yenphi

As promised, I thanks everybody here at this forum for all the help tips,
http://s217.photobucket.com/albums/cc59/yenphirx8/
these are some pictures of my installation.

ZumnRx8

so why did u go with the double din?

ferg

thats not the double bin,

ZumnRx8

well, i dont know what you call it but why not get the in-dash?

yenphi

DD is a little low to watch, I have 3 little kids, so they can enjoy fr the back if they want to, compare w/ DD this is more better in term of viewing, you dont have the neckache. This is my point of view. Thanks

ZumnRx8

understood, as i have a daughter, and am also getting a touchscreen. How much higher would you say it sits than a indash?

RotaryResurrection

iTrader: (3)

I find the indash double din unit is at an acceptable height and angle for viewing. Even by people in the back seat. However I put 2 tv monitors on the back of the front seats to help with that, too. :D

yenphi

much higher, if the kids at the back w/ a booster, they can watch easily, one of my kid still has a carseat then she absolutely loves it. The indash one, you will stuck w/ the shift all the time, you know want I mean? I love this set up

ZumnRx8

pics

yenphi

Hi RR, thanks man, they are kids though, 7,6 and 5 as we speak, I did not want too many monitors in a little car, I am also own the Avalon, so this is only for short trip and enjoy around town w/ children. Appreciate your help ealier.

yenphi

my new unit has video/audio output also, is it possible to send signal to the stock nav screen? anybody? w/out buying any adaptor?

bureau13

OK you guys will make fun of me for this question, but...is there any way to "hardwire" the AC system to bypass the in-dash temp control ****, and just be fully cold always? Every time I pull the kit back out and try to fix something, more stuff breaks. Currently no Metra display, no temp control, no defroster et al switch..what next? Well, I almost never take the thing off fully cold (South Florida) but its getting hot and the rainy season is coming. Eventually I'll fix it right, but for now if I could just hardware the f%$#er to cold I could get by.

jds

TragicallyHip

I'm semi-interested in picking one of these kits up this summer as I have a Kenwood Excelon KVT-815 DVD head-unit I would like to take advantage of again.

To those of you with the Double-Din dash-kit I ask this:
- Does it appear to be possible to mount a Single-Din unit with or without one of those generic pockets (to fill the hole that would be left)

The reason I ask, is I don't like how the Single-Din dash-kit forces you to mount the head-unit so high up (blocking off the vents, etc...) and I may upgrade to a Double-Din head-unit at some point in the future as well...

J_Owens

i have a single din kit available =p. as for the double din to fit a single din deck, not to sure, maybe but i dont know how tight of a fit the bottom area of the double din face is to let you put a deck there. might not be wide enough in the bottom of the face plate to put a deck

ferg

no you cant

here's some pics, its a re post but who cares

raphy3

Hi guys. I finally fixed up my problems with this kit. Earlier on in the thread (maybe way earlier) I posted that I have lots of white noise when I plug my line level outs from my Kenwood DNX5120 directly into my Bose amp. Then I reported that switching over to RCA preouts didn't solve the problem because I got tons of ugly noise and distortion when I did things like turn on the lights or open the doors.

I fixed it in two steps. First, I noticed that the ground that the metra kit would have you use actually connects to the axxess box, runs through the PCB, and then comes out and back into the mazda wire harness. This is just stupid. Stupid Stupid Stupid. Many other users in this thread didn't even bother using that ground; they made their own. I went out and moved my HU ground over to the vehicle chassis a couple weeks ago, but left my line level outs for a little while. The ground point I chose is in a great location, back in the sub dash behind the ash tray, the Bose amp is screwed into the metal of the car chassis. I just unscrewed the amp, wrapped my ground wires around the screw, and screwed the amp back down. Instant much better ground than the metra kit was using, and no need to drill yourself a new hole. If you have the Bose system this ground will work well for you.

Finally, when it got warm again, today, I went out and switched over to the RCA preouts again, this time using ground loop isolators. I picked up two from radio shack for $16 each. They work great. Now I finally don't have the annoyingly high white noise I was getting before, and doing things like turning on the lights or opening the doors cause me no problem. YESSS FINALLY! Clean sound. I had almost forgot what it sounded like, lol.

It may have worked even without the GLIs - moving the ground a couple weeks ago might have been enough, but I didn't want to do all the work of moving the speaker connections today only to find out I would need GLIs, so I put them in without testing the bare RCA preouts with the new ground first. They don't degrade the sound quality at all compared to what I had before, so I'm happy with em.
At last my RX8 HU swap saga is over

...that is until I update my axxess box to get rid of the occasional matrix code...

RotaryResurrection

iTrader: (3)

I dont even see the code anymore...all I see is blonde, brunette, redhead...

oh, wait...

haha, all bullshit aside, I have only seen mine flicker one time. The only real problem I have is that the damn clock gains about 30 minutes per week. I wish there was a way to just turn the clock off, because my HU displays the clock on the NAV screen anyway and it is automatically set via satellite so I'd never have to wonder about it.

raphy3

lol, you go back to the future more often whereas I prefer to visit the matrix.
at least in the 8 we can do it in style!

Descent

I know this has been beat to death, but I just want to make sure this is clear, when it comes to using the preouts over the line level wires...

You're essentially splicing RCA cables onto the harness that's in between the speakers and the head unit, and connecting the RCAs to the preout on the head unit, as opposed to using the line level outputs coming out of the stereo? And it's really as simple as that?

I haven't had my dash apart yet, so I don't know what the wires look like, but when all the wires come into the head unit, there's only the normal FR, FL, RR, RL wires? Because I know the Bose system has more than 4 speakers...I imagine those are just the wires that come from the Bose amps, I guess.

kanjas

You got it. That's what I did anyway and it works fine. I only had 4 sets of speaker wires and all of my speakers work, so yeah the Bose AMP must handle the extra speakers. That would probably sort-of explain the weird ohm ratings they use.

I have the same problem as raphy3 with alternator whine though, I am going to give his method a try and run a new ground and get some of them ground loop isolator thingy's. I suggest you do it on your first try because it's REALLY annoying

RAPHY3: The ground you found under a bose amp? Is that AMP in the Dash?? I didn't notice a extra amp in there.

raphy3

Heh, well there is a box back there that looks exactly like the other bose amps in the car. I don't know 100% if it is actually an amp. But some of the wires from the mazda harness head down to it, and then some wires head away from it. If you look at the amp back in your trunk it looks similar to that one.
It's behind the ash tray area, all the way in the back, under and to the left of where your HU sits. That space back there behind the ash tray would otherwise be empty on non bose cars probably. Right now I have: PAC-SWI, two GLIs, and a TON of wires filling that space now, lol.

I agree with just puttin in GLIs and making a good ground on the 1st try. It takes me forever to open up my dash, pull out the HU, and change out wires. I've done it 4 times on this car; I never want to do it again, lol.

Edit to add: I am probably stupid: that box I am talking about is probably an interface for the ECU. It's probably the thing that vehicle inspection stations plug their diagnostic code reader thingies into. I've seen things like that in lots of cars. So it is probably not an amp. It is grounded to the car chassis though.

kanjas

Well I don't really care what it is as long as using it as a ground get's rid of that awful noise.

Thank's for figuring it out! Now I at least have a plan on how to go about fixing it. I'm going to see if I can get away with NOT using the ground loop isolators first. (Probably means driving around with my dash torn apart)

9G Redline

Hey guys,

Just had this installed yesterday using the new kit. I LOVE the look.

I would think the angle is acceptable to view from the back seat.

If anyone would like I'll snap a pic from the outside of the car looking in.

This is my camera phone so pardon any lack of quality. My red screen now says "Zoon Zoom"

Kev

Atilla

iTrader: (1)

must.............resist...............buying

ferg