hard to speakers for any of them before I'd choose them over brands like MB Quart, Focal, Boston, etc. In fact, I reckon you'd get a better sounding system with $1500 in speakers & $500 in electronics, than with $800 in speakers & $1200 in electronics.

[teK]

I tend to disagree, if you start at the top of the chain from the source unit down to amps, to speakers, having better components up the top of the chain makes an overall better sounding system than having better components down the bottom. Take for instance a stock speaker setup. If you swap the head unit for a mid range aftermarket it will almost always sound better, compared to if you only swapped the speakers. Add an amp to the stock speakers and it's a whole new world :).

[bv]

I had installed a Schnieder 4x200W amp and bridged 2 channels to run a single 12" kenwood sub, great bass for a budget system. It was pretty much the highest power-lowest cost amp i could find at the time. Chucked in with that was a pair of decent kenwood front splits and a pro install and the whole thing cost just under $1000 (sub and box included). Alpine head unit runs it all.

I was very happy with the sound from an otherwise budget system. Didn't go with any of the fibreglass moulding stuff for subs, i wanted a removable box, eventually rigged up my own method of keeping it in the boot after it rolled over once when doing silly things on wet roads.

Next step is to hook up my LCD screens, remote keyboard/trackball, and an aux RCA switch box to the amp (head unit has no inputs I don't think), run an inverter ($70 from jaycar) and use my laptop to play movies/MP3's/web-GPRS/interrogate unichip etc :)

[teK]

Wrong thread bv?

[bv]

Yeah... kinda. Not enough sleep. I was sorta replying to this below but got carried away... and noone has replied to my other thread yet :(



Originally posted by Low Rider
fair enough,

what amp would be best in your opinion and what subbys? like i dont have a huuuuuge budget but not a small one, i will spend a bit of extra money for better gear.

thanx.

[Kinks]

Originally posted by teK
having better components up the top of the chain makes an overall better sounding system than having better components down the bottom.

I disagree. Differences between speakers are far more significant than differences between amps and head units. Additionally, the typical scenario for stock stereos is a radio/tape head unit, so of COURSE upgrading to a CD head unit will give you a big leap in quality. But that's comparing apples and oranges, the quality of the radio on each head unit is probably the same (ie, crap compared to CD!).

I agree with Forg, I would budget more money towards speakers. If you have speakers that turn electrical signals into crap, and you improve the electrical signals, you're STILL gonna get crap! Distortion figures for head units and amps today are typically much less than 0.1%, wheras speakers can be several percent easily.

[tandy ass]

Kinks - spot on, I should have elaborated a bit more.


Bozz, I reckon you could lead me into a car audio store blindfolded and I would be able to tell when you've got xplod speakers playing (the normal speakers, not subs). If I could easily tell the difference 3 years ago I'm sure I can now!

I meant the electronics division - The electronics division carries down most of the QC of the upper quality products. The speakers are, by far, the most important product in determining your sound quality.

I dont know the difference between the Sony/Kenwood/Pioneer/(Insert manufacturer here) speaker range but it's quite amusing to see somebody paying out on a product without having the intricate knowledge of how it's built, how easy they are to repair, how they operate etc.

The fact is, without DSP or treble/bass controls (ie EQ bypass), all head units sound almost identical. You would be VERY hard pressed to detect the difference between a cheapie and an expensive unit.

The speakers make most of the difference, followed closely by the wiring (in order of importance from most to least- Ground wire, amplifier and head unit power wire, speaker wiring, RCA leads to head unit).

Unless you are an adamant audiophile, I call utter BS if you say one head unit sounds shit and another sounds much better. Unless you are referring to DSP and sound altering features. These are the type of people that buy $600 all in one stereo systems with "Mega BASS" and other bullshit features with 1500W of PMPO power, and the complete speaker cabinets weigh 800 grams each, then drive their doof doof music well beyond the point of distortion before the speaker smokes...

[Kinks]

Bozz, very well said. I only ever judge head units and amplifiers at the flattest EQ setting possible. It makes no sense to do it any other way, you should pick the components that sound the best "naturally" and then tweak what you've got when it's installed. Equalisation doesn't make up for a crap system, it only makes it more tolerable by drawing your attention away from the flaws. Not a good way of doing things.

[TurboVS]

I think that is true to a point, yet my Pioneer HU in my Commodore sounds shiteloads better then the Supersound $150 headunit on my Datsun.....
But that is an extreme case. comparing all "proper" brands probably would show that there isn't much difference at a flat EQ setting.

[Forg]

Originally posted by teK
Take for instance a stock speaker setup. If you swap the head unit for a mid range aftermarket it will almost always sound better, compared to if you only swapped the speakers. Add an amp to the stock speakers and it's a whole new world :).
Hmm ... I disagree. Unless the head-unit is in ratshit condition, I've always thought that changing the speakers makes a much bigger difference than changing the head-unit itself. In fact, I reckon you'd be hard pressed to get into any car that's under about 5 years old, swap the head unit with the most expensive Nakamichi you can get your hands on, and tell the difference. Yet by comparison, just installing a mellow set of reasonable (not ultra-high) quality American or European speakers will make an enormous difference.

But I just read through Bozz & Kinks' posts & they just said the same thing pretty-much ... but buggerit, I'll post anyway, I took the time to type it. :)

[Manuel]

I've noticed that car manufacturers almost always spend their money on the bells and whistles of a relatively well sorted head unit, as opposed to the speakers which are hidden behind their funky looking grilles.

...get those 5W whizzers outta there!

People often rely on their sight too much... ironically when it comes to car AUDIO

although i believe the seamless integration of components in the cabin is a very important part of car audio.

so that means... similar illumination, colour, plastics, the kinds of controls, etc, etc ...i am a little pedantic though

has anyone read the Car Audio Cookbook? Its an interesting book and the author puts forth his ideas and opinions very well.

[Datto-Zed]

I have a newish sony 15" sub used as part of a home system and I have to agree it sounds boomy. The amp provides plenty of power, almost over kill and the sub's in a 2 cu ft sealed enclosure. Anything deep or hummy it sounds great, but when it comes to punchy bass I'm not all too happy. I spose I can't complain though, I got it cheap.

When I get the time I'll play around with reducing the volume, adding some of that stuffing (to late at night to remember the proper name :) ) and some more internal bracing. Hope that will help. :(

[Manuel]

Dacron, datto-zed

get it from Clark Rubber

[Datto-Zed]

Thanks :)

[Spunkymonkey]

My sister has a sony head unit, and a 12 inch xplod sub in her car. it sounds alright with the standard speakers in her car, but when you turn it up i does have a slight boomy quality to it...but its good enough for her needs.

I've got the velocity - higher end blaupunkt subs in my car and they sound pretty good and balanced in compared to my other speakers..nothing too extreme but just nice.

[tom117]

my partner and I have 8 sony 8inch xplod subs in the back of her excel and as most people know when these where on the market in 1999 cost less than $150 dollars each and we are extremely happy with the performance from them, It all depends on how you build and what type of box you choose to get the performance out of them. and considering that we both compete in sound quality comps and the results and comments from the judges are great and that we still have half a boot left to cart junk around. Sony are up there with all the other good brands, it like everything else depends on how you set them up and how much power you put into them.

[krisko]

I will go out on a limb here...

I think Tek was meaning when you get an aftermarket CD player they generally have higher powered internal Amps, this is what gives you the better sound/performance.

It really depends on the existing system. I would do both together get a decent headunit (I usually look for at least a 2 Volt output in a decent brand with features I like such as knob volume and get effeciant front speakers with the intention of adding an Amp later on.

Of coarse If it was really me I would upgrade the lot to:

CD Player, 4 Volt preout, knob volume control
Focal Polyglass 5" Splits
2nd hand Amplifier 4 ch best I could buy or new Coustic 4 ch.
Sub, JL 12WO
No rear speakers

Then spend alot of time on a best solution install, usually a compromise on stealth over out right best peformance...

[Rattlehead]

I must say that......Sony car audio gear is nice looking, especially the head units.

Their sound........SUX!!!

Whether it's off an Xplode amp or the hu itself...Sony stuff just doesn't fit anywhere in the equation.

I have NEVER owned an Xplode system but I've heard many and none of them sound good. But there was 1 car that had Xplode and sounded okay, but that was because of the way the speakers were positioned. He later put in some MB Quart up front and it was all over for Xplode.

But why are Sony crap??? Who knows! Maybe they spent millions on advertising and hiring art people to make their sub LOOK good, and had no money left on making them SOUND good.

And their subs are boomy and horrible sounding even...however, I think their amps are decent.

But if Xplode sound good enough for you, then thats really all that matters.

[tandy ass]

Not even worth a reply...

doh!

[PT Cruisin]

Just on the HU unit thing. A month ago I changed a pretty good factory HU to a mid ranged Sony Explod 200W HU and the difference is incredible. I only bought on price but it worked for me. Of course the speakers will also make a huge difference too when I get around to it.

[bike_boy]

X-plod is the rice of audio, looks the goods bout sounds like crap

[Stix Zadinia]

Alpine used to be good, they used to be standard fittment to Rolls Royce... until they sold out to the Koreans.

Now they're just crap. Anyone had any experience with the new Becker Range of headunits (need something for the Merc and i'm watching this thread closely) I've been thinking about a clarion headunit or one of the Becker Woodgrain ones, and maybe some clarion splits with a Blauplunkt Sub

any ideas?

[Low Rider]

i just got the new street machine and they had a thing on the best couple of 6x9's in there. the best reated speakers where clarion, xplods where 3rd best, jbl 4th and pioneer 5th and then panasonic, cant remember the second one though.

people tell me that the speakers are ok, but the hu and subbys are crap????

i dunno but im happy with my speakers

[tandy ass]

Would you trust a car salesperson or a mechanic to tell you about how good/reliable a car is?

Same deal with electronics but more so - car salespeople may have a foggy clue how mechanics work but consumer electronic salespeople typically do not have the foggiest clue of how well/poorly engineered a device is.

Read the previous posts, they generally summarise the topic.

[CXTdreamer]

I still love the eighties Becker tape decks... they're bloody nice... apart from the fact that they're tape...

I haven't listened to many Sony speakers, but I wouldnt buy them purely because I think they look crap, they are far too noticable

[tomee]

Originally posted by CXTdreamer
I

I haven't listened to many Sony speakers, but I wouldnt buy them purely because I think they look crap, they are far too noticable

yet ppl mostly buy them for their looks and not sound :rolleyes: