Flooded Carver DSP Amp issue resolved update

M

marcusford

Member
 Falkirk
Hi folks
At the end of last year I did a post about my Carver DSP amp which was damaged by water egress. Here is an update of how the problem was resolved.

The amp was sent away to two different specialists for repair but to no avail. I decided not to by a secondhand one off eBay due to risk of it not working or being compatible etc. Also a trip to BMW to link the new amp to my specific car at a cost of £102 + Vat put me off.

I found an excellent Car Audio specialist in Glasgow (MF2K Audio) who came up with a solution for me and working on my limited budget. He linked the original radio head to two secondhand Dynaudio 360 3 way passive crossovers set to +2db mid and tweet, to offset the 2db BMW mid bass impedance - (His words not mine, this stuff is all mumbo jumbo to me!) I did have an option to restore the sub woofers by fitting a 2 channel amp with variable low pass output and high level input but having heard the great sound coming out of the system just using the crossovers I feel is just wasn't worth the extra £300. Ron, the engineer who is used to working with very high end audio systems agreed the sound was more than acceptable also taking into account my budget. I suppose I was lucky that he had secondhand Dynaudio 360 in the workshop and anyone else going down this route may not be quite so lucky in sourcing these or equivalent. The one downside is that the CD changer no longer works, it seems the Carver DSP amp probably got a signal directly from the changer (possibly a digital one) and not via the head unit. The radio and radio CD play perfectly and fab!)

So there we have it, not sure if this will be of any help to anyone but after the assistance I got in the first place from forum members I thought I would update you all.
 
Sounds like an ideal solution! (I believe you're missing a zero or something on the BMW amp price, 102 quid shouldn't put anyone off :P )

I'm surprised anything was available to drive Carver subs, good to know, though as you've discovered, there's really no need with a good main system, the Carvers aren't all that great anyway.

You are correct about the DSP changer being fed directly to the OEM amp. I've heard some cars with DSP still have the analogue 6 pin changer connector in place though it is not used. It's long shot, but you might regain changer function by simply plugging it into the analogue connector! Don't try too hard though (access is difficult), you're lucky yours was still working, it may not work for much longer even if you did manage to get it working. :headbang:
 
bcworkz said:
Sounds like an ideal solution! (I believe you're missing a zero or something on the BMW amp price, 102 quid shouldn't put anyone off :P )

I'm surprised anything was available to drive Carver subs, good to know, though as you've discovered, there's really no need with a good main system, the Carvers aren't all that great anyway.

You are correct about the DSP changer being fed directly to the OEM amp. I've heard some cars with DSP still have the analogue 6 pin changer connector in place though it is not used. It's long shot, but you might regain changer function by simply plugging it into the analogue connector! Don't try too hard though (access is difficult), you're lucky yours was still working, it may not work for much longer even if you did manage to get it working. :headbang:
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Aha I may have a feel around and see if my luck is really in and I still have an analogue connection in place, failing that I will look at fitting some kind of ipod connection to the back off the radio head, I am assuming this will working following the changes I've made to the system. I think you are right about the Carver sound quality, I would be really hard pushed before to know I had the high end sound system in the first place! The set up now seems to have much more clarity.
 
srhutch said:
The £102 was just to program the AMP to the car bcworkz
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:oops: Thx for clarifying, I really need to learn to read more carefully, I've misread things enough times that I should know better! :oops:
 
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