[hilld]

Originally Posted by perryinva

I went ahead an bit the bullet and bought the 8DSP from Allwood. I didn’t expect the extra import and export taxes above the shipping and sales tax (almost $135 more), so the total came out to $1060, still more than $400 less than Alphaone from Bimmertech. They include a profile, but I will try the others from hilld first. I will document that install and impressions of worth when done. Their kit includes the harnesses and power connection wiring.

Mine came from Allwood (no profile included), but it was a demo unit. I did have to modify the 2 flat black brackets included (drill new holes) to use the factory mounting holes/studs. I did use a couple of short M5 button screws to mount everything.

Are you simply installing the amp/harness or also replacing speakers. The tuning file might or might not work for you, but it will be a good starting point.

[hilld]

One more thing to recommend. Get a 6 or 10' USB2 male/female extension cable and then pass that through the ski door to your amp cable connection. That way no cables around the outside of the car while you are tuning. The most annoying thing I found is that the car wanted to shut down the electronics with just the ignition on (engine not running), so for the extensive session, I had the engine running.

[perryinva]

Did it come with the M5 screws, or do I need to pick some up? I am keeping the original speakers for now. One step at a time. Personally, the sound QUALITY with them, after playing with the equalizer, is adequate, but obviously I think it can be improved and volume is definitely inadequate. They are installing 2 profiles that they say are good for the G29, (and can easily be switched between to compare) but I will reserve judgment, of course. I have a bunch of USB extension cables, one shorter one I will leave permanently mounted to the unit and easily accessed. Then plug in to that one when I need to tune. I actually don’t own a Windows10 laptop, which I understand is the only platform the software uses (I have Windows Desktop PCs and Mac Airs) so I will just see what profiles do what first before I invest in a laptop! Inalready downloaded the software from Fischer-Audiotec and have run it on my desktop. Inhave a desktop in my garage. (BTW- FREAKING EXCELLENT garage you have there!!! Excellent 2 post lift and flooring, with ultra high ceilings. Way to do it!!!)

I’m surprise there isn’t a way to temporarily defeat the autoshutoff. That doesn’t make sense to have to have the car running whenever you make changes!

[hilld]

I am pretty sure I used 16mm long 5mm screws, but I have a large screw assortment on hand, so I just had to go to the parts drawer. I did have to redrill the 2 flat metal plates that came with the amp. As mine was a demo, some of the stuff was already installed and the M5 screws didn't come with it. The screws to attach the plates to the amp are stored on the amp, so that is good.

The amp has a USB cable that attaches and will reach into the trunk comfortably, however it is not long enough if you want to sit in the drivers seat with your laptop, that is what you need the extension cable for. I am using a Win 11 laptop that I use for car and scope work, but yes, the software is Windows only. If you have a desktop in the garage, just get a longer USB extension cable and use that.

As far as speaker replacement, I think you could just replace the front door speakers and perhaps the center channel and be ok. Quite frankly the rears don't do much. I did notice a bunch more bass with the woofer replacement, however, those are kind of a bear to get out, not terrible but not as easy as the doors. The center channel speaker can be replaced in 5 mins flat.

Good luck.

[perryinva]

I’m basing the install on the Bimmertech video posted earlier, so it is really straightforward. The video actually says 8mm screws. I’ve done speaker replacements in a few cars in the past, as those OE speakers were really pathetic, and have removed plenty of car door interiors, so like you said, besides having spare clips in hand (thanks for that part number), it isn’t really a big deal if I decide to swap them down the road.

I was thinking the same thing, that the door units and center are the main drivers, and would do them first, if need be. The rears do look like a real PITA, but compared to my last few cars, the bass is actually much better. I’m not THAT fanatic a car sound person, and long trips in this car are unlikely.

I assume the center speaker grill just prys out? I actually haven’t seen any replacement videos for that speaker, and it’s always good to see the best place to start prying to prevent any marring.

[hilld]

Yes, the center grill cover just pops off. You need to use a chatsworth type of driver with a T-20 torx bit to get the screws out as the windshield is pretty close.

As far as the size of the screws for the amp, it could be a different size. I didn't use the Match screws for the brackets as I didn't see them until afterwards, so it could be M8 for the car side of the bracket vs. M5's on the amp side of the bracket. It still requires some minor fabrication but noting major, a drill and a file and you should be in business.

[perryinva]

Thanks again, you have been very helpful. Let me ask yet another one. How do you know what channels in the 8DSP are assigned to what speakers in the Z4? OK, 2! Is VSP anything you used?

I have a number of microphones, so I will probably at least try the SoundEQ feature, at least for timing.

[hilld]

Originally Posted by perryinva

Thanks again, you have been very helpful. Let me ask yet another one. How do you know what channels in the 8DSP are assigned to what speakers in the Z4? OK, 2! Is VSP anything you used?

I have a number of microphones, so I will probably at least try the SoundEQ feature, at least for timing.

I tried all sorts of mapping, but basically it was LF, RF, LR, RR, CTR, Sub1, Sub2

I tried with and without VSP, the sound file from Fisher had VSP enabled. As a note, once you enable it, you cannot disable it, you will have to reset that profile, i.e. start over.

The default Fisher profile didn't use Sub1 and Sub2 for the woofers, but rather used LF(50%) and RF(50%), but it didn't have any bass. Once I deleted those and made the mapping Sub1 -> Sub1 and Sub2 -> Sub2 the bass reappeared. It should be fixed in the "modified" profile file.

I am currently traveling and won't be back for a few weeks, so I don't have access to the car to look at any settings.

[perryinva]

No problem and thank you once again for rhe tips! 8DSP is supposed to be here in 4 days.

[perryinva]

Ok, got my Match UP 8DSP. Just have to find time to install it. Turns out the profiles that Allwoods installed was one from Fischer and one “we have used from a coupe”, so pretty sure they will be useless. I’ll probably just buy me a cheap win11 laptop and play around with hillds modified profile. I have familiarized myself with the software in Demo mode on my desktop, and will try to preload it, first.

[perryinva]

Just a general FYI, while I have plenty of computers in house, a Win10/11 laptop was not one. I can’t really play with the 8DSP profiles without one, due to the software requirements. Costco has the Lenovo Ideapad 1 on sale for $150. It comes with Win11, 4GB Ram and a 128GB eMMC ssd, both soldered in. The Costco version, though, has one free memory and one free NVMe slot each. For $35, it’s an easy upgrade with an 8GB stick and a PCIE3 250 or 500 NVMe and it becomes a very nice, dirt cheap 15.5” hi res screen laptop with a 4hr plus battery for under $200. Without the added memory, even with the bloatware deleted, CPU and memory usage are always in the 90% plus range. The Win11 requirements mean it is a decent speed (4 core/thread 1.1MHz/3.3 boost, but certainly not a 3D gamer by any stretch), and doing a clean install of Win11 on the faster NVMe and the increased memory to 12GB total, drops memory and cpu usage WAY down and it becomes a very snappy and cool running laptop.

[perryinva]

Well, I finally got around to installing the Match UP 8DSP in my US HIFI (676) optioned S30i. It actually took me longer to drill/dremel the required holes/slots in the included brackets and make them align with the 3 existing threaded holes (for the HK DSP) in the RAM bracket, than to wire it up. 5 holes need to be drilled. Making a cardboard template of the existing holes then marking up the brackets is highly recommended.

First, the brackets have to be mounted to the DSP NON standard, which means drilling a hole in each bracket to mount to the DSP. The included T-20 torx screws are very short and require a chamfered hole for them to be flush and have enough thread engagement. The excess ears can be either cut off or left exposed if they protrude from the top. If they protrude from the bottom they will interfere. I only have handheld drills and a dremel, so it took some creative metal work. Once mounted, use the template to locate the holes. The lower left hole can be used, but the chintzy brackets mounted non standard, place the existing holes too close to the DSP, so that hole has to be elongated away from the DSP to provide socket clearance. The brackets are barely wide enough to cover the threaded holes, so if you have a drill press, you can get them close enough to the edge. I ended up drilling close and then slotting them. I used locking washers to mount.

The mounting bolts needed to mount to the RAM bracket are M5-.80- 10 or 12mm length, that takes an 8mm socket. I was foing to add pictures, but hilld pretty much covered everything with his pictures.

The wiring is idiot proof; if you have the experience to do this install, that is the easy part.

Mine came with a “working” coupe profile installed from Allwood, where I bought the DSP on ebay, that was pretty much unusable. All it did was show me that the amp/DSP worked, and it was capable of more power than the speakers could handle. IO assignments were wrong and EQ was awful. Bass was comically over blown, and I discovered from that, that the coding out of ASD with Bimmercode does NOT completely eliminate it. The fake engine noise was loudly, clearly and annoyingly still coming from the subs even though Bimmercode showed “Not Active”!!!! Additionally, turn signals and warning bings/bongs were unacceptable in loudness.

Off to a bad start.

Luckily, I had downloaded hillds profiles above and started with loading his modified one next, which while it still had too much bass and ASD, he had already done the measurements for timing and the IO assignments were correct.

Because I am currently using the stock speakers, I was able to turn the gains down and still have more amplification of the music content than the speakers can handle, while that simultaneously lowered the gain of the fixed car sounds. He installed aftermarket higher quality speakers and subs (less efficient but better sounding) so he needed more gain.

Why BMW felt they had to pipe everything through the stereo instead of some other method is beyond me.

Does anyone really need artificial signal clicks or customized bongs when the seatbelt is not fastened?? Even HAVING to use something like Bimmercode to turn off/down ASD is unacceptable. It SHOULD be completely removable from within iDrive.

You really do have to spend quite a bit of time experimenting with the gains, equalizer, Low Pass and High Pass filters to get the sound nice. Maybe if I wasn’t too cheap and hadn’t installed it myself, a pro shop with DSP experience would have the necessary microphones to get a fast accurately balanced profile. But the DSP was already $1000, which really was WAY more than I wanted to spend in the first place. But top down, I know I like to enjoy my tunes at a decent volume and the stock HIFI only sounded ok, in the garage, with the top up and motor not running. My wife thought it was “just fine”.

I am getting very close to where it needs to be, but even if I leave it as is, it is an impressive improvement compared to the stock system.

Is it worth the effort and $1000? To most old (66) guys like me, probably not, to be honest. I have been an “audio guy” my whole life, but not anything like car stereo fanatics that need to hear their system 2 miles away and that will drop $5k in an install as if that is normal. This is just a fun car, to me, and being retired, I’m not driving a lot, maybe 5k miles a year, tops.

If I had the HK system, I might have been just fine with it. Maybe. I had HK in two 2016 Minis and had a 2023 440i loaner (identical engine and iDrive to my Z4) with the HK, and I can say that, without a doubt, this setup with the 8DSP with stock speakers is clearly superior to anything I could coax out of those HK systems, especially with the deep bass and soundstage improved. Which is exactly what Bimmer-tech says when recommending their more plug and play Alpha One (same identical unit as an UP 8DSP) install (includes brackets, screws, profile, and power prewired through the harness) for a few hundred more. Maybe $700 more. I really would like to get a hold of Bimmer-techs profile for the G29.

Shockingly, the stock subs can get more than adequate very deep bass for me, more than I need. A separate trunk sub is a totally unacceptable option for me. I would wager that the ASD is not routed through the external sub outputs on the DSP, as I haven’t read about that being an issue with those that installed subs.

Unfortunately, the effing turned “off” ASD is JUST at the limit that getting the bass where I would IDEALLY want it, also makes ASD too intrusive to me, with the top up. Top down, it is less annoying and, of course, top down requires more bass. But overall, with the balancing act, and using the lowest (100Hz) slider of the head unit equalizer, for top up/top down profiles, I can get better and louder sound than the HK would have provided for roughly the same price. As a side note, the 8DSP does have a provision to switch remotely between two profiles, but it requires an option module that would need to be run up to the driver for access, which is way more trouble than it is worth, to me!

Currently, though the signal clicks are CLEARLY louder than they were before, they are definitely not louder than I have heard in some other cars, and are a perfectly acceptable volume. The parking warning gongs, turned down to minimum level in iDrive are also acceptable. Only the “no seatbelt” warning is too loud. I haven’t found where or if it is even possible, to turn that level down.

[perryinva]

Looks like I can disable the seatbelt chime in Bimmercode, though all I really wanted to do was reduce the volume level.

[perryinva]

Well, maybe this is not news to anyone else, but it turns out I finally realized that I was not turning off ASD like I thought I was with Bimmercode. You do NOT “Deactivate” ASD, but instead leave it activated and then go to the bottom of the screen where it says activation codes, press that and THEN press deactivate ASD there! No more ASD with my 8DSP!! Sounds incredible with a little help from a free RTA app on the iphone!

[eclz]

I installed the Alpha One version of the amp this evening. I guess the two value-adds Bimmertech offers over the Audiotec-Fischer version are a nice metal mounting bracket and a tuning. Neither were flawless in my experience. The mounting bracket was pre-installed backwards. At least there's a YouTube video on how to do the G29 install so I was able to see how to orient it properly. And despite requesting a tuning without overpowering bass, the tuning they supplied had the bass dialed up to a ridiculously excessive degree. However, after I turned down the bass setting in iDrive about five steps -- I have the HiFi sound without the equalizer -- it was fine. I would probably emphasize the 1K - 3K range more than the default tuning but the overall sound quality is definitely a major improvement. I don't have PC at the moment to run the Audiotec-Fischer DSP PC Tool but when I do I'll share anything I come up with.

[hilld]

perryinva - why don't you share the tuning file here, so others can benefit from it.

[perryinva]

I will, as soon as I am finished. Just like you found, whenever I think I have it dialed in on a set of songs, I play something else and am like “WTF just happened?!?” The free RTA app I am using is called “Housecurve” and it works, but the sound I ended up with was not exactly right, and I think it was because ASD was still operating. I have to do it again now that I really have it defeated with Bimmercode, and see what results I can get. I am very close, I feel, and it is indeed orders of magnitude better than the HIFI and HK systems, even with stock speakers.

The DSP software is very versatile and powerful, but does take a learning curve to become any good at it. I do like how the changes you make are heard in “real time” even before you save them. I started with your profile and went from there, as like you said, your gains and eq were based on your aftermarket speakers. This does make me think that better speakers will be bougjt eventually, LOL.

[hilld]

Why not use the built in RTA with a USB microphone?

[perryinva]

Truthfully, because I have already spent way more than I wanted to, on a car stereo, and another $100+ for a decent mic that I would only use a few times, while I considered it, didn’t sit well with me. I bought the cheapest laptop I could find (Costco, on sale Lenovo Ideapad 1, final price about $180, upgraded to 12GB/500GB) but I can use that for lots of other things too, but I didn’t NEED one, except for this, we already had 2 Macbook Airs that were sufficient, but the DSP software is PC only.

The free iPhone RTAs are sufficient enough for me, for a car.

[StanDiego]

Are you guys focusing on profiles with the top up or down.

My top is down 90% of the time so I'm curious how much benefit can be gained with a top-down profile.

[perryinva]

I’ve done both, and really, SO FAR, the real difference is in bass and upper highs, no surprises there. For bass to sound good (to me, of course), top down, it is a bit too bassy with top up. So I basically go with flat bass top down and turn bass down with tone/equalizer with top up if too much.

The RTA app I use shows more bass than I hear, and no amount of eq will flatten it. I will try other RTAs later but what it does show is the difference top up and top down. Lowest bass and highest highs are attenuated with top down, but midrange actually sounds better (I assume less reflections). I’m still playing with F-R balance. These were with mic facing forward.

[eclz]

Very interesting response curve, thanks for sharing that information. The dip with the top up around 250Hz that almost disappears with the top down is very curious! I wonder if this is somehow related to the position of the top itself?

With the subwoofers in particular, a lot of the frequencies are from the lack of isolation between the speakers and the surrounding materials. I learned a lot about how to think about this problem from a guy on the Supra forum who wanted to figure out why the stock subwoofers sounded so bad (and let me tell you they are awful). His extremely careful and clever analysis might be of interest when we hit the limits of what tuning can do:

https://www.supramkv.com/threads/how-to-improve-oe-sub-bass-quality-and-eliminate-vibrations.5092