Robert_J

Things are changing at ID. Started earlier this year - http://www.diymobileaudio.com/forum/...-dynamics.html

impact

Yes Eric and others were pushed out of the company by their investors and I feel so bad for them because they built that company. On the other side of it the products are staying the same for now and I hope to god it doesn't change. I work very closely with a shop here that is a dealer for ID and I've used their products for a while now and so far so good, the products are still the same. As far as customer support things have stayed pretty much on the up I haven't had any big complaints about it other than the initial period when the transition took place.

On another note I can't wait to see what Eric has in store for the future. I know he's working on some things

Robert_J

I look at it like when Scott sold RE to the owner of US Amps. They were the same subs for a short time until they sent production to China. I know the guy that went over there and taught them to build RE subs. Now that the owner has implemented his cost cutting measures, the quality has dropped.

On the other hand, I am familiar with Powerbass because I own one of their amps. And I have a friend who had one of their even larger amps. Great value amps that produce more power then the specs show.

bigbegum

Any updates?

anarchyx34

No updates yet as I've been kinda sidetracked, but I started looking into this again today. I think I'm actually going to go with the Polk db840DVC http://www.polkaudio.com/caraudio/specs/subs/db840dvc/

It has the highest QTS of any of them (.7) but not retardedly high like the pancake shaped pioneer. Also the FS is at a nice 53hz instead of 35 or lower like many of the other woofers I checked out. It's cheap too. I hope this one works out well.

This review on amazon also is kind of comforting:

Polk Audio sub replacing Mark Levinson sub in Lexus LS430, May 3, 2009

The Mark Levinson (ML) subs in 2001 - 2003 Lexus LS430 are notorious for blowing-up very easily. Lexus ML replacements cost $350 - $400 (plus labor) ! !

I decided to pass ML and instead went with the Polk Audio db840DVC sub which cost me less than $60 (inc. S&H) and installed it myself. Even though the ML sub has a 12ohm impedance vs the Polk at 8ohms (4+4), the Polk works great. I'd say it sounds better than the original ML sub

edit: just ordered it. $50 shipped. There was another review saying it was perfect for a LS430 so I'm confident.

Robert_J

From the link:
Xmax (linear) .51 inch/13 mm (peak to peak)

My guess it is still better than the ML sub. Normally, xmax is measured 1 way so in this case it consider it 6.5mm. The Exodus Anarchy 6.5" 'sub' moves almost the same amount of air being a smaller driver plus it adds low distortion features - http://www.diycable.com/main/product...roducts_id=538

anarchyx34

Okay so I just installed the Polk sub, and while I only had about 5 minutes of listening time I have to say WOW! The difference is astounding. This thing actually HITS instead of going brappp. I had to turn the gain up on my amp quite a bit but once this sub has some power, way more than the factory sub can handle, it sounds sublime. If just pushing on the cone of a sub is an indicator of QTS then the factory sub is like a .2. It has no stiffness whatsoever, which is why it sounded like I was killing it (I probably was). Bass heavy music like hip-hop can be played on the Polk at high volume levels and it sounds perfectly comfortable doing it. I played a few rock tracks and the higher frequency bass seems to be well integrated as well.

I don't have time to do frequency response analysis but I'm curious as to what the results are going to be. I did however take some pics.





I didn't have the brains to actually take an above view pic of the sub installed but use your imagination. It actually fit quite well in there and it's got enough clearance with the trunk liner that it's not protruding. I had to drill new holes of course since the factory mounting system wont work (note... the mounting tabs are cast into the aluminum frame on the stock speaker, there's no removing the ring and using that on a new woofer. Maybe on older models but not this one). And I robbed the factory sub of it's connector and used that for an easy hookup. Very satisfied so far.

Robert_J

"springiness" is actually Vas. Here's an explanation of all the different parameters - http://www.eminence.com/support/unde...dspeaker-data/ .

I'm glad everything worked out.