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I've decided to go 5.1 with my setup as i will be spending a lot of time in car and want the audio to make me happy

i picked out a clarion centre speaker half din setup.as wellas my four frontand speakers and a cub.

im trying to find setup guides or more info on how to setup 5.1 in car what exactly it takes.
i plan to stay clarion and have more of my parts picked out.

does anyone know of a good guide site? or location to find this info?

thanks!!

 
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Youll have to get a 5.1 processor to do it right. What kind of headunit do you have?

 
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are you plannin on buying your music recorded in 5.1? regular music played over 5.1 wont sound good at all.

check out the forums over at carsound.com lots of discussions about 5.1 in cars over there.

 
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^^ x2

if you just want to listen to standard music, forget about 5.1 and rear speakers and get a pair of really good speakers for your front stage and run them off a 4 channel amp or a pair of 2 channels.

You need either a headunit that supports 5.1 or an external 5.1 processor to get full surround. Kenwood makes head units that do 5.1, I think the model number of one of them is KDC-X979 or something. If you get an external processor I believe you'd have to get one to match the head unit, like an Alpine processor with an Alpine deck, or Clarion with Clarion, so that the head unit has a way of sending a 5.1 to the unit, otherwise you are just going to be giving it an analog signal and the processor will just be splitting it up, which wouldn't be true 5.1.

 
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yeah i know i waslooking at the clarionDVH940

ill check out those other forums. and the 5.1 is for movies and dvd music. also i hear sirius will be offering 5.1 music dts soon or later.

it what i want depending on it im not sure if i willgo the route. right now im buying front speakers and an amp for them. then sub and amp to get that started. willworry about the 5.1 later this year near xmas but am wanting to research it now.

 
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I don't think Sirius will be broadcasting in 5.1 or anything close to it any time soon, or in the distant future either for that matter. Not even all of their stations even broadcast in STEREO yet.

 
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xm's goin to be broadcasting i believe three channels in 5.1 later this year. of course new hardware will be needed to receive and decode the 5.1 signal. Xm's trying to increase the subscriber base who use home component receivers. I know one station is going to be a jazz station, a live performance station, not sure about the third.

The number of stations broadcasted in 5.1 probably wont amount to much, there's only a finite amount of bandwidth assigned to xm and sirus; for each 5.1 station being broadcasted, 3 regular stereo channels could be transmitted instead

 
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Its very hard to make 5.1 sound good in the car. The environment is just not setup perfect for it. Ive done it in the past and have never been pleased with it. Those Din Center channel speakers suck. They do. If you want to do it the RIGHT way, you cut a hole on the top of your dash and stick a 4 or 5.25" component in there. The center channel is the key speaker in 5.1 surround. Thats where ALL voices and main sounds come from, the rest of the channels are for surround effects. It takes a lot of tuning to get it to sound right, with time correction and eq, etc. Regular music is also hard to tune with a center channel. 5.1 is more than its cracked up to be. Ive had it in my truck for about 3 years in the past (Alpine PXA-H510 at the time) and it had it coolness factor, but never sounded quite like sitting at home with nice 5.1. The nice thing about it is you will have to add the 5.1 processor, which even if you dont want the 5.1, they have a zillion tuning features. Good luck. Choose wisely.

 
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The other issue is that if you're going for 5.1 sound you're going to want (need?) 5 matching speakers for optimal sound. While you can probably find a way to put in some nice 6.5" or component speakers front & rear, I don't know how you'd do that for the center channel...

Plus the whole thing is pretty silly unless you plan on sitting in the middle of the car with the parking brake up your butt while you drive.

 
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time alignment??

 
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haha, but the first way sounds much more pleasing

 
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lmao

yeah im not sure its research im doign to see if its worth it. the 5.1 is nearly 600 bucks so i dunno if i will do this.

so for now im getting 4 of the 5.5 or maybe 6.5 component speakers for front and rear. gonna see if i can find another location for the rears a bit better angled ont he deck or such.

 
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1 - i'd go 6.5 with the speakers if theres an option.
2 - good luck getting a clarion to play dvd-a... the only in-car dvd-a encoder is the new alpine f#1 dvd transport and f#1 processor. pricetag for the pair is a whopping 4,000 - 5,000 bucks...
3 - your rear sound is going to be horribly placed unless you get fancy with some glassing rear deck pods.
4 - the clarion center channel 1/2 din unit SUCKS. a proper center channel would involve either a dash pod, or something down in the cupholder area, although it would horribly drop down your center image
5 - 600 bucks for a full 5.1 setup in car is gonna yield horrible results.

5.1 in the car takes some serious tuning and install capabilities

 
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i said the 5.1 reciever for my deck was 600 bucks. that is not a whole setup thats simply the encoder.

 
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some units have a center channel out. specifically the dvd unit. the clarion center channel is self powered.

in all reality, you wont know the difference if you just have 4 speakers.

 
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The new Acura TL has a 5.1 system in it capable of playing DVD-A disc's, and it sounds pretty nice for a stock system. A friend of mine has one and music recorded in 5.1 sounds very good, regular 2 channel stereo stuff sounds okay.
Really, 5.1 in a car is, well, ghey. As stated above, to play DVD-Audio disc's, you need expensive *** equipment, and well, how often will you be watching movies in 5.1 in your car?
Also, XM offering 5.1 stations (which will only be 2-3 stations) is going to be for HOME. I doubt we will see a car XM receiver capable of decoding a 5.1 signal this year.
Invest in a nice set of components, a good amp, good headunit and create a good front stage, you would be amazed with how good ONE set of components can sound when setup correctly.

 
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less is more

 
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yep exactly,

i dont have a civic, but i have an rsx, thats setup to sound pretty good for what it is. its really all in the install. the more time you take to do things right, the better it sounds, until youve done everything, you wont know what the speakers are truely supposed to sound like.

 
Rep Power: 317

I've never seen the need for more than a 2.1 setup in a car, you can easily get them to sound good. And really, if you had a $1000 for speakers, would you rather have 5 okay speakers, or a really good component set?