2007 Honda Civic - Upgrading From Stock Honda Civic

Better:

The speakers would be Focal Polyglass 165 V2 6.5" components for the front doors, while the rear locations would receive Focal Polyglass 165 CV1 6.5" coaxials. The doors would be treated with a Dynamat Xtreme Door Kit and Dynaxorb panels would be placed behind the midrange to absorb and diffuse the back wave, increasing output and improving sound quality. "We've done testing on speakers, placing one Dynaxorb panel behind the midrange on one side and not on the other, and you can hear a dramatic difference," Young says. The rear speakers would also get the Dynamat Xtreme Speaker Kit treatment.

The subwoofer would be upgraded to a JL Audio 13W3v3 13" driver in a custom ported enclosure mounted in the hatch and integrated into the car. "This would be someone who would not be concerned with taking it out," Young says. "It's also for a customer that wants a lot of output. That's also why we went with the Focal Polyglass speakers, since they play loud and cut through the bass."

This system would get two amps: a JL Audio 300/4v2 (75 watts by 4) would drive the Focal speakers and a 500/1v2 mono amp (500 watts by 1) would power the sub. "By doing a 2-ohm subwoofer, it gives the customer the option to add another sub later and use the same amp to power both," Baldwin says.

A Stinger SWK4D 4-gauge Pro Multi-Amp Power Kit would route juice to the amps, Stinger SHX1717-foot Helix RCA cable would send the signal from the head unit to the amplifiers and Stinger SSW16BLK 16-gauge speaker wire would run from the outputs of the amps. "This system will play very loud but also be very responsive," Young says. "The 13" sub will give 40 percent more output than a 12" driver, but it doesn't take a box that's 40 percent larger," he adds. "And the Focal speakers are smooth, but will cut through the bass."

Better

Materials$363

Labor (14.5 Hrs)$1,475

Total$5,008

Best:

The head unit would be an Alpine IVA-W205 with plenty of bells and whistles. "You get the ability to add navigation plus iPod control," Young says. "You get a big screen with lots of information and it's really fast." The driver would have iPod control capability with the addition of an Alpine KCE-422i Full-Speed Connection cable and gain navigation-both in the Civic and any other vehicle-with the addition of Alpine's PMD-B200 Blackbird2 portable nav. This innovative portable docks inside the IVA-W205 and can be controlled by the head unit and use the head's 6.5-inch display. It can also be removed and used in another vehicle. "This is for the person that didn't buy the factory nav system," Baldwin says, "and it's much better and less expensive than the factory nav since you can move it to another car. It has RDS traffic and Bluetooth built in."

By adding an Alpine KCA-SC100 Sirius satellite radio interface and Sirius SC-C1 universal tuner as well as an Alpine TUA-T500HD HD Radio tuner module, the driver could access hundreds of channels of music, news, weather, sports, traffic and more. Sound Decision would also add a Peripheral PESWIAKJ interface that allows the Civic owner to keep the steering-wheel audio controls.

The front-door speakers would step up to Focal's high-end 165 K2P 6.5" components. "They are incredible speakers for the money and they are very durable," Young says. The rear locations would get Focal 165 KF 6.5" components, but they would be configured as coaxials with a conversion kit. The door speakers would again be installed with a Dynamat Xtreme Door Kit and Dynaxorbs, and the rear speakers with a Dynamat Speaker kit. Sound Decision would also step up to two JL Audio 10w7-3 10" subwoofers in a custom sealed box for this system.