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Not really a question, just posting my current project. I got a 2013 BRZ about a month ago and the stock headunit is just as bad as everyone says it is. I wanted something with CarPlay, a CD player, and a volume knob, and settled on the Sony XAV-AX200. I finally got it mostly installed this week and it has been working pretty well. Complaints are the interface lags at times, the touch screen is resistive and feels a bit dated (especially when the system lags), and there's no mute or off function that's easily accessible. The Metra double din adapter kit doesn't really match the stereo or interior at all, but its basically the only thing on the market that fits except for maybe one from the UK, but that costs $60 shipped and I can't find any reviews on it so I'm not ready to risk that yet. I also got rid of the 12V socket in the center console and replaced it with a USB outlet that is connected to the headunit (and had to find a right angle cable to get it to fit nicely.  I need to find a USB hub that is compatible with the headunit so I can the second port on that outlet working, as well as the original one under the climate controls. Next step will be getting the backup camera I also picked up installed. I did the wiring on the headunit side and verified everything works, its just a matter of cutting a hole in the trunk lid and running all the wiring up from there. At some point I'd like to add a bit of sound dampening throughout the car, and then maybe upgrade some of the speakers.
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Mar 3, 2019 01:18
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Krakkles posted:This is one of those big things I didn't know I really cared about but I'm glad something tipped me off to - I got the Pioneer MVH-1400NEX particularly because I wanted a capacitive screen, and this makes me glad I did. quote:For the question side of things: If I want to switch on my camera based on the backup lights or a manual switch, how do I wire dual power? It seems like if I just run both wires in, it'll power on my backup lights when I flip the switch. Which ... I debated whether or not I even mind that, because it'd make it more obvious the camera is on, and probably light up whatever I'm looking at, but I'm curious how else it could be done - I know there's a way, I just have no idea what it is. Wasabi the J posted:The xav series has customizable steering wheel controls. Go to the heading steering wheel control settings and select CUSTOM and then program a button to mute or ATT (lowers volume to 10%). The first hub I used I tried it both external powered and bus powered, it just didn't know what to do with it and said the device was unsupported. I ordered one off of ebay that someone claimed worked on theirs and it finally arrived today, I will give it a try tomorrow. Mostly I just want a second port active for charging for when I'm on longer drives with my girlfriend and the only 12V is in the glovebox which makes it inconvenient to use.
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Mar 6, 2019 02:18
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I currently have a loaner 2019 Impreza with the HK option, and earlier in the year I had the same model car without it. The sound in the one without was complete garbage. It seemed like the soundstage was in the passenger side footwell, and nothing could be adjusted to fix that. With the HK setup it feels where it should be, around the upper body area with actual stereo separation. The sound quality still lacks, there’s no real bass and you need to roll off the treble a bit otherwise it’s too harsh (and there’s only a 3 band EQ to adjust), but it is listenable.
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Oct 1, 2019 02:38
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I'm in the middle of installing a backup camera in my BRZ. I have the camera installed in the deck lid and starting to work the wiring up to the front. Rather than run a ground to the head unit, I found this in the trunk, it seems like a ground but I wanted to check before using it:
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Apr 11, 2020 23:29
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I do have a multimeter, hopefully I have enough extra wire to reach the battery to test. edit: found a wiring diagram, I think I'm good:  Its point H1 DrChu fucked around with this message at 00:49 on Apr 12, 2020 |
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Apr 12, 2020 00:44
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Look into motorcycle audio amps. I see a bunch like this on eBay for around the same price: https://ebay.us/DWfRBG Anything else seems to be starting over $100, in which case you’d probably want to look into the OEM underseat sub, or some other aftermarket powered sub which will hook up easier to your head unit and sound better than the tiny hatch one.
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Jan 29, 2021 03:15
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Since I have to ask this is probably too advanced for me, but are there any resources that explain how steering wheel controls work/how to add in a similar functionality? I have a 2013 BRZ (no steering wheel controls) with a Sony AX200 head unit in it. The head unit has a couple buttons on it that don’t really do what I want, but it does have the functionality built in as I can do it through the remote control (which I really don’t like using while driving). There is a port on the port on the back of the head unit for a wired remote interface, a 3.5mm stereo jack that uses ground, first input and second input. From what I can tell the super simplified version is that when you press a button the voltage momentarily changes to a specific value which the head unit maps to an instruction. What I want to do is add a couple buttons (or even just one) next to the head unit to work in the same manner. I have some experience building circuits but mostly in the realm on guitar electronics, so I’m not worried about wiring a resistor to a button and then to a jack, but is this all much more complicated than that?
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Feb 6, 2021 23:22
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Captain Cool posted:I used this site to wire a couple of paddle switches to my Pioneer. The resistor values may be different but hopefully the basic circuit is the same. That sounds a lot like what I’m looking for. Any pictures of the work you did?
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Feb 8, 2021 22:16
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Finally had a chance to make a little progress on adding a wired remote control to my Sony headunit. While my searches for something like "wired steering wheel control" came up emptyhanded, I stumbled across the existence of wired remote controls for marine applications. As an experiment I bought the cheapest one I could find with a 3.5mm interface, a DUAL MRW15, plugged it into the headunit and it worked. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A2kw0JhFIPE Boring video of me pushing buttons. Unfortunately the mute function on the remote maps to the ATT function on the stereo, which only cuts the volume in half. Since one of my goals was to try to find an actual mute I'm going to need to do some more work. I compared the resistance values to the one in this link: Captain Cool posted:I used this site to wire a couple of paddle switches to my Pioneer. The resistor values may be different but hopefully the basic circuit is the same. And they were basically the same, so I think these are at least somewhat standardized. Now that I have an extension cord from the input routed into the console for easy acces, next step will be trying to duplicate one of these paths on a breadboard:  and then changing the resistors to play around with different values to see if they do different functions. Or maybe order one like this https://www.amazon.com/Wired-Remote...4548304&sr=8-11 that has more functions and see if they work as well (I assume the Mute on that would also be ATT, but the Source On and Off switches could be useful).
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Feb 28, 2021 22:55
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Wasabi the J posted:Dude no go to the "General" settings on the head unit and tap "Steering Control Custom". There's only about eight functions assignable through this way, none that I want. I'm hoping to find some more because the wireless remote can directly access like two dozen functions, but I can't use that while driving. Since the car has no steering wheel controls this is also a project to learn a little about how they work and being able to design a simple circuit.
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Mar 7, 2021 18:44
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STR posted:There's purpose-built spare tire subs with a built-in amp these days, just a little more money than I'd like to spend since I already have a functional amp and sub. Here's one. They just bolt on top of the spare tire, and most of them can be easily unplugged if you need to actually use the spare (I have no plans on ever using mine since it's old enough to enlist in the military... used to be old enough to buy cigarettes until they raised that to 21) I have the shallow version of that sub, the VPSTX12, in my BRZ and its fine. It can easily overpower the stock speakers and takes some tuning with the EQ to sound right. The biggest issue I have is when I'm at highway speed the road noise drowns out the low mids, so I hear mostly bass drum from the sub, and high mids/vocals from the cabin speakers. I need to spend more time with the EQ, but the car sounds completely different parked than at speed so any change I make at home might not work while driving.
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Mar 22, 2021 17:40
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Is the 09 the MK6 generation in your country? If so you may want to look into a RCD-330 variant. It will be a drop in replacement for the OEM stereo. You do have to be careful about the version, some only support CarPlay and not Android Auto.
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Apr 17, 2021 15:40
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A used Sony AX 100/200/1000/etc should be around $200 and give you Carplay and not be sketchy like one of those cheap Android units
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May 21, 2021 14:42
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everdave posted:Do they make a Bluetooth fm transmitter that runs on much lower frequencies than the ones I’ve tried? How about ordering one from Japan? https://www.amazon.co.jp/-/en/Trans...f_rd_i=85426051
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May 24, 2021 15:42
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You can cut and splice back together an RCA, it’s just a signal wire and ground shield in there and it’s not carrying high voltage or anything like that.
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Aug 11, 2021 19:29
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abelwingnut posted:hopefully this is the right thread. It looks like there are aux input mods available for the factory stereo, but they’re expensive and combined with the external Sirius player would cost about the same as a new head unit and look a lot messier. With a face plate adapter you can fit basically and double (or single) DIN head unit in there. What’s your budget? Do you want other features like CarPlay or android auto? Bluetooth, or built-in navigation?
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Aug 18, 2021 19:48
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The cheapo backup camera I bought off of Amazon had a very small connector that went to the camera, not much bigger than the cable, I think that is fairly common across cameras and may be small enough to feed through the openings edit: this style would probably require drilling a hole on the underside of that handle area, so I don't know if I'd want to do something like that on a truck like yours. DrChu fucked around with this message at 21:49 on Feb 17, 2022 |
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Feb 17, 2022 21:45
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My partner has a 2011 Subaru Legacy and I want to upgrade the factory nav unit for her to something aftermarket that supports Carplay as its pretty outdated and unresponsive, and this car will be our main road trip car for the next few summers. I think I have everything sorted in terms of wiring harnesses, dash kit, head unit, etc, except for how to convert the factory reverse camera to work with the new headunit. I can find plenty of adapters to allow aftermarket cameras to work with the stock head unit, but not the other way around. Worst case scenario I can buy an aftermarket camera and throw that in, but I'd rather avoid the hassle and expense if an adapter exists to use the stock one.
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Feb 27, 2023 02:14
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Lowclock posted:I couldn't find any adapters either, but it does seem like it's plain old composite video that you could just cut and splice a different connector on if you really want to keep the factory one. I did the first attempt at the install this weekend and it did not go well. What I'm starting with:  Trim removed:  Headunit removed:  I did not count on that bar being behind the screen (center of photo). That prevents a normal depth head unit from fitting in at the correct angle. Luckily I got one with a floating screen so I have some wiggle room, but the test fit still wasn't great:  I'm not expecting flush but it does stick out a little more than I'd like. Because of the issue with the bar I'll be drilling new mounting points in the dash kit so hopefully I can get it sunk in a little more. That's not the main concern now, when I first wired up everything I had no sound. Because of the lack of harnesses specifically for this car it turned out to be because the amp wasn't getting the remote turn on signal. After spending way too much time digging through ae64.com I found the remote turn on signal goes through the secondary harness. I pulled that pin out of the main one and gave it a try:  It worked, but the sound was kind of lifeless compared to the stock radio. The harness I used the line level outputs of from the head unit, but apparently the factory stereo send speaker level signals to the amp, so I'm going to try a different harness that uses the speaker level signals instead to see if that's any better. Before I spend about $20 for a custom cable from ae64.com for the secondary connector, is there any way to look up connectors by pin count, or does this look familiar to anyone? Its 24 pins.  If Metra or whoever has one of these for a different car I don't mind depinning everything not in use so I can get the one wire I actually need.
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Mar 6, 2023 23:44
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It is a lot more quiet as well, it was well over 50% to be at what I'd consider a normal listening volume while parked outside my garage, so I'd imagine while driving I'd need it up even louder. Its only $10 for a harness that uses the speaker outs so I'll give it a try, if it sounds distorted I'll go back to the original one and try to work the EQ more. I'll probably order the adapter, I think I found a bulk one like you said, but not a corresponding regular production one anywhere - https://www.alibaba.com/product-detail/24-Pin-Car-Stereo-Radio-Replacement_60644853125.html
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Mar 8, 2023 02:09
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More misadventures with the 2011 Legacy. I wired up a harness to use the speaker outputs instead of the RCA outs to run into the factory amplifier. This brought the volume level close to the stock headunit (maybe a little louder), but there was also a low-level static sound present when audio wasn't playing. This didn't sound like a ground loop, just a static sound like you're not quite tuned into a radio station. The sound is also the same not matter the volume level set on the headunit, setting the LR balance or FR fader doesn't isolate it to a particular speaker, if you mute the system its still there, but if you turn the headunit off (from the headunit, still keeping the car power on) it will go away. I'm going to try again with the RCA harness and make sure its not present using that one and if not try to figure out how to deal with the low output. One thing I've seen suggested is using some kind of line driver to boost the voltage of the pre-outs, but I'm having trouble finding a basic one that will do 4 RCA inputs to 4 RCA outputs with an adjustable gain. Most seem to also integrate a LOC and only have speaker level inputs to RCA outs. I also ditched the floating display headunit. There was no good way to fit the chasis into the dash, and the display always stuck out too far. I went with the same model as just a regular double DIN headunit, since I found out the depth of that version is only like an inch. At least it will look ok once I get all this wiring sorted out. 
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Mar 27, 2023 20:15
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Did you notice any benefit from updating my the firmware? I working on installing one now that’s basically just going to be used for CarPlay so it may not even be worthwhile for me to update.
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May 5, 2023 18:15
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After taking some time off from working on it I realized we've got a road trip next month and I'd like the Legacy wrapped up before that. How I last left it before today: In my last posts I was having issues with the audio going to the amp being either too quiet if using the RCA outs, or too loud if using the speakers, as well as some low-level background hiss at all times. The hiss seems to have been solved with a ground loop isolator (metal box on the lower left side). For the output level, I found the blue Scosche line out converter on Amazon. However I'm not using it as a LOC, it has a setting that can attenuate speaker volume and keep that as a speaker out for factory amps, so I have that at about 50% and it seems like the factory amp is happy getting that kind of signal, as it sounds more alive than using the RCAs and I can turn it up without distorting now. Today I added a 12V to 6V step down converter to power the factory reverse camera. It took some digging through the factory wiring diagrams to find which cables to tap to get the reverse gear signal, video, and power to the camera but I got those sorted out now. The only thing left is getting the steering wheel controls working. I've check the wiring a few times and I should be plugged into the correct wires coming out of the car's harness. I've even hooked up a multimeter and verified the values change when I push the buttons. But the head unit doesn't sense any activity when I press any of the them. I need to double check the SWC resistance values with the head unit's wiring harness connected, maybe I have a bad connection or ground. There's not a specific SWC - wire on the harness, and everywhere online seems to say to just connect it to the rest of the grounds which I have (black terminal block on the left). I'm also going to try the 3.5mm SWC input with a generic control unit I got to try something with our other car.
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May 17, 2023 22:00
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Yeah, I’ve tried the setting where you press the function in the head unit, then it tells you to press the corresponding steering wheel control but nothing ever happens, it doesn’t recognize any button press. I’m hoping it’s just a bad ground or something.
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May 20, 2023 08:21
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Finished up the Legacy today. I struggled with the steering wheel control wiring for another hour, redoing all the connections and finding a few things I had done wrong. Most wiring diagrams for the main 20 pin connector say pin 13 is for the second SWC wire, however I found another that said it could also be pin 11. The difference is apparently due to what kind of bluetooth it was originally equipped with and it also changed mid-generation to further muddy things up. I have no idea what the line I was trying to connect to does but luckily it doesn't seem to have caused any problems. The second issue is I had the two positive lines reversed. In Atoto land the line labelled "Steering Wheel Key # (+)" corresponds to SWC 1+, while the one marked "Steering Wheel Key (+)" goes to SWC 2+. Once I swapped those I was able to assign the buttons. The final mess:  I figured I'd never notice the sloppily cut hole to pass the USB cable through once it's in place in the car, but there's definitely an angle that I can see it. Ready to receive the unit. So many vampire taps, since I only had an adapter for the main harness, I used the taps to get to the wires I needed on the other ones.   Unnecessary detail I'm recording in case I want to make a posting to some Subaru forum or Reddit This line provides the reverse gear signal to the head unit. I have this connected not only to the reverse trigger on the head unit, but also the 12V to 6V step down converter which powers the factory camera.  Grabbing the video signal out of these. The other half of this cable is a regular RCA cable connected to the rear camera video-in on the back of the head unit.  Same connector, this is the line to provide the 6V to power the camera.  This line is the remote turn on wire for the factory amplifier.  Everything put back together.  Reverse works (no shots of the SWC in action).  There are still a couple issues but I don't think I'll be dealing with them, since this is primarily my partner's car and she doesn't really mind these things and its working well enough for me for our planned summer trips: The factory subwoofer is noticeably weaker than with the stock head unit (which was not great to begin with). I'm not sure how its set up other than it also relies on the factory underseat amp and seems to be tied into the rear speaker volume. Since she primarily listens to audio books and on longer trips we tend to end up with podcasts this is not a biggy. At low volumes there's a noticeable "pulsing" of the the sound level. This also occurs with the stock head unit, so maybe the amp is a bit buggy, but when the overall volume is set low the level seems to fade in and out a bit. I'm not about to drop a couple hundred on another used amp to test things out so I'm also ignoring this for now. The rear camera seems to look worse than the stock head unit. I didn't think to A/B them when everything was apart, but overall it seems to have a lower quality picture and the fact the camera is offset seems to be more noticeable now. In the last picture above you can see top of the rear bumper cover and it has a bit of a fisheye effect that I never noticed before. It still works well enough to not hit other things when parking so it'll do for now. As for the headunit, its an Atoto F7 XE that I paid a whole $138.31 after taxes from Atoto's eBay store. Its fine. It could be a bit faster/more responsive, and some (on-screen) buttons are annoyingly close to the edges of the screen. Its going to spend the majority of its life in CarPlay, but the FM tuner seems fine. The screen actually looks really nice, however I put the included anti-glare screen protector on so it looks a little fuzzy now. There's no DSP or anything like that. I'm hoping I can customize the home screen a little just to remove the stuff we won't use like XM Radio. The little pinhole mic on the front next to the screen is a little weak, but it does include an external mic to plug in that I didn't feel like find a place for so I'm not using it yet, possibly ever. Also, it supports Wireless CarPlay but I haven't tried that yet as I'm used to plugging in since it seems to drain my phone faster than I'd like.
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May 21, 2023 23:35
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Wasabi the J posted:Wow I have the same year and trim outback and had the same head unit (I later changed to a larger size) I'll take a look through those settings to make sure the LPF is turned off. When I was testing the wiring with the fade/balance controls I noticed as soon as the rear speakers were out of the mix the sub was doing nothing so I figured the amp was just grabbing the signal from them. Captain Log posted:
If there was a pre-wired harness I would have definitely gotten one. Nobody makes one for this generation of Legacy/Outback, I think because there were several different head units, bluetooth was an add-on, the reverse camera could be in the rearview mirror or the headunit depending on trim, the underseat amp, etc. In my BRZ I have one of these - https://cerwinvega.com/12-shallow-spare-tire-powered-subwoofer-vpstx12.html. It takes up negligible space (it pushes up the trunk shelf maybe half an inch), its not the most powerful thing but definitely adds some low end the door speakers are lacking. I also looked into under-seat ones but there was not enough room, but I imagine the seats in your Spark sit a little higher so you should be able to find something that fits. Your whole car is not going to shake, but you'll feel the kick drums and low bass at least.
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May 22, 2023 16:47
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Darchangel posted:You can't, and that annoys me ever so much. Through some searching I found a way to remove the XM icon, but I cannot find any sort of crossover/filter options. https://www.reddit.com/r/ATOTO/comments/ywgwr9/atoto_f7_secret_menu/ After changing these settings the system did an unexpected boot cycle and I had to reteach it all the steering wheel controls, but the XM icon is now gone.
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May 23, 2023 02:24
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Don Dongington posted:Has anyone had any luck integrating one of those ATOTO units with the factory steering controls on a Subaru? My 2018 outback came with an Android Auto/Carplay unit, but it's really touchy even with the AA-Wireless. I installed an Atoto headunit in my partner’s 2011 Legacy and was able to get the Steering Wheel Controls working without an additional interfaces. I posted about it earlier in this thread, I had some difficulties but that may have been because I had some pins backwards. Here’s the general wiring explanation I followed: https://ae64.com/20-pin-pinout.htm Only the primary function for each button works, with the factory some have a secondary button (like holding channel up would seek to the next radio stations). Some of the nicer interfaces have the ability to add that back in. If going for Atoto, go for a nicer S8 model rather than the F7 series. The F7 does have a nice display, but the interface is a little slow and has some frustrating things, like the CarPlay volume is a lot lower than radio and sometimes it doesn’t respond to taps in the very edges of the screen.
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Nov 10, 2023 16:20
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