3sixty

[fnelson9]

Originally Posted by el_duderino

I think that installers who use the 360 or the CleanSweep in X5s don't know what they are doing. There are cases where you need one of these - but X5s and X3s are not any of them (and neither are E39s, E90s, E46s, etc).

Functionally, both units are intended to do the following:

1) Knock speaker level signals down to a usable level. Don't need that in an X5 or X3 - HU has balanced preamp output.

2) Reverse-equalize factory EQ curves out of the signal - especially in cars with dynamic equalization (volume-dependent). The X5 and X3 have a flat un-processed output from the HU -don't need that.

3) Provide an aux input. We have Icelinks and DICE modules and others, don't need that.

So other than giving an installer a false sense that he knows what he's doing with OEM HU integration, what good does this $400 do you?

Use an amp that will take an OEM balanced input. If you want max audiophile SQ, get an Iso-Max.

Those of us who have DSP don't have flat unprocessed output from the HU - unless we want to trash DSP.

At least that's my (very limited) understanding of the problem. The 360 will take the high level outputs coming out of the DSP amp and bring them back down to line-level, and also allow you to eq the signal if necessary.

I'm in the process of designing the audio integration for my X and the current design involves using 360's after the DSP amp for the reasons stated above. If I'm completely off-base on this I'd certainly like to know NOW before I lay out the $ on the 360's and all the amps. There are ELEVEN channels in the DSP system and you'd need to retain functionality of all of them (which means you can't sum any of them) if you want to retain full functionality of the DSP processor and its EQ.

There's a distinct possibility, however, that I have no idea what I'm talking about. I just started researching this a few months ago and my day job is NOT in the A/V industry