Stereo upgrade - Bose or aftermarket?

E

E_S

New Member
My stock non-Bose stereo is "ok", but not more, especially as any bass is lacking. I want an upgrade. Not a SPL contest, but just nice sound comparable to modern stock systems, not 20 year old ones.

Option 1: Get a Bose system (can get a complete Bose system for £350) and install it. Labor intensive with the wiring, but the result should be nice.

Option 2: Aftermarket subwoofer, leave the rest stock. Cheaper, bass part will be better than the Bose box, but the rest is the same old.

What should I do?
 
BOSE, every time :) It's quality more than sheer quantity, although it will still rattle the windows if that's what you really want. It was designed to fill the interior shape of the A2 with sound, and it's 100% compatible with the OEM headunit. Don't forget you will also have to code the headunit with VCDS to output a flat signal which BOSE will then work its magic on.
 
Moving coil speaker technology hasn’t fundamentally changed for decades. The basic speakers in the A2 are 5“ paper cone bass/mids, and a hard dome tweeter with 6db per octave cross over achieved with a simple capacitor. I had to replace both my bass/mids as they were starting to distort ( gravity causes the suspension to distort over 20 years in one and the other got trashed by the check strap ). The Bose system has more sophisticated cross over and amplification and different drivers but is inherently the same technology and of course has a sub. I would say adding an after market sub base would be the most cost effective upgrade you could make. Some have upgraded the standard bass/mid speakers but this involves butchering the old speakers to retain the mounting frame. This is something I’m going to look at over the Winter.
 
Aftermarket for sure!

Have two A2s, one with aftermarket as in below thread, the other one with Bose.

Make sure to get a HU that have built-in crossovers and your standard door speakers will play like never before.

Potential Bose killer - easy install

Just spend 3 hours to install Phoenix Gold Z8150. This is a 5cm tall shoebox with active 8-inch subwoofer. I placed it below the driver seat, and pulled cables below the carpets from boot (power) and headunit (signal and remote). Everything is basically hidden. The headunit Pioneer X7800 was...
www.a2oc.net
 
Morning,

My choice is always Bose as it does me just fine for my 600 per week commute. Yes the installation is labour intensive but totally achievable. I’m sure you’ve already found the pinout for this upgrade on the German Forum:

a2-freun.de

Boseverstärker nachgerüstet

Hallo Ihr Lieben, Mütze hat mal wieder gebastelt: Ich habe einfach einen Boseverstärker an den vorhandenen originalen Lautsprechern angeschlossen. Dazu den vorhanden Kabelbaum vom Verstärker der hinteren Lautsprecher erweitert. Die Vorverstärkerleitung der vorderen Lautsprecher sowie Lautsprecher...
a2-freun.de

If you open the link up in Google Chrome (possibly other search engines as well) it will be automatically translated for you.

If you want to try the aftermarket approach but with a factory twist then I have a spare factory Bose subwoofer enclosure you could try to modify with a larger bass speaker, it’s pretty tight in there though. Shipping to you might also be an issue due to size and guess it wouldn’t be a cheap option.

Kind regards,

Tom
 
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