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      09-19-2022, 01:15 PM   #1
PinkNinja400Guy
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DIY: Partial H/K => gray market B&W audio upgrade

I did this on my '22 (pre-LCI) X7, where I was unable to get the B&W system due to supply limitations. Visually, the LCI looks to have the exact same system, so I imagine this would also work on the '23+ models (Edit: confirmed fit on LCI X7 by Orient330iNYC).

The parts & installation process are also identical between the X5 & X7.

This first post provides an overview & review of the retrofit parts, and some photos. The remaining posts provide detailed installation instructions.



There are two main issues with the H/K system:

1) The audio quality of the H/K is good but not great.
2) The H/K speaker grilles don't look good. When I picked up my car, I was quite disappointed in how the door panels looked with their black grilles and could tell that a silver grille would really elevate the appearance of the interior. The B&W LED lighting is also quite nice, I wasn't expecting it to make a big difference but it does.

Obviously doing a full retrofit would be ridiculously expensive. Even the parts themselves are very expensive. Fortunately, Chinese manufacturing comes to the rescue and helps to source parts for cheap.

BMW runs manufacturing operations in China; it's a big market for them. They have a joint venture with a local group and the overall operation is called BMW Brilliance. In general, for things that are manufactured in China, factories will often run a "night shift" where they produce extra units to sell on the gray market. These units be just as good as the official parts, or they may be manufactured with cheaper subcomponents and/or have worse QC. And obviously the Chinese also separately manufacture & export lots of knockoffs and fake goods.



For these specific items that I got, it's hard to say whether they are legitimate or knockoffs. I'm leaning more towards the side of legit, but not sure. Ultimately what matters are the results, and the results are that these sound better than the H/K setup and that the speaker grilles + LED lighting look just like an OEM B&W system. So I'm happy with it and I'd do it again if I got another X7.



The speakers themselves are ~$350 for the full* set of 14 and do sound better than the H/K speakers. And even if they're not quite as good as "real" B&W speakers (I have no way to tell), they're still an upgrade over H/K, so whatever.



The speaker grilles (with builtin LEDs) are roughly $700. The parts I received in many ways have the fit & finish and overall quality that you would expect from OEM parts. But there are a few odd things about them. I could write an essay on all the minor details that point towards these being genuine or fake parts, but I'll spare you the details. Once installed, it looks exactly like a factory B&W system would look. I've attached a few photos, not really any point to them since you can just look up photos of B&W-equipped X7s, they look the same. It definitely makes a difference at night and even during the day. The speaker lighting isn't quite as bright as the photos make it look.



I had previously ordered the Bavsound upgrade kit, which is $1000 for the main speakers and $600 for the woofers. I plan to send that back, but I will still use their woofers. The H/K's woofers are pretty bad. The H/K (and Bavsound) subs have 8 ohm impedance, whereas the B&W subs are 4 ohm. 4ohm should still *work* with the H/K amp but I don't think it's a great idea to use them.

The amp remains the stock H/K amp, and we don't get the extra four 40mm mid-tweeters that the B&W system puts into the headliner. Only the 14 main speakers (7 tweeter + 7 midrange) are upgraded. For what it's worth, Bavsound says on their website that the H/K amp is pretty good and creates a clean audio signal - it can't output 1300 watts like the B&W amp, but aside from that it's a solid amp. No idea how true that is, obviously they would want to say that to assure their customers, since there aren't any upgrades available for the H/K amp.



I'm not the best judge of audio quality. I thought the H/K system was pretty good (though definitely not great). Listening to it in my garage, the "B&W" speakers definitely add clarity to the system. But I usually don't listen at loud volumes, and most of my time listening to the H/K was while driving, where road noise & wind noise hide lots of the fine details (and hide the deficiencies of the H/K system). In that situation, the audio quality upgrade feels pretty minor.

I didn't install the Bavsound kit to test, so I can't comment on how this compares to that, but I imagine it would also be a minor upgrade over the H/K for my normal "reasonable volume while driving" use case.

Also, the B&W speakers have silver reflective cones, whereas the Bavsound kit has black cones. The LED lighting should still work decently with the black cones, but the silver color of the B&W speakers is very noticeable through the grilles (even during the day) and amplifies the lighting. Combine that with the big price difference, and overall for me it's a no brainer to send back the Bavsound speakers and keep these B&W ones.



I'll also leave these three links here as reference material:
https://g05.bimmerpost.com/forums/sh....php?t=1794420 (lots of photos in this thread)
https://g30.bimmerpost.com/forums/sh....php?t=1857152
https://g30.bimmerpost.com/forums/sh....php?t=1548541
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      09-19-2022, 01:17 PM   #2
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Unboxing & part photos

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      09-19-2022, 01:18 PM   #3
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Installation of speakers & grilles

The kit comes with everything you need: tesa tape-wrappped extension Y-connectors/splitters for the ambient lighting, and screws + washers needed for the door midrange grilles. It also had two extra speaker wiring Y-connectors which are not used.

It also came with 4 trim pieces for the 4 mid-tweeters that the B&W system has in the headliner. These are not used because, well, the H/K system doesn't have speakers in the headliner. Interestingly, these pieces are made of plastic, not metal. I wonder if the OEM B&W system also uses plastic for them. (Also - are the OEM B&W grilles magnetic? I think they're supposed to be stainless steel on the "real" B&W system, but the grilles I got are not magnetic so it seems like they're aluminum)



Installation of the speakers is straightforward. This is separate from the grilles; you can use the Chinese B&W speakers for a cheap audio upgrade while retaining the factory nonilluminated H/K grilles, or use your own set of speakers while using the B&W illuminated griles.

Follow the Bavsound video and jmciver's X7-specific notes: https://g07.bimmerpost.com/forums/sh....php?t=1846757

The wiring that comes out of the tweeter (to plug into the midrange) is the only thing that is changed, since that wiring is permanently connected to the tweeters, so when you replace the tweeters their wires get replaced with them. The H/K tweeters and the replacement B&W tweeters did not have tesa tape on their wiring and I did not add any. I didn't get any rattles (*). All the other speaker wiring that runs through the car is retained, and all of that wiring was wrapped in cloth tape from the factory.

(*) Edit: I did have rattling from the rear doors, and now also from the A-pillar tweeters after I did some additional work to them. I'm going to take off the door panels and put tesa tape on the wiring, that should hopefully resolve everything.

I did notice that for the midrange speakers, the wiring connectors only insert about halfway into the B&W speakers and can't go in any further. But it still makes a solid connection. Not sure what's up with that.



The dashboard center trim/cover piece goes in the exact same way as the H/K one does. But when you remove the H/K piece, there are 10 metal clips which you need to pry out with a flathead and transfer over to the B&W piece.
The "Bowers & Wilkins" text on the center cover can be lit up, but I didn't connect the wiring harness because I think it would look pretty tacky. Apparently the wiring is also a bit difficult for this, it needs to run through the dashboard.

The D pillar grilles do not change between the H/K and B&W systems. RealOEM shows that they both use the same part.

The front door tweeters are in the A-pillar part of the door, installation for those is described below. For lighting, you have to run wiring up to them when doing the door midrange speakers.

The rear door tweeters (just in front of the door handle) are not illuminated (same as the OEM B&W system) and the grilles are easy to install. The grille is secured to the door panel with a number of clips. Just release the clips and pop out the H/K grille, then push the B&W grille into place. It felt like the clips on my B&W grille were just 0.5mm too short. With a bit of force I was able to get most of them to snap in securely and it's holding up fine. If you're ugrading the tweeters, do it while the grille is off - that lets you push the old tweeter out from the front, which makes it easier to remove.

The door midrange grilles are the toughest part, but it's super simple once you figure out how to do it. They're the same for all 4 doors.


Here are all the tools you need for the entire project (all speakers except woofers, and all grilles):
- Pry tool
- Clip tool (notched pry tool) to help reset door clips
- T20 bit & bit driver
- Low profile right angle bit driver, for dashboard speakers (for speakers, not needed for just replacing the grille)
- T30 bit for D-pillar speakers (for speakers - grille is not changed here between H/K and B&W)
- Flathead & Philips head screwdrivers
- 90 degree pick tool
- Pliers would be helpful
- Drill with 1/2" bit
- If your bit driver isn't magnetic, you'll also need a ~2" long skinny magnetic stick
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      09-19-2022, 01:19 PM   #4
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Installation of door midrange grilles

The G05 forum thread has info on this. But it's not complete. The first few pages of that thread have people who give helpful info but are vastly understating the amount of work you need to do. The last few pages have a few other people who figured out that there's extra stuff that needs to be done, but didn't give info on what *exactly* that was.

It took a long time for me to figure out how to do the first door, but once you do figure it out, it's super straightforward, the 3 remaining doors were pretty quick. I think I got the 3rd & 4th door grilles done in under 15 minutes each. So here are the exact steps.


First, take off the door panel.

There are 8 plastic welds and 4+1 screws that you need to remove.
On the front doors, one of the plastic welds is behind a wire which you can bend out of the way. On the rear doors, one of the screws is beneath some plastic, but is still easily accessible with a screwdriver. Aside from that, they're identical.



Inside/behind the grille, there's a gray wiring connector which feeds the door's ambient light strip. Disconnect that. Towards the rear of the grille there's also a purple ambient lighting connector for the small pocket in the door armrest. Carefuly disconnect that one too.



Let's start with the 8 plastic welds, which you can drill out. The G05 thread had someone suggesting using a 1/4" bit. This didn't work for me. A 1/4" bit would let you drill through the center of the connection, which is not what you want.

The way the connection works is:
The grille has circular standoffs (which you can see on the new B&W piece)
The "sheet plastic" on the door panel has bigger circular holes
The grille is inserted into the door panel until the top of the standoffs is just in the same plane as the sheet plastic / holes. Then, a plastic ring is melted to bond them. Notably, the connection has no depth, and the plastic ring is the only thing connecting them. So you don't need to drill deep through the connection.

Put a 1/2" drill bit onto the connection and give a very quick pulse on your drill. If you do it right and have a bit of luck, just a few revolutions is enough to get the drill to chew off the ring of melted plastic. But you'll probably need to drill a bit more. Once the ring is mostly removed, you can push on the grille to break the remaining bond. There's no need to drill deep into the connection, especially on the top since the wood trim is on the other side. Worst case scenario, you make a 1/2" wide hole through the plastic and basically destroy the whole connection area, that's fine.

Use a vacuum to suck up all the plastic shreds.



There are four screws to remove on top of the grille, and one additional screw at the tail end of the door's existing ambient light strip.



Once you have the 8 welds and 5 screws and 2 electrical connectors removed, the whole (grille + wood trim + ambient light strip) comes out as one piece. You can push the front bottom corner of the grille out a bit with your hand, and may be able to push other parts out a bit with your hand as well.

Then you can start prying from the leathered side of the door panel. Near the top of the ambient light strip, but not at the top, an inch towards the rear, it's likely that the light strip will have started poking out just enough to fit a trim tool in there. Pry from there, move forwards towards the wood trim. You can also pry from the front of the grille up to the wood trim. The wood trim is secured by three very tight metal clips so it'll take some force to remove. Remember that the grille/wood/light strip all come out as one unit, so they should stay roughly together with each other while you're prying them out. Once the wood is out, pry back along the light strip and the tail end will pop out.

One thing to keep in mind is that the grille also has some clips in it, which you can see on the new B&W grille. You'll need to release these clips as you're taking it out. Easy to forget.



Now that the whole thing is removed, the back end of the grill has 3 points where the ambient light strip clips into it. Look at the new B&W grille for reference. Pivot the grille out, and it'll detach from the wood + light strip. Pivot/attach the new grille onto those three clips.

The wood trim has three metal clips behind it, and the ambient light strip has two metal clips on its tail end. For me the wood trim's clips were incredibly tight on every door, I couldn't insert it back onto the door even with a lot of force. Use some pliers to squeeze the clips, that'll loosen them up but it's still going to take some force to reinsert. You can gently squeeze the light strip's 2 clips as well, it's not strictly necessary but will help.



Ok, the overall steps were:
- Remove 8 plastic welds and 5 screws
- Pry out the grille + wood trim + ambient light strip, they come out as one unit
- Remove the H/K grille from that unit and put the new B&W grille on
- Loosen up the clips with some pliers

Now, push the whole unit back into the door. The metal clips will require some force. Reattach the 5 screws.

In place of the destroyed plastic welds, the kit comes with 7 screws & washers for each door, plus one spare.

There was one plastic weld on the top of the grille which I could never get a screw to grab into, on any of the doors, so 7 screws is all you need. Even if you have a 1/2" hole in the plastic, the washer is just barely big enough to grab onto it and overall it'll still be a secure fit.



The very final step is to connect the ambient lighting Y-splitter/extension. First of all, don't forget to reconnect the gray connector for the preexisting ambient light strip. The purple connector behind it was also disconnected, use the Y splitter with that to power the new grille LED. The plastic connector on the Y splitter could rattle against the door panel's plastic, so tuck it behind the white fabric layer to prevent that.

On the front doors, attach another splitter to the purple ambient light plug at the top of the door (the one that lights the door handle) and route it to the front, to be used with the A pillar tweeters.

Put the door back onto the car. **None of the door ambient lighting will work unless all 4 doors panels are connected to the car**!! So if you take off all 4 doors and then put the first door back on, it's not going to light up until the end once you have all 4 doors back on!
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      09-19-2022, 01:22 PM   #5
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Installation of A-pillar grilles

For the most part, the speakers & grilles/LEDs are separate, but the front door A-pillar tweeters are the exception. The speakers come preinstalled into the triangular plastic housing. Well, they should have been preinstalled - for me, the right side was, but on the left side the speaker wasn't fully seated from the factory, it was loose in the packaging when I got it.

You *should* be able to swap that tweeter out for another speaker if you don't want to use the included one. Other people have reported success with that. ~~But I wasn't able to do it. The attachment mechanism inside the B&W tweeter housing had 6 points (vs. 3 as shown in the Bavsound video) and I had lots of difficulty getting that loose speaker back into its mounting bracket. While attempting that, I accidentally poked the aluminum dome with a screwdriver and destroyed that speaker. So currently I still have the H/K tweeter & grille on the left side, I've only upgraded the right side A-pillar tweeter to the B&W.~~ Edit: If you want to change the speaker, bend out the 3 tall clips (you don't need them), then there are just 3 small clips inside the circular housing which will hold on to the speaker. The stock AliExpress speakers have a locating notch which lines up with a cutout in the circular housing; insert and then twist to lock into place.

Also in that same A-pillar tweeter area, there's a foam insert behind the H/K housing. The B&W parts don't come with a foam insert. The H/K foam won't fit because of the extra lighting connector, which is pretty big. You could probably cut out a piece of the foam to fix that. I just took the foam piece out entirely and didn't bother reinstalling it. I may eventually do something like put a thick fabric behind the tweeter.

The trim piece doesn't sit perfectly flush with the door's A-pillar molding, but it's not a big deal. With the new B&W trim, it looks like you *should* be able to get it to fit perfectly, but I just wasn't able to get it done even after trying a bunch of times. There's a small gap at the very top towards the rear & outside of the A pillar. The G05 forum had photos which seemed to show correct fitment, so I think this is due to error on my part.
The photos of this do exaggerate the effect a bit. From the normal seating position, this isn't that noticeable, and the light leakage is also not too noticeable (not at all noticeable from the drivers seat, and perhaps a bit from the passenger seat depending on where it's positioned).

Edit: That was an installation issue by me, they do fit properly. There's another plastic tab on the side of the housing near the top, that tab may not insert into the door naturally. So you just need to give it a push once the housing is on the door. That'll seat the tab and close up the gap.

Finally, I broke the light pipe in the right front A-pillar tweeter unit. As mentioned, I tried installing this a bunch of times to get it to sit flush, and eventually the light pipe broke - it's a pretty thin brittle piece of plastic, just like the factory light pipes in the other parts of the door panels, so you have to be careful with it. I think the capacitor from the tweeter wire must have squished against it while I was installing the trim onto the door. So secure the capacitor & wiring before you install. Fortunately, the lighting still works just fine. Even with the light pipe snapped, as long as the two parts are roughly in line with each other, light will flow through the breakage.

Because of the left tweeter issue and the right light pipe issue, I'm going to be ordering a new set of just the A-pillar grilles/speakers and redoing them. Edit: Ordered the new parts and installed on both sides. The overall illumination and especially the circular spiral pattern is now much brighter with the non-broken light pipe. It looks better, it's not excessively bright.

Also note that the B&W system has diamond dome tweeters for the front two tweeters, whereas the ones I got were plain aluminum dome just like the other 5 tweeters. Looks like the seller was cutting costs there instead of using the actual diamond dome variant. But it's still better than the H/K, so whatever.
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      09-19-2022, 01:23 PM   #6
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Buying

The seller I brought from was "China Car Audio Store." He has a number of listings, some have identical products on them, and the prices are all the same. There are also 1-2 other sellers on AliExpress which seem to be selling the same stuff.

This is the exact listing I brought from: https://www.aliexpress.com/item/3256803197760239.html

You have to select 12v, then I bought both the very first item ("X5X7 9Pcs cover") for the grilles and the second to last item ("14 speaker") for the speakers.

I paid $40 for FedEx International Priority shipping, which is guaranteed 3 day from China to the US. It took 6 calendar days for the seller to ship the package and then 3 days for FedEx to get it to my house. There is free shipping but that's via China Post, which generally works but isn't great and you may be waiting a while.

Normally these are $720 for the grilles and $345 for the speakers = $1,065. When I was buying there was a sale, so it was $660 + $320 = $980. I actually messaged the seller to negotiate and he gave me a $60 off coupon for the regular price. But AliExpress was showing that the sale would begin in 2 days so I just waited for that to get the best price.

When you do order, I'd send over a message to the seller saying that it's for an X7 G07 with factory H/K system. Just to make sure that he sends the right parts.

The seller seems to have an auto-response set up on AliExpress messages which will tell you to contact him on WhatApp, but he does use the AliExpress message system so you don't actually need to switch over to WA.

When I was talking to the seller, he mentioned that he actually has the factory build these based on the exact quantity of orders that he gets - normally it takes a day to get your items manufactured.

The seller seems to run a car audio shop in China. And I'm guessing he's friends with the owner of the factory that makes these parts, which is how he acquires them. I did ask about that, and depending on how you translate his reply, it may be possible that this factory is the same one that supplies official BMW Brilliance parts. Or not. He also said that he often does audio upgrades for the local car dealerships.

AliExpress didn't want to take my credit card, seems like their automatic fraud detection systems got triggered on it. I checked out again and used Paypal, and that worked fine.
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Last edited by PinkNinja400Guy; 09-19-2022 at 01:36 PM..
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      09-19-2022, 01:40 PM   #7
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Well, that's all. Holy smokes that was a long set of posts.

This upgrade is definitely worth the $1100 or so. It's great.
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      09-19-2022, 01:47 PM   #8
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Excellent DIY . Going to read in more detail as I just skimmed but great work.
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      09-19-2022, 03:12 PM   #9
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Wow. Awesome post! I used to compete in car stereo contests when I was young. Might have to get back into tearing the car apart. Lol
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      09-22-2022, 02:57 PM   #10
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Does the center speaker has lights? I think LCI one does.
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      09-22-2022, 04:39 PM   #11
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Setllarboss View Post
Does the center speaker has lights? I think LCI one does.
It should, the Pre-LCI did as well. The B&W name lights up.
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      09-23-2022, 12:16 AM   #12
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Setllarboss View Post
Does the center speaker has lights? I think LCI one does.
Yes. I did not hook up the cable for that since I prefer not having that be lit up.
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      09-23-2022, 08:35 AM   #13
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I am tempted to get this done now . I just don't have the skills to install this. Perhaps, I can find someone that can install it for me. This looks amazaing!
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      09-23-2022, 01:43 PM   #14
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The B&W system is insane. I cannot get over how good it is. Yet to find a flaw with it. It takes everything I feed it with ease.
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      09-24-2022, 11:41 AM   #15
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Awesome write up, thank you! I am trying to avoid ordering an X5 due to wait/lead times, and a couple lot cars that are on my shortlist only have HiFi, so I had already started prepping my parts lists to retrofit either HK or B&W, this would make it a no-brainer to go with the B&W option.
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      09-24-2022, 08:40 PM   #16
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Quote:
Originally Posted by roxxor View Post
Awesome write up, thank you! I am trying to avoid ordering an X5 due to wait/lead times, and a couple lot cars that are on my shortlist only have HiFi, so I had already started prepping my parts lists to retrofit either HK or B&W, this would make it a no-brainer to go with the B&W option.
Keep in mind if you buy a hifi unit, the amp is very underpowered. I swapped a hifi system with bavsound, though it was noticeable difference but you had to crank it up at least 60 to 70 percent to notice anything.
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      09-25-2022, 01:50 PM   #17
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Quote:
Originally Posted by awesoM View Post
Keep in mind if you buy a hifi unit, the amp is very underpowered. I swapped a hifi system with bavsound, though it was noticeable difference but you had to crank it up at least 60 to 70 percent to notice anything.
Most definitely, would replace the amp and booster to the correct model (either HK or B&W) if I go that route. On my F30 years ago I replaced the hifi amp with the HK amp and added the BavSound HK speakers and it turned out pretty well.
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      09-25-2022, 05:53 PM   #18
Phasers
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Is it worth it to just buy the speakers without the grills and keep using the factory HK grills?

Last edited by Phasers; 09-25-2022 at 05:58 PM..
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      09-27-2022, 01:36 PM   #19
Setllarboss
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I am thinking just to buy the grills for the lights. I wonder if the lights will be connected with the other ambient lights or will be operated separately.
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      10-03-2022, 04:16 PM   #20
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Setllarboss View Post
I am thinking just to buy the grills for the lights. I wonder if the lights will be connected with the other ambient lights or will be operated separately.
This is another difference from the factory B&W system. The actual B&W system has a separate ambient light circuit for the speaker grilles, which can be independently controlled.

With this mod, the grille lights hook into the existing ambient light circuits for the doors. Therefore they are all controlled together as one system.
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      10-03-2022, 04:22 PM   #21
PinkNinja400Guy
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Phasers View Post
Is it worth it to just buy the speakers without the grills and keep using the factory HK grills?
Hard for me to say what the best course of action is for you. If you're dissatisfied with the H/K audio, these do help, so yes? But the more important question is:

Is it better to get these "B&W" speakers for ~$350 or the Bavsound speakers for ~$1000?

That's for the 14 "main" speakers. With either option you'll have to go with the ~$600 Bavsound woofers (which are 8Ω) or source your own set of 8 ohm subs. The B&W subs, being 4Ω, are afaik not a good option to use with the H/K amp.


So for the 14 main speakers, these "B&W" are much cheaper than Bavsound. The question is, how's their audio quality compared to Bavsound? These "B&W" may be worse than Bavsound, or they may be similar, or these "B&W" may be better than the Bavsound. Unfortunately, I have no idea because I've never tried the Bavsound kit.


And you could repeat that question for: Is it better to get these "B&W" speakers for ~$350 or the Focal speakers for ~$(a lot)?

These "B&W" speakers might actually be better than a set of Focals. Or they may not be.

Last edited by PinkNinja400Guy; 10-03-2022 at 04:27 PM..
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      11-18-2022, 09:03 PM   #22
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wanted to thank the OP for the write up, i I ordered the speakers and grills a week or so ago, i opted for the free shipping figuring it would arrive sometime in December, but they shipped it FedEx so i got it last week and did the install this afternoon. I had printed out the door panel removal instructions from TIS but forgot them, ended up just using this thread.

install was straightforward, it took longer than it should have because i kept doing stupid things like forgetting to connect wires or the Bowden cables and had to pull the door panels off to fix. I am now an expert at pulling the door panels and resetting the panel clips.

I initially had issues getting the tweeters seated- the aftermarket tweeter covers seem to be made of a stiffer plastic that the HK ones.
theres a rubber gasket the edge of the tweeter has to sit on that kept getting bunched up- once i figured out how to get the housing to fit between that gasket and the felt, it all snapped into place without a gap. i also covered the light pipes with some tesa tape.

i was able to get all the screws into the drilled out welds, i popped the seams and put the welds under tension while drilling, i didnt end up having to drill completely into them to get them to separate, they would pop apart when the plastic was thinned enough. that left enough of the post to thread the screws into.

to my untrained ear, the speakers in the kit sound cleaner/clearer. they are an upgrade over stock, i have not heard any of the other upgrade options, but im more than happy with the result for the price.

Based on what i see of the parts, im fairly certain that these are parts being made after hours on the lines that make the genuine parts or something similar.

thanks again to the OP!
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Last edited by Orient330iNYC; 11-18-2022 at 09:14 PM..
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