Yes, this is just another owner’s take on the forum-polarizing topic of upgrading their Harman Kardon “Premium” sound system. My personal journey inspired by actual events…
Who: Me. A 2023 Telly SX owner since October 2022. I love music and the experience of both listening and feeling it, especially while driving when the only alternative is talking with my family. I have kids who love music, too. I also have kids whose eventual screaming matches need a good drowning out from time-to-time.
What: The Harman Kardon, 630-watt, 12-speaker, 11-channel, factory-EQ’d sound system. Always gotta be a bit cautiously optimistic with stereo systems in mainstream vehicles, especially those tagged with a “premium” label. I chose the SX trim for all the other bells and whistles, so with that the H/K system was the only option.
Why: For me this H/K system just did not deliver what I enjoy about music. Up to about volume level 50 (~66% max), it’s decent. It was well-balanced, full and therefore probably meets the acceptance of the vast majority of owners. However at volume level 50 it just still wasn’t very loud or powerful and I could definitely hear the low end really start to taper off when pushing it further, not to mention the factory EQ-ing and processing becoming more apparent. So it was right there at those entry listening volumes where the H/K really fell apart for me.
Solution: An upgrade. Being my family hauler I wanted any upgrade to be as minimally impactful to the space and functionality of the vehicle as possible. That decided, I was limited to space under seats and in the rear storage compartment. Also didn’t want to reach too far into my wallet, so any holiday sales and scratch & dent deals were prioritized (Crutchfield
).
Plan:
Install:
Setup:
Conclusion: Totally biased here.... These upgrades perform excellent and have given me the sound system in the Telly that I wanted. A vast improvement over stock and done so within a reasonable budget. I have retained all audio functionality, albeit with some new methods to do so. Will now be enjoying this ride even more until I trade it in for a ‘24 later this year (simply because of the amber DRLs).
D-4.800 install:
H/K amp breakout harness:
*Pre- soldering to speed wire.
D-4.800 fuse:
Sub fuse:
Firewall:
Sub install:
D-4.800 remote:
H/K Front woofer signal:
H/K Front tweeter signal:
H/K Rear channel signal:
*Kinda confused by this one as it drives both the woofer and tweeter, but nothing much on the high side??? The front woofer channel looks more appropriate for the rear setup.
Who: Me. A 2023 Telly SX owner since October 2022. I love music and the experience of both listening and feeling it, especially while driving when the only alternative is talking with my family. I have kids who love music, too. I also have kids whose eventual screaming matches need a good drowning out from time-to-time.
What: The Harman Kardon, 630-watt, 12-speaker, 11-channel, factory-EQ’d sound system. Always gotta be a bit cautiously optimistic with stereo systems in mainstream vehicles, especially those tagged with a “premium” label. I chose the SX trim for all the other bells and whistles, so with that the H/K system was the only option.
Why: For me this H/K system just did not deliver what I enjoy about music. Up to about volume level 50 (~66% max), it’s decent. It was well-balanced, full and therefore probably meets the acceptance of the vast majority of owners. However at volume level 50 it just still wasn’t very loud or powerful and I could definitely hear the low end really start to taper off when pushing it further, not to mention the factory EQ-ing and processing becoming more apparent. So it was right there at those entry listening volumes where the H/K really fell apart for me.
Solution: An upgrade. Being my family hauler I wanted any upgrade to be as minimally impactful to the space and functionality of the vehicle as possible. That decided, I was limited to space under seats and in the rear storage compartment. Also didn’t want to reach too far into my wallet, so any holiday sales and scratch & dent deals were prioritized (Crutchfield
).Plan:
- Upgrade #1: Speakers. I knew from the start that replicating the 11 H/K channels was not an option. The center and 2x surround channels were of little added value. And the sub, well…it tries for a bit. By that assessment I knew I would target the doors and sub, all of which could certainly outperform any artificial presets for soundstaging and general overall performance. A prime example of quality > quantity. Seeing in these forums the difficulty of pushing new speaker wire out thru those door connectors, I chose to stick with the stock wiring and go with passive x-overs and components, similar to the stock setup in the rear doors (2x speakers/channel vs. 1x speaker/ch in front). IMO components outperform coaxials, and the Telly is already designed for components with those stock locations. I ended up going with Polk speakers, x-over mounted and wired all within each door.
- Upgrade #2: DSP/amp. By my remedial math, 5 output channels is what I needed; 1ch to each door and a 5th for a new sub. DSP…yes. The H/K amp doesn’t just amplify, it also does a ton of processing without a lot of user control other than a 3-band EQ in the H/U. Considering my minimal space impact I chose to go with the Audio Control D-4.800 amp/DSP combo unit. Why? Size: small; Power: big (125w/ch RMS); accepts amplified hi-level inputs; built-in DSP providing full customization (x-over, time alignment, 30-band EQ, signal summing). Although only 4 channels, this unit does have one low-level output, perfect to feed a…
- Upgrade #3: Powered subwoofer. The factory sub has nothing to give at higher volumes which makes music sound empty and unbalanced without those low-end frequencies. Again considering space, I went with the Kicker 46HS10 (180w RMS) which fits wonderfully in the rear cargo compartment. Neighborhood-shattering…no. Does it complete the music with power, depth and balance…absolutely.
Install:
- The 6.5” Polk’s were basically a direct switch with the stocks. Drilled one little vertical hole to pass the woofer wire from behind the inner door panel. Passive x-overs fit just fine on the inner door panel with some Gorilla tape and #6 bolt+nut. The stock tweeters are built into a plastic bracket, so for the Polk’s I used #8 screws in the stock door holes with the tweets mounted to a thin piece of aluminum; using multiple nuts you can adjust the installation heights to match the offset angles on the door. Respective wires routed to the x-over with the stock woofer wire; secured neatly with Tesa tape. In the front doors, the stock tweeter wire is now unused.
- The D-4.800 went under the driver’s seat; it’s quite small and should not interfere with (or by) kid or adult feet. This location was ideal as it’s in close proximity to the H/K amp to pull signal and push back out to speakers along with being on the same side as the battery for powering. I used 4 gauge directly from the battery, passed thru the firewall in the footwell area and routed down under the floor side trim. Used a weather-sealed grommet and zip-ties throughout. Made a simple bracket and mounted the fuse right in front of the battery. Since I wanted to utilize the stock speaker wiring, I had to find a way to both grab the amplified H/K signal for the D-4.800 and send its new signal back out to the speakers. For that I made a breakout harness that inserts between the vehicle connector and into the H/K amp, permitting me to do so without cutting any factory wiring. Since there wasn’t much slack available from the factory connections, I re-mounted the H/K amp about two inches closer to the door to create some breathing room for the new wiring. Two runs of speed wire between the driver and passenger seats was all I needed to make the needed signal/speaker connections; removal of both seats and center console were ideal to making it clean, direct and secure, and didn’t wind up being nearly as challenging as I anticipated.
- The Kicker sits nicely on the driver's side in the cargo compartment. Powered directly from the battery with similar installation and wire routing as the D-4.800. One pair of RCAs and a single trigger wire from the D-4.800 was all else it required. Although far from an ideal sub enclosure, the cargo compartment does “port” thru the stock sub location and doesn’t seem limited by the rigid cargo cover plus mat. For me those sub freq are prob more about the feel than they are the direct sound.
- Additionally, I did replace the stock battery ground wire with 0-AWG.
Setup:
- The DSP is certainly the brains of this operation (more-so than me) and where all these upgrades come together. The factory EQ, corrected. The factory bass roll-off, gone. The ability to customize the sound however I choose, available. With this setup all other voice and navigation features are completely retained which was critical as I use them every day.
- Prior to my final install I did take a look at what the factory signals looked like and decided to utilize the front woofer and tweeter channels for primary sound; although the rear signal didn’t offer anything additional than those fronts, I did use them to retain music playing during voice nav prompts (fronts set to auto-mute in H/U). In the DSP I summed those four front and two rear channels, set a high pass and now use that summed signal to drive both the front and rear doors. The sub receives only the front woofer signal with a low pass. Again with this particular setup I retained H/U volume control and balance, but not fade. However, what I also really like about the D-4.800 is its ability to store multiple configuration presets: with the Audio Control remote (mounted in the fuse panel) I have the ability to change those presets for a particular driving scenario. Primarily, I’ll have all speakers on, but on road trips when the kids are passed out I can easily change to a preset that has no sound in the rear speakers (effectively a fade). I also have that same remote linked to control the sub volume so it can be adjusted as needed.
Conclusion: Totally biased here.... These upgrades perform excellent and have given me the sound system in the Telly that I wanted. A vast improvement over stock and done so within a reasonable budget. I have retained all audio functionality, albeit with some new methods to do so. Will now be enjoying this ride even more until I trade it in for a ‘24 later this year (simply because of the amber DRLs).
D-4.800 install:
H/K amp breakout harness:
*Pre- soldering to speed wire.
D-4.800 fuse:
Sub fuse:
Firewall:
Sub install:
D-4.800 remote:
H/K Front woofer signal:
H/K Front tweeter signal:
H/K Rear channel signal:
*Kinda confused by this one as it drives both the woofer and tweeter, but nothing much on the high side??? The front woofer channel looks more appropriate for the rear setup.
