so my close friends and I exhanged our gifts that we got for each other for Christmas, and one of mine was something I've had an itch to do for a while... a nice aftermarket subwoofer!

So I just have a 10" infinity sub (I still have to buy amp & box) and whatever else is needed to hook it up.

here is my question though... can I hook it up to the factory head unit alone or do i HAVE to get a new head unit? any suggestions (think budget if at all possible... I still havn't gotten my gf her birthday present yet YIIKES!!)

 

you can hook it up to your factory head unit but you will need an aftermarket amp. Do you have the monsoon system or base? If you have a base system you will need a line level converter to convert your high level outputs (speaker wires coming from head unit) to a low level input for your amp (rca jacks) this one works well and doesn't give you much interferance noise.http://www.crutchfield.com/S-WHi2w5z...;i=142SLC4#Tab

that's all you need, just cut the 8 wires to the 4 speakers coming out of the back of the headunit and put the wires from the radio into the input of the line converter, then take the 8 wires to the 4 speakers and put into the output of the line converter, this way your 4 door speakers will still work. Then plug in the rca cable from the line conver output to the amp.

You can buy amps that have a high level input as well as rca's but don't use them...they almost always give you alternator hiss and backround static.

 

wow, YOU"RE THE MAN!! Thank you very very much for the fast and awesome reply! I have the base system.... come to think of it, this going to be funny sounding with the base speakers and a 1400 watt sub[8D]

 

I went through the same thing. I kept my base speakers and ran two 1200 watt mono block amps to 3 tens hoping the door speakers would provide at least some fill butthe bass way overpowered the door units. That meant I had to spend cash on another 850 watt 4 channel amp, a 6 1/2" component system for the doors and a 6 1/2 two way system for the back doors. I haven't fully installed everything yet, but when I tested it it sounded great. Once the warm weather comes it will be time to rip out the interior and install everything.....can't wait!!


BTW.....if after you install everything the scoche unit just doesn't sound good you may want to upgrade it to a line level amplifier/coverter. These are around $75 compared the $20 for the scoche but they will bump up your speaker wire inputs to a 10v pre-amp output...which is better than most competition headunits give. I always say to try the scoche first and see if it's ok for you, only $20 bucks and you can get it at WAL-MART!! If it sounds lousy,take it back for a refund and get the line level booster.

 

damn! I'm not about to throw that much money at the H3's stereo to upgrade all of the components... I bet that will sound great!