Integral Audio Soundstage + subwoofer install/review (updated with pics!!!) (2024)

squidlyboy

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Drives: 2014 Alpine White 328i M-Sport

Join Date: Jul 2014

Location: Chandler, Arizona

hey Nate - congrats on the new system! Just curious what you plan on doing with your Bavsound Ghosts now that you no longer need them... PM me if you are wanting to sell them.

EDIT: Sorry Nate, when i discovered this thread today, i was so excited about you wanting to dump your Ghosts, that i didn't even bother to read through the rest of your review lol

Didn't mean any disrespect, as i'm happy for you, but i thought i should probably read the rest of it to provide some feedback. I was slightly amused when you said this system "makes the BSW S-1 sound like a base system" and that the new system "blows EVERYTHING ive heard in a BMW clean out of the water". Those are some pretty bold claims teetering on the edge of heavy hyperbole. Should probably tone that down a little bit if you don't want to put a bunch of people on the defensive from the get go.

With all the talk so far in this thread being on speakers, I took the liberty to jot down some notes/specs in your changing of the amplifiers. Frankly, i don't think we give enough credit to how much an amp contributes in improving a system. Its often more significant than upgrading the speakers, depending on the situation. Wondering if that might be a bigger reason you think this system sounds better... even more so than the speakers themselves?

From everything i read here and online specs for your previous Bimmertech amp as well as your new Arc KS 125.4 / OEM HiFi amps that are used by the Integral system, these are the specs i found. Please correct any of this if there are errors. I tried to double-check everything.

Btw.. take my comments with a grain of salt as i have never heard the Integral system up close/personal. As you can only go so far from technical specs from a data sheet, i realize there are limitations. With that said...

Some observations:

• So right off the bat, i noticed that with your new Integral system, the power to your front speakers has been beefed up from 55w to 75w with two of the Arc channels. I'm not implying that you are one of the louder-means-better-quality crowd, but i'm wondering if maybe because you are experiencing more headroom in the two most significant channels in your car, that this is one of the primary reasons you feel that this system is better? Hey.. nothing to be ashamed of either. I think having more headroom to bump up the power ceiling to your music is a good thing, esp with clean power from a solid Arc amp. Who among us doesn't want that? I certainly do - in fact i have 75w-100w going to my own front channels.
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• This is a really odd/interesting mix of the use of the new Arc 125.4 mini amp and the OEM HiFi amp for this new system. I'm not sure how i feel about it yet. I couldn't quite first understand how, upgrading 6 new speakers across 4 channels (not including adding a sub, which requires a 5th channel), you were able to power everything using a 4-channel Arc 125.4 mini, especially when you are also bridging two of its channels to provide 250w for the sub. That leaves only 2 channels remaining (for the fronts). Then i realized you're using the OEM HiFi amp to power the new underseat woofers!! You hinted that the OEM amp was still used to power the rear mids and center, but not the new upgraded underseats. You left that part out which brings me to my next point ...
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• You are going down from the BimmerTech amp's 55w down to the OEM HiFi amp's 40w to power the new Integral Underseat Woofers. Why? I don't know how i feel about that honestly... going from an nice aftermarket amp back to the lower-quality OEM HiFi amp, and also taking a step down in power to boot. Sounds like a downgrade to me. The BMW F30 underseat woofers are typically flatter speakers due to where they reside. Due to these flatter speakers having more limited cone excursion travel, and super limited enclosure space (if you can even call it that), to really get good clean sound out of these speakers, you need MORE power, not less (Hoffman's Law). I don't get upgrading these speakers, then downgrading the power and amp quality to power them. Doesn't make sense. For my own system I am planning on adding Ghost underseats and powering them with 200w (bridged channel) from my XD800/8.
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• Other than the sub, the new Arc 125.4 amp is only being used to power the front two speakers. This is interesting on a couple of fronts. Being that you like the sound of this new system so much, i think it goes to show that the rear mids, the center channel, and the underseats, don't figure in significantly to a person's perception on what makes a system "Great sounding". Integral seems to think that these channels don't deserve a dedicated upgraded amp channel on their own, and are better left to be more obscure (in the background) than anything else.
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• Integral seems to think that the front speakers (midrange/tweeter) and the trunk sub provide the biggest bang for the buck in the entire system. I don't disagree with this. Personally, i think the underseats primary objective should be to tie together the trunk sub lows to the midrange freqs - i.e. do lower mid-range to mid and lower bass (covering even some of the sub freqs even though they are ill-equipped to do so)
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• I thought your assessment of your original Rockford Fosgate 300w 10" trunk sub (P300-10 amplified Punch i assume) was the most interesting comment/review of all- haha. I would think that having a 300w powered 10" trunk sub would do wonders for your system, but your assessment that it was underwhelming was startling. Knowing nothing about RF from personal experience, but only from what i read other people say about it in general, that its a step lower in quality from the standard JL subs that most people seem to favor here. That, and it does seem like the enclosure its in is rather small for a sub that size. Well... I guess you can't expect much from a $160 sub that you can get from Walmart

P.S. I was serious about being interested in your BSW Ghost underseats if you are willing to part with them! Or even your Earthquake SWS-8's ... Let me know... and again, congrats on your new system

Last edited by squidlyboy; 12-19-2016 at 03:05 PM..

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