Hello to all...I just picked up my '04 MCS, Liquid yellow, Sport, stripes, roof panels, and HK upgrade. I love the car...2600 miles in 10 Days!!!...but I am not in love with the HK system. Is it just me or do the rear speakers sound like an old Victrola with a wet towel thrown over it? What gives? If I turn the fader to only the back speakers...I've heard better sound from two tin cans tied together with a string. It seems that 98% of the sound comes from the fronts. Are the rears acting as a sub? Other than that, the car is awesome...Borla exhaust, 15% pulley, Alta intake and diverter are right around the corner. Thanks

 

Check the settings in the unit. Typically it is set to "Driver", which is not bad. Ups the volume when you drive and lowers it when you stop. Plus it "aims" the sound at the driver's seat.

Something else to look at is the setting called.... forget. Anyways, the settings are like "Electronic" and "Ampitheatre" and such. Big difference in sound there.

Most people I have talked to say the bass in the HK system is terrible. Not bassy enough or something. I find the bass overpowers my treble. I have turned the bass down about halfway and it still overpowers the treble.

Oh well. For the most part I am happy with my HK system.

 

There are several problems with the HK system from a non-audiophile's point of view:

1) the bass is way too strong

2) there is no mid-range adjustment; with the bass so strong it's really hard to balance the system to sound good without it going either all bass or all treble

3) the automatic speed/volume control has never worked very well if at all (it's supposed to increase volume when you speed up to account for road noise, and vice versa, but if it does it's so subtle as to be ineffective). A MFSW is key to counteract this nonexistant function!

 

I have the HK system in my car as well. I always keep the setting to "Electronic". Thats the setting that pretty much gives me that crisp digital sound. I am pretty much satisfied with it. But you have to keep some things in mind, you drive at high speeds with the windows down and you put the volume to max, the front speakers tend to sound shakey resulting in whatever music you have on not sounding good and as a result you have to put the volume down for it to go back normal again. I think that is the only setback of the HK system.

 

Agreed

Agreed :smile:

Totally disagree!! Yours MUST be broken. Mine works awesome. Increases the volumn and decreases with speed all to my satisfaction. :smile:


Agreed :smile: I most always have mine in the Electronic mode unless I'm listening to older recordings where the Festival mode seems to work really good at bringing depth to the sound.


Me too. I keep my bass three to four clicks down from center.

Hmmm. I've seen this a lot lately. Complaints about the HK system. I got one of the first ones (ordered car Dec 2002 and had a Jan 2003 production) so when I ordered the car, there was no way for me to listed to the HK prior to purchase. But now...there's plenty of people complaining about their new car with the HK. Did you test drive a car with one? I'm sure all dealerships have a car on site with HK for you to listen to. It's not just you MeloYelo. There's been a rash of people over the last few months "complaining" about the HK system they bought. I'm just very surprised!

What mode do you have it in? There is only one mode that adequately places full spectrum of sound to the rears. Read the manual as it will tell you why the rears are acting as subs. Go ask your motoring advisor how to adjust it, or if you're in the PHX area, I can show you how to work it. Give me a PM and we can hook up.

 

Short answer: Don't turn to rears only

The rear speakers are almost-subs - there is no mid range or tweeter unit in the rear. In some modes (eg: spatial) some low-mid-range comes from the rear speakers, but their primary job is low frequency.
The HK system is designed to be forward biased (my biggest complaint with it, though I have got used to it).

 

Check the current H/K audio setting in your stereo. "MINI H/K", "Electronic" and "Instrumental" are all front speaker biased (Front stage) sound processing modes. You will not hear the rear speakers, or if you do, you will get muffled sound from the rear coaxials.

Now modes "Spatial" and "Festival" use all 4 speakers in the car. In "Spatial" mode, your rear passengers will be able to hear the rear speakers or if you prefer to fade the sound stage towards the back of the car, you will be able to do so in this mode.

People don't seem to understand what the different H/K sound processing modes are supposed to do and blame this on very poor user documentation provided by MINI.

 

:smile: After fiddling around with all the different choices, I've basically settled on the MINI H/K setting as the all-around best. Radio sounds best on that setting and most of the CDs do, too. I have no problems with my auto/speed volume function...works just fine. Wanda is my second MINI, the first one had the stock sound system and the H/K has been well-worth the additional expense.


Clo/Wanda

 

My 9/2003 build '04 MCS HK stereo equipped car did not come with the speed volume stetting enabled.

Could it be that early build (2003) MINIs with the HK option still offered the speed volume feature and later removed?

 

There's a SPEED VOL setting on my Head Unit where you can adjust from 1 to 6. Later version of the HK Head Unit does not have this enabled. Why? Because the speed volumn is electronically done in the special HK Amplifier/DSP, not in the head unit. I spend the better part of two weeks trying to get my SPEED VOL to do anything...when it wouldn't do anything on the HK. Live and learn. To remove this confusion, MINI removed it from the Head Unit programming.

If yours doesn't automatically (in the Amp/DSP) adjust the speed volumn, then clearly there's something wrong.

Take it in for service.

 

It most likely could not be. Mine is a Dec '03 build and I have NO SPEED VOLUME FEATURE. I was told by the dealership that the HK didn't actually come with that feature -- only teh stock Boost system. I was told this, of course, AFTER I was told that the speed sensitive volume was unique to the H/K. And now I come to find that I SHOULD actually have it (per this thread) and boy am I pissed that the service advisors told me what then told me when I told them to fix it.

A PLAGUE ON MINI of PITTSBURGH!!!

 

Dominic, I remember seeing a lot of threads from early '03 that all complained about the speed sensitive function not working on the HK. You are the first person I've seen who says it works. Kudos to you. How did you make it work?

Peanut's build date is Jan '03; I have one of the early HK systems that has the speed setting available to fiddle with...

 

Are you saying you do not notice any automatic volumn adjustment based on speed? Or are you saying the "SPEED VOL" adjustement screen was removed from the head unit?

 

I was saying the 1-6 setting on the "SPEED VOL" appeared to do nothing. And it turns out, they do do nothing. The volumn automatically adjusts depending upon my speed. That has always worked. It was just that setting 1 was just like setting 6. No difference in the slope of the speed to volumn line. The slope is always there, just not adjustable via the SPEED VOL screen on the Head Unit.

 

Here's an older thread on some of the basics of the HK system. There's a long post in the middle that's a must read for all HK owners. There's a few followup posts that are good too.

https://www.northamericanmotoring.co...ead.php?t=9236

Enjoy!

 

There is absolutely, positively, without a single shred of doubt in my mind or in the mind of the many I have enlisted to double check my hearing, NO DIFFERENCE in the volume dependant upon speed. I do have the speed volume control on the head unit, but was told by my service advisor that that control was only a residual from the Boost system and that it did not function with the H/K system.

 

Interesting. Mine works and works fairly well (other than boosting the bass too much as compared to the other freq ranges). Big noticable difference between street and freeway. People who've riden with me can even notice it when decellerating down a freeway off-ramp and while accellerating onto the freeway. In other cars without speed vol, I always have to reach down and bump up the vol after getting onto the freeway or bump it down when exiting from the freeway. My HK auto-adjusts very well. Sounds like I lucked out and got the functionality or your (and others) are broken.

Same here...but I was told the speed sens volumn is handled in the Amp/DSP (no adjustments).

 

My system also has speed compensation such that I rarely need to adjust volume at highway speeds - except if the windows are open.

Since I have an aftermarket HU feeding into the HK amp, I have no "SPEEDVOL" adjustment but it still works because the function is inside the HK amp itself.

For a month or so I had an aftermarket amp and it was obvious to me that there was no speed compensation - I would have to adjust volume at different speeds. As soon as the HK amp went back in, that problem was once again solved.

 

So GBMINI, are we lucky that we have speed compensation in our HK's or are the other ones out there broken?

 

Dominic, I don't think my HK stereo is "broken" simply put it is likely that this feature was removed from the stereo's programming at some point later in production. Going thru the different parameter prompts in my HK headunit I do not have the option to select the auto volume feature (Which is fully present in the standard stereo of my other MINI, a '02 CVT) at all.

Like I said my stereo sounds and works great so not having access to the auto volume prompt does not automatically mean that something is "wrong" with it.


I think we could corroborate with other '04 and '05 HK stereo owners.

 

Here's another helpful explanation of the various listening modes of the H/K, no discussion of the variable volume tho'

http://www.angelfire.com/in2/guitar/minihkreview.html

 

Thanks for all of the answers. I guess it is just a matter of getting used to the way the HK system is set up. The sound is good, although it could use a bit more volume...but the HK issue only makes up about 1/2 of 1% of a complaint. The other 99.5% is just awesome!!!

 

Is it safe to say that, if you have the SPEEDVOL adjustment you SHOULD have the speed-sensitive volume feature? (and then I promise I'll quit hijacking this thread )

 

OM,
If you do *not* have the HK upgrade, you should find the SPEEDVOL adjustment and it should adjust the "simple" speed compensation built into the stock head unit.

If you *do* have the HK upgrade, your head unit may or may not be "smart" enough to hide the SPEEDVOL adjustment - but either way, it has no effect.
On the HK, all speed compensation is internal to the HK amp and follows a fixed and non-adjustable algorithm. Maybe not the best but that is how it is.

I was driving in to work today and noticed initially that the volume did not need adjusting as I increased in speed on the highway. But then I got to a bit of highway with noisier surface, and I did need to bump up the volume one notch. So HK compensation adjustment would be nice but presumably just too difficult for the programmers to achieve - instead they chose a "typical" subtle compensation.

 

^^ But then how do the people who have the H/K upgrade (as I do) ALSO have the speed compensation?