Now, THIS was a challenging AND fun project! As soon as we saw the customer pulling up outside our shop, we knew exactly what he wanted but we let him tell us the sad story (that is true of any car equipped with a BOSE sound system!) of the Mazda CX-5 anyway. The only prerequisite was the often required condition that the OEM radio was not to be changed. We do not really like that but we can still work with this condition and have an excellent end result. Let’s go!
Removing the heart of the problem. The BOSE OEM abysmal quality amplifier.
Yes you heard it correctly. The BOSE amplifier is the biggest problem that the CX-5 has, at least audio-wise. Powering 9 speakers that are also abysmal, BOSE has the bright idea of using the speakers located on the front doors as Subwoofers. They also opted not to use any Tweeters (!!!) and go along the way of using small full-range speakers throughout the setup (as you will see below). So, first things first! Get rid of the main problem!
Installing the much more powerful, flexible and controllable via DSP Amplifier.
Introducing the star of the show! The amazingly flexible, powerful and MADE IN ITALY A/B Class Gladen/Mosconi ONE 90.8 DSP! Featuring 8 Channels of 100W pure amplification this gem can power all the speakers of the CX-5 with ease while providing us with an extensive set of features (Delay, EQ, Crossovers and more) that are so desperately needed to save this car from the audio hell that the BOSE setup casted upon it!
Replacing the Front Door Speakers
As mentioned before, BOSE had the bright idea of installing 2 subwoofers on the front doors. Possibly to avoid having one in the trunk? Who knows? What we know for sure is that they sounded pretty bad and also that the car would be much happier with a more lively driver in that location, a mid-bass driver for example. For this we chose the Axton ATW20 which take the job of providing the mid-bass frequencies pretty seriously!
Replacing the Rear Door Speakers.
Just like the front doors, the rear doors needed the Powersound Treatment. Here is a photo of when our lovely Focal ICU 165 speakers were being installed. The rotating tweeter always allows for an optimum installation!
The all important Tweeters.
The is no doubt that when installing a new pair of tweeters, placement is of the outmost importance and this installation was no different. The result cannot be described with words. The separation of the Low/Mid frequencies with the High frequencies derives to a much more refined musical presentation! Special care was given to the Tweeter’s angling position. We wanted to make sure that they are facing the main listening position to ensure a correct soundstage!
The Center Speaker.
The center speaker was replaced by a Focal FLAX Midrange speaker, one of our favorites for this job. Flax cones are made of high-quality flax fibers core enclosed by two thin layers of glass fiber. They satisfy the key criteria of a high performance diaphragm : high internal damping, high velocity of sound and high flexural rigidity. The improvement over the cheap paper cone BOSE speaker was evident from the very first auditions!
The Subwoofer.
After we removed the BOSE Subwoofers from the front doors, we needed someone else to take care of the low frequencies. The Focal BOMBA BP 20 was chosen since it has proven itself as a royal servant for many years now. It is a compact, gorgeous looking, discreet 8″ (20cm) Active Subwoofer that punches way above its weight. We had absolutely no doubt that it would fill the car with accurate, fast bass!
Cabling.
We went all out with this one. Why? Because you can never have enough juice! We used a 2 Gauge (35mm2) power cable by Gladen, that then went into a distribution block routing the power cable to 2 x 4 Gauge (20mm2) that in turn fed the Gladen/Mosconi ONE 90.8 DSP amplifier and the Focal BOMBA BP 20 subwoofer.
The OEM Speakers.
The less said the better. Just take a look at them and try to explain to anyone that understands even the basics about audio reproduction why do these drivers that look so cheap and sound so bad cost so much money. We will never stop complaining about this and calling them out whenever we see them. It is always the same story whether the OEM drivers are BOSE, HK, B&O etc. It seems that there is motive here. Car manufacturers commission these companies to make their speakers for certain cars. What we deduced is that most probably they are telling them that they should meet a certain budget but still bear the marketing name of the chosen company. Which is a shame because in the end, these companies manufacture sub-par products and they just slap their brand name onto them and sell them for much more than they are worth. Check the photo below, and draw your own conclusions.
The results
Wow. Just Wow. After playing for several hours with the DSP settings of the Gladen/Mosconi ONE 90.8 DSP we finally came to a point that we had no more complains about the car’s audio system. It just sounded so right as it should have from the very beginning. The bass was much more now but still balanced. The mid-bass is now spot on and the tweeters are happily doing their part as the last missing ingredient of a perfectly executed recipe. Pure Audio Bliss!
Owner’s reaction
I love my car so much but its factory sound system was just lacking, I would find myself not listening to music because I couldn’t enjoy it. Luckily the guys at Powersound worked their magic with the help of Focal and Gladen, and now I’m looking for every excuse to go for a drive and listen to music. Big thanks to Andreas and Marios!