![\"\"](\"https:\/\/projectkeira.com\/home\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/raine_audioguide_a_banner.jpg\")
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Preface: If you started reading this to find out what wiring harness you need and which adaptors will let you keep your factory USB and steering wheel controls working\u2026 you\u2019re in the wrong place.<\/strong> This series of guides will not<\/u> cover any specific installation steps, parts lists, or harness guides. This is more about why all Nissan Frontier owners who enjoy listening to music in their truck should seriously consider upgrading their OEM audio components. A lot of this guide will be based on my own experiences with my Frontier, as well as leaning on everything I\u2019ve learned and experienced over roughly 25 years of tinkering with all kinds of car audio as one of my hobbies. That also means a lot of this guide is MY OPINIONS ONLY<\/strong> so keep that in mind; this audio upgrade guide will only reflect my thoughts, explanation, and advice.<\/em><\/p>\n Intro: Your OEM Nissan stereo sucks.<\/strong><\/span> Hello and welcome! So I saw that you have a nice Nissan Frontier you bought brand new (unless you bought it used, or \u201cnew to me\u201d whatever you want to call it) and it has a working stereo system. Maybe you have the cool one with the big touch screen. Or better yet, maybe you have the Rockford Fosgate \u201cpremium\u201d system with the powered subwoofer under the rear seats. Some of you might even have the newest and final 2nd<\/sup>-gen model years 2018-2019 fresh off the Nissan dealer lot, which came with their latest and greatest Nissan \u201cConnect\u201d infotainment system with factory navigation. So high tech, right? Well when it comes to actual sound quality, guess what?<\/p>\n Now before some people get mad about what I just said, let\u2019s start with this: if you really, really, really are satisfied with the \u201caudio quality\u2019 of the OEM Nissan Frontier sound system, then you know what? That\u2019s just fine. Stop reading here, and do something else. Just understand that ignorance is bliss, and again – if you believe that the OEM Nissan Frontier sound system has \u201caudio quality\u201d then that\u2019s where your standard is. Stop reading the rest of this, and enjoy your OEM stereo =)<\/p>\n However\u2026 if you wondered if you could improve it, or if you tell yourself \u201cit\u2019s good enough\u201d (meaning you\u2019re already trying to convince yourself that it\u2019s fine but deep down inside you know it isn’t), or if you want to upgrade to a nice sounding audio system that plays music the way it\u2019s supposed to then guess what? The first thing you have to accept is that:<\/p>\n This is because not only is the OEM Nissan head unit a really poor performing device when it comes to audio quality, but the way Nissan chose to configure the rest of the stereo system components themselves is annoyingly sub-optimal. To illustrate this point, take a look at the following\u2026 illustration:<\/p>\n Shown above is the OEM stereo system + how it is wired for most Nissan Frontiers since 2005. The only exception is that if you have the \u201cpremium\u201d Rockford Fosgate system, it’s wired slightly differently and you have a wired subwoofer as well. But that doesn\u2019t matter right now \u2013 what does matter is how the front speakers on each side are configured.<\/p>\n Ideally, a good sound system setup will have speakers at the height of the listener’s ears, at equal distances from the listener on each side, balanced to \u201cproject\u201d a listening experience where you feel like you\u2019re listening to a live band on a stage in front of you.<\/p>\n Now take that description and apply it to the OEM Nissan factory stereo setup. If you\u2019ve ever looked at how these components are in your actual truck, you already know 3 easily visible problems:<\/p>\n 1. There are small 2.75\u201d speakers in the dashboard up high near ear level\u2026 but they are farther than your front door speakers\u2026 and they are pointed up to the windshield. And how about we add a few more problems, one of which wouldn\u2019t know without digging into equipment details and seeing my diagram above:<\/p>\n 4. The factory head unit limits high and low frequencies the higher the volume is set\u2026 in other words, the more you turn it up, the fewer frequencies you\u2019ll be hearing from the speakers. And just to make it a complete mess, let\u2019s mention 3 more problems that affect most vehicle sound systems, not just specific to the Nissan Frontier itself:<\/p>\n 7. You (the driver) are not listening from dead center \u2013 instead, your seating position is all the way forward and over to the left (in relation to the speaker placement). Combine all 9 reasons I gave you above and the conclusion here is:<\/p>\n So how then, can we make it better? Yes, you can. It\u2019s not a lost cause at all. In fact, there\u2019s a lot of things that can be done to improve the audio quality of the Nissan Frontier\u2026 it all depends on how picky you are and how far you\u2019re willing to go:<\/p>\n In Part 1<\/strong> of this series (the actual “Part 1”), I\u2019ll explain why the head unit is the most critical component in any car (truck) audio system. Hint:<\/strong> where is your brain located?<\/p>\n Links to All Parts of the Audio Guide Preface: If you started reading this to find out what wiring harness you need and…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1945,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[574],"tags":[564,87,562,327,45,109,563,572,573,325,565,405,378],"class_list":["post-1937","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-audioupgradeguide","tag-aftermarket","tag-alpine","tag-audio-upgrade-guide","tag-hertz-audio","tag-jl-audio","tag-kenwood","tag-oem-audio","tag-raines-audio-upgrade-guide","tag-rockford-fosgate","tag-sound-quality","tag-sound-system","tag-soundstream","tag-super-nes-classic"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.projectkeira.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1937","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.projectkeira.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.projectkeira.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.projectkeira.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.projectkeira.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1937"}],"version-history":[{"count":27,"href":"https:\/\/www.projectkeira.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1937\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3391,"href":"https:\/\/www.projectkeira.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1937\/revisions\/3391"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.projectkeira.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1945"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.projectkeira.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1937"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.projectkeira.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1937"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.projectkeira.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1937"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n
\na.k.a. Prepare to be disappointed.<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\nYour OEM Nissan factory audio system sucks.<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/projectkeira.com\/home\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/raine_audioguide_a00.jpg\")
<\/p>\nYour OEM Nissan factory audio system sucks.<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/projectkeira.com\/home\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/raine_audioguide_a01.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
\n2. There are 6×9\u201d speakers in the front doors\u2026 down low\u2026 aiming sideways at your ankles.
\n3. There are a pair of 6.5\u201d speakers behind me in the rear doors\u2026 that are actually closer to your ears than the front speakers\u2026 and they are aimed directly at each other.<\/p>\n
\n5. The front dash and front door speakers are wired in parallel, somewhere behind the dashboard where you can\u2019t reach the connections.
\n6. The factory speakers run at a lower resistance than the industry standard to artificially make them sound louder.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/projectkeira.com\/home\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/raine_audioguide_a03.jpg\")
<\/p>\n
\n8. The Frontier isn\u2019t the quietest, most aerodynamic vehicle ever made (it\u2019s a truck), so road and wind noise easily enter the cabin and drown out audio frequencies (engine noise too).
\n9. The cab itself is relatively small (even the Crew Cab version) which means sound can bounce all over the place.<\/p>\nYour OEM Nissan factory audio system (obviously) sucks.<\/strong><\/span><\/h3>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/projectkeira.com\/home\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/raine_audioguide_a02.jpg\")
<\/p>\nJust as an example, if you look at the current audio system setup I have in my Frontier (shown above), I went way, way down that rabbit hole! However, this is just me and how I do things. It took a while to build my system into what it is now, and I can confidently say that I am very, very happy with how my audio system is equipped, and (more importantly) how it sounds. Also, everyone I’ve demoed the audio system to compliments the audio quality, the defined sound stage, and the distinct separation of instruments. The voices sound real, the music is crisp, and yet at the same time, I can also shake the people in the car next to me if I crank the subwoofer control knob up.<\/div>\n<\/div>\nNow then, to be completely honest – you don\u2019t necessarily need to go as far as I did to get sound that you can truly enjoy, but the process of improving sound is best done when plans are made and steps are taken in the correct and logical order. If this is intriguing to you, stay tuned.<\/div>\n
\n
\n<\/u><\/span>Intro: <\/strong>Your OEM Stereo Sucks. (this post)
\nPart 1: <\/strong>It All Starts With the Source.<\/a><\/span>
\nPart 2:\u00a0<\/strong>Speak(er) the Right Way.<\/a><\/span>
\nPart 3:<\/strong> You Don’t Drive From the Back Seat.<\/a><\/span>
\nPart 4: <\/strong>Dogs Underwater<\/a><\/span>
\nPart 5: <\/strong>Less is More<\/a><\/span>
\nPart 6: <\/strong>More is Less?<\/a><\/span>
\nPart 7: <\/strong>Separation Anxiety<\/a><\/span>
\nPart 8: <\/strong>Time Travel… While Standing Still<\/a><\/span>
\nPart 9:<\/strong>Partial Means… You’re Not Done<\/a><\/span>
\nPart 10 Finale: <\/strong>At the End… Here’s 10 (Things to Know)<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"