I am interested in what you think of just the HK door speakers. I have been debating for some time what to do with my system. I don't really want to mess with the rear speakers and I am torn between the HK doors and aftermarket products for just front. (good component speakers and maybe amp) I don't want to spend a bunch of money (I would spend $1200 or so if I knew the aftermarket product would be a lot better than HK door only speakers) so I have been leaning towards the HK doors but have not pulled the trigger.

It would be great if I could hear both options to help me decide. All I know for sure is that I am not happy with my current "HiFi" setup!

 

Same thing here, I ordered something from there and they charged my acct and blah, blah, blah, I went through hell getting my money back for something they didn't stock. Lots of chasing down someone who knew about it.

The Walmart of parts stores and they have like 3 of those companies with different names that do the exact same thing.

I would rather pay more somewhere else and at least know I'm not getting jerked around.

Sorry, back to topic...


Mark

 

Not that I'm a big fan of them, but Walmart is pretty good at refunds.

 

Okay I just talked to the actual dealer BMW supplier for Parts.com, the one person that runs it has been out for two months with an injury. You should receive an email today. All orders are going to be canceled and you will need to resubmit on Monday.

Two weeks ago I ordered BMW parts from DDMTuning and had good luck, but they don't stock MINI parts yet.

 

So you are saying we are going to be refunded our money and we will need to reorder the parts?

I may go to a different supplier then if this is going to be a problem. I'd rather pay a little more for some peace of mind knowing I'll be abe to get my parts.

Its frustrating that if he/they know the orders are not being processed, they are still allowing orders to be placed and money collected

 

I wasn't charged yet, were you? Also, you can contact parts.com on Facebook, that's what I did to get an answer. Yes, I agree that is pretty bad business practice not to have a backup person at least to say there is an issue. Morristown MINI was good to me. Parts.com has always been able to deliver very quickly in the past.

 

After looking at my Bank account I see that I was not charged. I talekd to the guy [Ruben] and he said pretty much the same thing you did.

I guess the question is now do I take a chance and reorder on Monday or go a different route, maybe Pelican Parts or my local dealer. the price may be a wash since I will not have to pay for shipping if it goes to my dealer for pickup.

What are you planning to do?

 

I see that DDM Tuning does not have them listed (the speakers), I did order the Bluetooth retrofitkit and some other parts from them yesterday, but it is annoying because I need a bunch of misc fasteners that parts.com did list. So what I would do is check with Pelican and also give Morristown MINI a call. They have pretty good prices too and very good service. They emailed me the install instructions for the Bluetooth Retrofit yesterday. My local dealer parts prices are INSANELY high. Usually way over MSRP listed on RealOEM!

 

Okay. Here is my analysis.

After the big fiasco with Parts.com [see above], I ordered my parts from Mini Genuine parts out of the UK. Thanks Martin [SWorks to all you Nammers]. They came in pretty quick for have to come from UK. Maybe a little more expensive than Parts.com, mainly due to shipping costs. My dealer would not order them because they were not original to my car. I ordered the full door swap. Rears will come later and I probably won;t go with the A pillar tweeters.

So I had them installed last night at Best Buy [don't hassle me about them. They have done good work for me in the pst and they were pretty inexpensive.] As a test I litened to one of my favorite songs by The Who, Baba O'Reily, several times so I could use it as a comparison. They had the car done in about 1.25 hours. A simple swap but not something I wanted to do.

So I turned on the system after it was ready and it was set to a local FM station. It sounded pretty good. I waited for my Garmin Nuvi 5000 to boot up. And I waited. And waited some more. And then waited some more. My Garmin is my in-car MP3 player, back up camera monitor, and GPS all rolled into one.

As luck would have it after waiting all this time, my music source is crapped out. I only had one of my daughter's CD's in the player, and what 46 year old guy wants to listen to Hannah Montana sing about the "Best of Boat Worms" or what ever that song is called. Any way, I listened to FM and I have to say that this was a great mod. The bass is much more powerful and the mids sound very crisp. I was concerned that the power would not be there but it is fine.

I had to adjust the bass down, it has nuch better response. I wll replace the rears at some point but will leave the amp stock. If you are on the ffence about doing this, make the commitment and do it. It may be cheaper now that Parts.com has gotten the act together but either way you won't be sorry.

Oh and my Garmin. I am having it replaced so in the mean time I have the music sourced though a card reader connected to the USB. I miss my Garmin interface.

 

Great feedback Callahan00. I wish I could hear your set-up.

I have been thinking about this for some time..... just was concerned that it would be that much better than what I have now. I only want to do the door swaps as well. Maybe the pillar tweeters but wonder if that would be a waste of money.

 

Augie,

Do it you'll be happy with it.

Nice looking JCW. You shoudl check out the Alta thread about the Access Port. I put in on my R56 and it is at Factory JCW level. The Factory JCW guys are getting incredible power boosts. Another mod well worth the money. The thread is in Modifications --> Drivetrain. Check it ot

 

I just ordered a pair of the HK lower door speakers from Ray at Morristown Mini, $175.50 shipped to the door. They ony had 1 in stock so I'll be waiting a while until they show up. I'll post when they arrive and how much difference they make.

 

I installed the rear 6x9's today. It took me about 4.5 hours. it wanted to take my time and not break anything. It went well and I am enjoying the heightened base line. I also add some CCFs from sound deadening showroom.

 

The Harmon Kardon lower door speakers arrived from Morristown MINI yesterday. I removed the passenger door speaker and took a couple of pictures for comparison. The HK's look very similar, but are deeper and much heavier. The stock Hi-Fi is on the left and the HK on the right.

Here's the second one.

 

Pardon the ignorance, but I've checked on Morristown MINIs website, I don't see the Harmon Kardon Stereo components listed, does it take a phone call to get them ordered??

TIA

Ps. I'm wanting to do the Full Monty!!

 

It might take an phone call or email, ask for Ray. He should be able to get you everything you need.

 

Woo Hoo!! Thanks Big Jim!!

Prolly won't be able to have it done 'til April '11, Molly's 3rd B-Day, but if I can swing it before then...you know I will!!

Just got off the phone w/my Dealer 10min. ago, I will definitely be doing the HK Upgrade in April '11...if not sooner. Price wasn't as cost prohibitive as the Parts Guy first said, for parts anyway, labor I'm sure will be a whole other matter!!

 

I got the door woofers installed today and this is truely a 30 minute upgrade that is plug and play. Removing the door panels is very easy and anyone can have one off in 5 minutes. Just read some of the messages boards on replacing the speakers for instructions.
The sound is much improved over the standard Hi-FI with much deeper bass. Replacing just the door woofers should be the starting point to upgrading the 2007-2009 Hi-Fi system. This is going to be the only uprade to my system I make. Cost again was $175.50

 

So you're having the dealer install it?
Are you planning on doing the HK amp as well?

If so, please have them detail exactly what they do to get the amp working properly (any stereo software updates, etc.): mine didn't prove to be plug-and-play with my '09 MCS (see an earlier post for details), and I'm very interested to find out what it takes to fix that.

 

This question was posted much earlier in the thread, and I think it's a question most folks considering this upgrade are wondering so I thought I'd weigh in....

So why not just use off-the-shelf aftermarket speakers? Because modern OEM car audio systems aren’t like your home audio system – the various components are NOT interchangeable. The MINI’s factory amplifier (both HiFi and H/K) has active crossovers and DSP (Digital Signal Processing) that divide up the frequencies and send them to the various speakers. Each speaker in the system gets a signal that the speaker is designed for (well, sort of….but that’s another topic entirely).

Speakers aren’t one-size-fits-all. A speaker that is optimized to produce bass won’t produce midrange or treble well, and vice-versa. Most quality aftermarket speakers are designed (as all speakers are) as a compromise – in the case of your typical 6” mid-woofer that compromise is between midrange clarity, bass-extension, and efficiency, among other things. In the HiFi and H/K systems, the 6” door speaker is only a bass speaker. I’ve attached an image showing the electrical output from the HiFi amp to the door woofer (keep in mind this is the electrical signal – not the acoustic output from the speaker). You can see that the door woofer gets a highly processed signal that only covers from 20-80Hz, with a hefty bump around 35Hz. The signal is processed this way to match the physical properties of the HiFi door woofer, and also to try to make up for its deficiencies to a certain extent. I’ve attached a second image that shows the power output from the amp to the door woofer, just before clipping. The door woofer is getting only 24 watts – that’s all the amp can deliver (and this is by far the most powerful channel of the HiFi amp!). I can assure you, there isn’t a single aftermarket speaker available that will perform accurately with this signal and power combination. This is just the situation with the door woofer, it gets worse with the other speakers.

All of that said, I’m not advocating for the H/K upgrade. Why? Because even though the H/K components are of better quality than the HiFi (and certainly the base system), they are still an unbelievable rip-off. That woofer that MINI is charging you $100 for? It’s about a $10 speaker. The other issue is that plugging the H/K speakers into the HiFi system is going to give you the same problems as above, albeit to a far lesser extent than with a typical aftermarket speaker. I realize that some folks on this thread have swapped in the H/K speakers and have been pleased with the results, but just know that a HiFi amp + H/K speakers isn’t going to be a perfect match.

 

Dealer quoted me parts as a HK Stereo Upgrade, don't know if that included the Amp, I'm guessing it did since you can't do an Upgrade without having "all" components.

I will try and have them detail as much as possible, however this won't be happening 'til April next year.

 

Was the quote for parts more than $1,000? If not, no amp, as that's about a grand by itself from the dealer.

The parts I have for my hifi->hk upgrade are:
— 4 door speakers (2 per door)
— 2 front tweeters with HK A-pilars
— 2 rear 6x9 speakers
— 2 rear tweeters
— 2 rear wave guides (plastic piece that goes between speaker and interior trim panel)
— 1 HK amp

 

Hmmm...interesting, guess I'll have to see a complete list of parts I was quoted. A-pilars were what I was wondering, he didn't even ask which Headliner I had??

 

I'm also wondering about the A-pillars. It seems as though everyone who's ordered them got them in black. My problem is that I have the standard gray headliner with matching A-pillars.

From what I can see looking around, the HK pillars are only available in black. Am I mistaken in this regard? Can I get the HK tweets san pillars and swap them with the HiFi tweets in the stock pillars?

 

http://www.realoem.com/bmw/showparts...51&fg=40&hl=29

The gray HK pillars are:
51437236258 Right
51437236257 Left