ICE (In Car Entertainment) for My Swift is now completed!

I am blogging after a long time, this time from PC instead of mobile (this post might be a bit heavier due to images in it).

For those who missed out the recent updates from me, I bought my first car – Swift VDI with ABS on 3rd March, you can see some snaps from my Facebook Profile .

ICE Setup

Coming into the audio setup, I chose a budget option as already there was a big hole on my pocket by going for the top end Maruti Swift, and already on an alloy wheel too. I chose a simple 4 speaker setup – Front components and rear full range coaxial.

Head Unit (HU)

I chose Pioneer 6200BT as the head unit for my car, bought it for about 150$ from Amazon US, this was brought to India by a colleague (Thanks John!).

Why did I choose this HU: My pre requisites were AUX input, USB support, 3 RCA outs (I won’t be using it right now, but in case I choose to upgrade with an amp) and Bluetooth. Main criteria was under 8k INR 🙂 In Bangalore similar configuration costs 12.5k INR, so I saved 5.5k INR by bringing it from US.

Front Components

The manual of my HU said use speakers of above 50W (the HU has built in AMP which powers 50W output), and mainly speakers with an impedance value 4-8 ohms. This is an important factor to consider, having a lesser impedance, your speakers can draw more current and are in the danger of burning out. Here is where being a techie helps! The showroom accessory guy told that there are no such problems but I chose the speakers matching the specs mentioned in my HU manual.

For the front components I chose JBL GT5 265c for which the MRP is 5990 INR.

Rear Speakers

Again, the criteria was 4 ohm and ovals fitting to my budget, again not compromising on the sound quality. The verdict was JBL GT6 699 6X9 ovals – MRP 4990 INR.

Additional accessories

The ovals needed to go on the rear parcel tray, which wasn’t present on my model of Swift. I had to take one from Maruti dealer. The parcel tray is made of MDF wood. I have quotes starting from 350 INR from JC road to 1250 INR at Maruri dealer (MGA). I settled on the MGA one, but trust me, that wasn’t a bad decision for the quality and the brand.

The installation was done at

Bimal auto agency, Mahadevapura, Bangalore. Reason: I didn’t want to experiment with the electrical warranty of my car and since I had saved enough on my head unit, there wasn’t much to save if I had gone for another shop for installation and for the speakers.

Total Cost

 

Head Unit – 7000 INR Approx.

Front Components – 5990 INR

Rear Ovals – 4990 INR

Rear parcel tray (MGA MDF) – 1250 INR

Fitting and labour – 500 INR

Apart from the HU (which was bought separately from US, the final price paid for speakers and fitting was 12k INR)

So total cost = 19k INR approx for a HU with BT and with a decent speaker setup.

Damping

I didn’t go for damping for door, since there is no power amplifier involved and there won’t be much of boom-boom which will be heard outside and which can make vibration on the door parts. At the moment I am not experiencing any need of damping.

Have a question?

Post it here!