Fitting new Alpine headunit.

[hillo61]

Just got an Alpine iDA-X001 and want to replace my Concert headunit. What exactly do I need in the way of wiring looms ?? Read somewhere I need an aerial connector as well ??
Any help would be welcome...

[malarcy]

OK - Discalimer - everybodys milege may vary - here is my story

I

[malarcy]

OK - Discalimer - everybodys milege may vary - here is my story

I bought an alpine headunit with ipod adapter for my a4 cab and had it professionally fitted - they tried 3 different types of wiring adapter with carying degress of success, 1st one front speakers only, 2nd one front and rears but that didn't work because the rears are amped in a cab, 3rd try kinds working - but, no auto dim (there is no plain wire in the radio loom for "lights on", and no power off with ignition (again- no easy connector) - so they took them from the fusebox, then it was back again to get an aerial booster installed - they forgot that audi's were like vw's and the aerial requires an amplifier.

Once it was all installed and the sound adjusted - it was truly terrible - I jsut could not get it to sound right, buddy of mine was a pro sound engineer - he tried - no good, then we tried the setup cd thing through the alpine site - sets up the ead unit for you car based on various measurements.

I really missed the DIS display of radio station etc. - alpine said they would never produce a module to enable it.

End result - I paid the supplier/installer to take it out - they refunded the money for the system and said they wouldn't ever try to do one again.

Hope they were just wrong and there is a magic kit out there - one other installer did tell me of a audi bus adapter that makes things like hooking to lights and ignition work better but it was 100's of pounds

Be interested if you get any further because I still want a better head unit in my car.

Malarcy

[kphonik]

I've done this twice now and the most recent (in January) was the alpine iDX. Works great. You'll need-

1) A shop familiar with installing over audi+bose soundsystems. This is huge. There is a trick to turning on the amp that involves the left front speaker. Wish I knew more but frankly to me it's worth the $65 to have a shop do the install.

2) Audi symphony wiring harness. Not sure if this is compatible with the Concert, but a little research should tell you. This harness will map the audi cable harness (there are two, one for the head unit, one for the speakers) so you dont need to cut any oem wires. I bought my last one on ebay for $4.00 I believe.

3) An aerial amplifier. This is a powered amplifier for your radio antennae. It's built into the bose headunits, but aftermarket units require a line amplifier. This is about $15 at any audio shop.

4) Turbokit. You can find these on ebay for your specific model. This is the trim piece and cubby tray that match the stock plastic. These can be fun at times to try and fit right but the shop installer should be completely familiar with them. Some turbokits include a wiring harness (Metra makes harnesses as well as the trim pieces for audis)

That's about all! Not sure what problems the other guy had with sound quality. I'm not an audiophile, but I guarantee you it will sound better than the stock HU if installed correctly. You may need to add some preamp wires with the magnets on them (sorry, dont know the term) to cut out any engine whine.

The big thing is finding the right shop with someone who knows what they're doing. I'm normally a DIY'er but why fight with it for hours when a decent installer can knock it out in 30 min?

Best of luck!

[malarcy]

I think we are 100% in agreement - the variation is that the A4 CAB has amped rear speakers as standard - the wiring looms you refer to are available in 2 flavours - A4 without BOSE and a4 with BOSE but both are specific to the saloon.

The loom adapters available for the a4 convertible/cab are for earlier models - and none cope with the rears being amped.

So - the sound quality issue I has was the rears need power that the standard head provides (possibly by telling the s-bus to power them possible directly - either way) they don't wake up - the workaround was to wire the power antenna output into the loom (hack job on the loom adapter - not the original wiring) - problem with that is the alpine unit tells you not to use that power output for amps and in this case you need it for the antenna and the rear speakers.

Result was to hear everything "good" you had to drive the head unit flat out - and that was no good as soon as you dropped the roof.

I spent over £600 on this system (with the ipod adapter) and in my case, it sounded bogus.

When I got the shop to remove the system I found they had added wires to the fuse box to deal with ignition on/off (turn the unit off when the key comes out) and lights (dim the display at night) - none of the loom adapters present these wires because they are provided over the "bus" to the original unit (that's why the standard head unit stays on with ignition off until you remove the key - same signal that says - light up the interior says - turn of head unit).

I agree someone who had done it properly before could make this work (I don't know what the left speaker trick is) - but after 4 goes at it and it still sounded rubbish - I decided enough was enough and I pulled the unit.

As I said at the top of the post - everybodies mileage varies - I just found I spent a lot of time and a lot of money on something that sucked. If someone knows the left speaker trick or has a part number for an adapter that works then I might try again .

As previous poster says - good luck - hope it works out for you.

Malarcy

[lrnzcrz]

i got my alpine cda 9884 to crutchfield the package include the inallation manual wiring harness and the radio removal tool, install it my self since it has an amplifier when i got the car that is why i did'nt have a hard time to install it. may be you guys can give crutchfield a call im sure they can help you......
P.S. here's the website crutchfield.com