[shaguar]

I recently finished installing a new system in my car: MATCH UP7BMW amp with USB DAC, SWS-8Xi woofers, ETON components and ETON coax rears/center. The system sounds pretty good, but the woofers lack mid-bass punch. (As others have said, the OEM woofers seem punchier than the SWS, but don’t go as low).

I am considering running an OEM woofer under one seat, and an SWS woofer under the other, and then set the IO/EQ in the MATCH amp accordingly.

Any chance this will get me closer to some deep bass and also some mid-punch? Or am I being a total noob and leaving out something obvious?

Thanks!
-Ian

[MarcoZandrini]

I've found the factory HK subs (low range woofer, really) are fine. Have you tuned the amp? That's the first step.

[BEM-S4]

Go back to factory underseat speakers (note I said speakers not subs) and if you can get your $ back get a proper setup in your trunk. It doesn't take much room and is much better if you have to pick one or the other (I upgraded both).

[jv92red]

OP - The main problem with the under-seat design is that the under-seat drivers have shallow enclosures so you are limited in using only shallow 8" subs and as a result, these drivers lack the physical cone travel needed to be able to reproduce the low frequencies that subwoofers are typically asked to reproduce. Also, subwoofers make awful sounding midrange drivers. Putting subs under the seats presents an issue in missing frequency response starting from where you low pass them and where you high pass your door mids. So after seeing this missing frequency response one would decide to go ahead to fill in the missing response and raise the low pass point of your subs higher to meet the low end (high pass point) of the mids so your Eton 4" mids have a resonate frequency of 87Hz so general rule of thumb to avoid distortion is at least twice the drivers resonate frequency for a high pass point so 175 Hz to 200Hz or so depending on the amount of power you're feeding them. So in this example, you're asking your subs to produce sound from the low end starting around ~20Hz all the way up to 200Hz which is a bad compromise. That midbass punch as you are referring to happens mostly in the 70Hz/80Hz to 200HZ/300Hz frequency range which subs are not designed to reproduce as effectively as dedicated midbass drivers. So you're either missing these "punch" frequencies with a void in crossover settings or your reproducing them with a sub so they are present but not accurately reproduced. (BTW I wouldn't try to x over those Eton's lower than 175HZ to try and make up some of that lost response as they will certainly fry)

The factory 8" underseat subs are ok as midbass drivers and not very good as subs. partly because of the design of the driver and again because of the location they are in. They are a compromise and to improve the sound you need to re-think using subs for these locations.

The solution is to nix the underseast sub idea and use midbass drivers for this location and use a dedicated sub (or subs) in the rear. So now with dedicated mid-bass drivers under the seats, you can find drivers that perform better at these higher frequencies than subs. Since you'll be bandpassing them, they will free themselves up since they are not playing as large a frequency spectrum and also this allows them to handle more power as well. A past BMW forum favorite were the Jehnert XE200 8" midbass drivers. They excel above 80Hz but do not below that. Not sure if they are still available in the US but Jehnert is still offering them in Europe I believe. You may be able to find a U.S. distributor to get you a pair. A car audio forum favorite 8" midbass for this location in BMW's are the Audio Development W800NEO drivers. They can be high passed a little lower at 60Hz to 70Hz and they outperform the Jehnert XE200 but that comes at a higher price, they're $700 for the pair. The Illusion Audio C8-W and Focal Utopia 8WM would both work well too but they're priced more than the W800NEO's. Most of the replacement 8" drivers tailored for this location as BMW replacement 8" drivers are designed and marketed as subs and this is the problem with what you have in those SWS-8XI.

So if going midbass under the seats that leaves going with sub(s) in the back. With a dedicated 3 way front stage you can now look at adding the low frequencies properly with a legitimate 10" or 12" subwoofer in a rear quarter enclosure or sub box. You should get very good performance from one dedicated 10" sub so I would recommend doing a Musicar enclosure. They run $495 but you may be able to find a local shop to do a custom fiberglass enclosure cheaper?
https://musicarcertified.com/product...fer-enclosure/

Also, I believe there is an eBay seller called VisualIce that sells custom rear quarter enclosures for BMW's. They are located in the UK and will do it for around $250 shipped last I checked but the issue is long lead time with fab time + shipping time.

If after all of that above and you still want to stick with what you have then honestly I would just sell the SWS-8XI woofers and get what you can back from them and put the stock 8" drivers back in, bandpass them like I explained above and then add a sub or subs to the back and be done. You'll like the sound better than trying to make the SWS-8Xi work as a compromise without rear sub(s).

But to add some of my personal .02 to this, you went through the trouble and investment of changing out the stock front speakers and crappy amp to have a very nice setup with the Eton's and Match DSP/Amp so it sounds like your goal is to have a high-quality sound system at an as reasonable a cost as possible. Part of having a nice system that can sound very good is having drivers in the system that make sense and that can be tuned as a whole to sound great. You've made too much of an investment to start compromising on sound. You're ALMOST there, don't stop now!

edit: I see you're in Oregon. MusicarNW are located in Portland. I would give them a call or even pay them a visit if possible. They have a TON of experience in doing BMW sound systems and will steer you in the right direction.

[Hekler]

I did the eton speakers, the match amp and tuned it pretty good. In the end I just wasn't going to be satsified so I broke down and bought the musicar box, added the JL speaker and amp and finally, have a tremendous sounding system.

The musicar box is pricey but is really stout. Adds a really solid punch. I doubt any one would be sorry for buying this enclosure...

[shaguar]

Thank you so much for the responses, everyone. You rock. jv92red, that was the pep talk I needed!

You've convinced me to go all-in and do the rear sub too. I've been lurking this audio section for awhile, and my gut kept telling me to skip the SWS, and just do the Musicar enclosure. Always trust your instincts.

Last week I grabbed some Amazon gift cards from a Christmas-past and decided to get cute and order the SWS's, what a waste of time. Anyone reading this in the future: the SWS's do not get the job done. For what you gain on the low end, you'll miss 2x more in the mid-range.

Thank goodness for the Amazon return policy!

There's no free lunch

[Arominus]

I did the visual ice box and got it in about a month, very very worth the wait. Big ups on these midbass suggestions as thats my next step.

[cooolone2]

Sub'd (pun intended)

[TropikThunder]

Originally Posted by jv92red

BTW I wouldn't try to x over those Eton's lower than 175HZ to try and make up some of that lost response as they will certainly fry.

Great post, just one minor thing I would point out: Eton sells high-pass filters for their mids if they're getting full-range signal (like if you're not using a DSP). The cut-off for those HP filters is 160 Hz, so I think it's safe to say the Eton 100's can go down to 160 Hz. Whether that's the best frequency depends on what underseat midbass drivers you're using, but they can go below 175 Hz.
B 100 XHP: https://www.eton-gmbh.com/en/product...uct/b-100-xhp/

The crossover point for the XHP isn't listed on it's product page, but is listed in the installation manual for the B100's: https://www.eton-gmbh.com/fileadmin/...210111_web.pdf

[Encanto]

You should have been able to coerce enough mid-bass from the SWS-8Xi with the UP-7BMW.

Originally Posted by shaguar

Thank you so much for the responses, everyone. You rock. jv92red, that was the pep talk I needed!

You've convinced me to go all-in and do the rear sub too. I've been lurking this audio section for awhile, and my gut kept telling me to skip the SWS, and just do the Musicar enclosure. Always trust your instincts.

Last week I grabbed some Amazon gift cards from a Christmas-past and decided to get cute and order the SWS's, what a waste of time. Anyone reading this in the future: the SWS's do not get the job done. For what you gain on the low end, you'll miss 2x more in the mid-range.

Thank goodness for the Amazon return policy!

There's no free lunch

[Humpus]

I'm in the same boat. Installed the UP7 BMW and changed the door speakers and dashboard speaker to Etons. With the DSP software I can make the underseat subwoofers kick but they I have a massive dip at 35hz and 65hz, and a massive peak at 45hz.

Anyways, I'm not willing to spend a lot more money than I already did. I'll bandpass the underseat speakers to become mid-bass speakers, and I'd like to add a powered sub to the back.

I have an F48 so I'll have to make my own enclosure. I saw an awesome example here.

Due to space limitations, only low profile 10 inch subs will fit.
To keep the price low, I was thinking about a Rockford Fosgate R2SD2-10 combined with a Crunch DSX-1750 amp. Will that do the trick?

I could also just go for a MATCH PP 8E-Q, but then I will still need a 200W RMS amp.

[Jcoop901]

It's quite basic innit? You need air and space to create volume and reproduce frequency. The under-seat subs will always suck. There is simply not enough space in the enclosure. You can deny this fact, but you are simply in denial. If you want true, real, accurate frequency reproduction that you can honestly feel you need a dedicated enclosure in the trunk.

[Humpus]

That's true, but it depends on what you're after. Big bass requires a lot of space, a lot of power and therefore a lot of money.

I'm thinking of just putting a Pioneer TS-WX400DA in the trunk and be done with it. It will fit under the folding floor and it will produce sub 40hz bass which the underseat subwoofers cannot. It's only 100W RMS but it comes with a remote that you can mount in the little glove compartment at the front.

So it might not have strong bass, but it's easy to connect, won't draw a lot of power, can be removed easily when changing cars, and I can turn the bass up or down depending on the song.

Check out Xorbitman's post here.

[Jcoop901]

Yes, you definitely don't NEED anything extreme. What I have is overkill for sure. A simple sub mounted in a small box will definitely do the job. There are some nice setups that take up very little trunk space and provide excellent response.

[Humpus]

I'm afraid if I ever go overkill, I can't go back anymore

I ordered the Pioneer today. If it doesn't do the job, I'll create my own fiberglass enclosure with something more powerful.