Here you will find equipment that I've used in the past.

I decided that the stock audio system in my 2002 Civic was junk, so I took a stab at getting much better sound in my car. This is what I ended up with, and I must say... I'm quite pleased. Every time I sit in my car, I turn it up and enjoy the beautiful sounds that come out of my speakers. I built the subwoofer box with the help of my gf. (With the help of people over at 7thgencivic.com). All said and done... I probably spent a good $1500 on it. Quite a bit of money compared to some installs... pennies compared to others.

Of course, there's always newer and better stuff out there... I get the itch to go out and spend money from time to time... but I resist!. Main 'upgrades' I'll be getting in the future are a) MP3 Eclipse deck, and maybe custom (or q-logic) kick panels. My latest pride and joy... the 2003 Zapco Reference 350. Looks really nice and sounds damn good! And I only paid $30 over cost =)

Head Unit: Eclipse 5303R
The amazing, the great... Eclipse! They make some awesome decks, with clean output, and they're not too flashy! This is a 'deadhead' deck, meaning that it has no internal amplifier, so you *need* an amp in order to use it. It has a motorized flip down face, 3 RCA preouts (5V), and reads CD-Rs (no CD-RW, unfortunately); no MP3 support. This was a top of the line model, once upon a time, and still makes a great deck. You can find one on eBay for ~$150 + S&H. My only complaint is that it'll skip sometimes at a relatively slow speed, it works flawlessly most of the time though.

CD Changer: Eclipse 5122 - 12 Disc Changer
This changer's awesome! I've never had it skip, and 12 discs provides plenty of music playback hours.

Components: Infinity Kappa 60.3cs
I bought these since quite a few people on the 7thgencivic forums were using them and recommended them. Speakers sounds pretty good, but the tweeters can be a bit harsh sometimes on the high notes (female singers singing pretty high pitched). Overall, they're good speakers! I would suggest that you don't install the tweeters anywhere that's close to your ears, preferrably, install 'em within 6" of your woofer. Rear speakers? I have none! And it sounds great without them. Having rear speakers would simply ruin the soundstage. I've sat in the back, and it souds good back there (most of the time, it's just me though) without there being any speakers in the rear.

Subwoofer Amp: MTX 6500D
And this is what powers my subwoofer. It was cheap pretty cheap, the amp is a subwoofer amp (mono, class D), and it does the job pretty well. I can put the volume up pretty high and only have very minimal lights dimming.

Last modified: Wed Oct 20 22:23:17 PDT 2004