jimbo01

Got to watch those sales people though, selling high end monster speaker cable, HNMI cable, and subwoofer cables on bottem end systems where there is absolutely no decernable difference for 99% of people. Caught one the Harvey Normans sale staff using the RCA video in, and showing the HUGE different made by the monster HDMI cable. Was serriously unimpressed when I let his awed older customers into his nasty little trick, and pointed them in the direction of the gaming consoles where you could buy a perfewctly good HDMI cable for about $40. They also sold my sister inlaw over $600 of damn monster cables when she bought an a 42" HD TV, not full HD, just the minimum spec ones they can claim are HD, a end of line Yamaha sound bar which came with a sub cable, and another brand DVD player (not a bluray). Confronted the sale guy who claimed it was a high end system so I got the manger, and asked him if what my sister in law had bough was in any way "high end", he admited it wasn't. I did a blind test with my sister in law and family with the $120 worth of cables we bought from d*ck Smith (including an additional VGA cable for her PC). No one could see or hear any difference.

Bought an extended warrenty with the POS Sony SXRD 60" TV on the recommenedation of the Harvey Normans sales guy. Glad we did - thing failed with 3 separate and well documented faults after the standard warrenty eexpired. Replaced as the other was consided a lemon with a new Sony 55 inch. It is not an equivalent TV but better than the old faulty one.

With 3D there are 2 systems, active which have active shutter glasses and you get full HD, or as LG has done on it's LED TV's, you can have passive 3D, and use the glasses from your local movies theatre. There is one MASSIVE drawback with this though and that is 1/2 the lines are for one eye, the other 1/2 are for the other so basically 1/2 HD. At some point there will be 4K TV's, but even when they arrive they are likeley to carry a premium price for some time. A few of the latest hometheater receivers are including 4K upscaling, they would have to as there is no 4K content. I read that a standard Bluray would not be able to hold a normal movie at the 4K spec - there is just too much data. So we will need new players, and if you download the contetnt they will be huge files, much much bigger than a normal HD movie file. Even with digital broadcasting the signal will require a lot of bandwidth as again there is so much data. So is it something to hold off buying now for? - no way (unless you love being 1st on the block to own something, and have money to burn - they will be pricy).

I'll post details of the reversing camera install, I have a few photos of it. Camera kit is from Hotwire who sells them on Trademe. Camera includes a LED and fits into one of the rear number plate lights. It needs a little modification to get it to fit in the E38 number plate light hole (I used silicon to hold it in place). Kit includes a LED bulb for the other number plate light. There were a couple of mods needed to tap into the video on the video module and Hotwire provides the details of this with the kit. As to turning on the amps; my 'remote on' feed is a white whire from the boot head unit wiring. I think its the 'car awake' wire as the amps stay on for a short while after the car is switched off, then the blue power lights go out. Because of this the moment I turn on the radio or CD I have sound.

http://www.meeknet.co.uk/e38/AV/Index.htm

http://www.bmw-planet.com/diagrams/release...65e66/index.htm Follow this to get to the BMW wiring diragrams site. Every damn connector, module, swtich, and wire is covered down the the colour of the wires. May have to use the Chrome browser to see the diagrams as the site uses Scalable Vector Graphics with IE8 on my Vista Machine wont display, and the IE9 on my Winodws 7 machine won't display. Comes in very useful when doing stuff to BMW's.

Finished the passenger door. Getting the door panel off on these is easy, and getting it back on easy too. Amazed as tweeter is quiet a bit bigger than the old midrange, and new woofer speaker is mounted on a 18mm MDF spacer I made tonight. I fully expected issues. I re-used the old foam seal that goes between the original speaker and the door panel but I think it's contacting the rubber edges of the new speaker due to the spacer so I'll pull the door off and trim it back. Had to pull the door panel off again anyway to replace 4 door clips which Smith and Smith Galss munted when they replaced the window glass. Doing the next door will be easy now I know what to do so i'll take a few more picks and add a new topic covering replacing / upgrading a front door speaker in an E38. If Abtec come back to me with the answers I need (that it will accept line level inputs) I'll buy this to give me iPOD connectivity, and control over the sub level etc. As it comes with a remote it means the kids can skip the music they don't like without me having to do it.

What says mute, the E38 system? Isn't there a jack for the sound (mono) as well as AV?

Got the amps powered up tonight. Major step was pulling the inner door trim off the front passenger door to get at the speakers. I've removed the tiny little mid range and tweeter from the top of the door trim and am installing the tweeter where the mid range was. Have modified the heck out of the plastic mount that came with the Pioneer tweeter and will hot glue it into place tomorrow. Will trial fit after that to check it's going to fit but basically it's suck it and see. New mid woofer needs about a 15mm spacer. I'm not going to be able to leave the stock speaker grills in pace as they have nasty plastic bits protruding in that would damage the rubber edges of the new speakers. Thinking of cutting a hole in the door trim so the speaker pokes through and then use the Pioneer speaker cover. Alternatively I'll remove the exisitng speaker grill and just bolt the Pioneer grill to the trim with the heads inside the door. They will be outside the diameter of the rubber so shouldn't casue a problem.

Sony have an interesting unit, the DSP XDP-MU110 takes the output from a headunit and adds in iPOD as a source so you can switch between standard stereo or the iPOD/iPhone. Only issue is that it take speaker level inputs and I've tapped into the wiring before the E38's amps. iPOD goes in a dock with basic controls. Probably not a bad option for an E38 but it depends on if the line level output from the BMW headunti will drive it. Anyone tried it?

Got the amps re-installed tonight and tested. Now just need to connect the power and earth. Going to tackle one of the door speakers this weekend. My replacement speakers are huge so not sure exactly how I'm going to get them to fit in the sealed enclosures, or even if retaining these is a good idea. The other option would be to mount on the door pannel, use some dynamat, and use infinate the free air / baffle. Thankfully there are decent youtube videos on how to remove the door panels and replace the speakers.

Agree on getting an X5 one day. It would definately be a turbo diesel, although not a chipped one. We were impressed with the diesel performance and even with buying km's for the road user charges it was cheap to run day to day. Audis are not cheap to repair, not just because of expensive parts, but also some of the cheaper parts, like the thermostat, are placed where it takes an huge amount of labour to replace. Basically a cambelt job, without the cambelt. It would help if those replacing the cam belt (Audi agents in Hamilton) actually replaced the thermostat at the same time as repalcing the cam belt. Unlikely to buy another Audi - ever. What also didn't impress was the issues with the letters on controls wearing off, and according to forums something still not solved in even some recent Audis. Just not good enough for what is supposed to be a premium product. According to Reuben at Powerhaus, Alltec told him MOST of the turbo failures they see are from cars that have been chipped so yeah I guess they they are seeing a pattern. They took a look at my toasted Turbo and asked "Is the car chipped?". No idea if this is across turbos in general, or specifically diesel cars. That said if you chip a car you need to make sure it is properly maintained. Previous owners + Ford in Taupo are obvioulsy not up to the job. Replacing an oil filter but leaving the old oil seal in place is crap maintenance. Having an engine bay coated with oil due to a loose oil filter is crap maintenance. Having no anti freeze in the cooling system is crap maintencance. Having a completely dirty air filter is crap maintenance. Maybe if it had been preperly maintained this would not have been a problem.

Sold the damn things on TM with full disclosure that there were illegal and got $30! Woohoo. Just $520 out of pocket.

My E38 rear left is higher than the rear right. Wheels are the same, as are the tyres. Doesn't seem to affect it in any way.

Hey Grant - hows things? Been out tracing wiring and looking at the online BMW wiring diagrams. There is something very strange going on. My car is a December 1999 E38, facelift, BUT the wiring in the boot lid appears to be pre-facelift based on the wiring colours. There are a number of wires going through the conduit that appear to be double ups, i.e. the same colour wire is there more than once (and not just the brown earth wires). There are also too many wires, which may explain why the conduit was such a tight fit. There are a number of wires that have been reconnected as the joints are covered in shrink-wrap. I'm thinking WTF but using the pre facelift diagrams I have identified the offending wire; a gray/brown wire from the S205 rear lid swtich that ends up at the General module.