Don't waste your time replacing speakers and amplifiers. All you really need is a decent subwoofer and amp. Most of the power of any amplifier is used with the lower (bass) frequencies. Let the subwoofer amp do the heavy lifting by keeping the bass on the head unit below the midpoint. This will get you cleaner power from the stock amp and it will sound like a completely different sound system. My bass is set to ~40% and treble is set to ~70%. It sounds great and would strongly recommend you try this first and save your money.

I think I paid ~$150 for my Coustic 400W class D amp and $150 for my 10" MTX subs in the box. It is a very simple install using a couple in-line splicers so you don't have to cut any wires and can return it to stock. All the connections are in the trunk, makes wiring a simple task.

I just checked amazon and you can get a similar set up for $129 for amp and dual MTX 12" subs for $125. There you go $250.

 

Jjsaustin,
Using your added Sub and Sub amp method listed above, Should I leave the oem sub unit hooked up or just delete it from the system?

 

Out of curiosity, did you investigate whether the head unit can be configured with a subwoofer in the '12 base system? Perhaps someone knows how to get into the setup menu to fool around with this? I agree that a sub will make a big difference, but I am trying to keep the trunk as stock as possible, which would mean getting ahold of the Jag sub that goes into the tire well and wiring as appropriate. I do still think, however, that an upgrade to the midbass and tweeters will do wonders for the vocal and instrument range of sounds.

 

I don't know much about the stock sub, but if you are not getting clean bass out of it, I don't know whether is is a problem with the amp or the subwoofer or both.

You could probably start by adding a dedicated sub amplifier and try it with the existing subwoofer. It it sounds good then stop. Otherwise then move on to the subwoofer. Using the existing enclosure, replace the existing subwoofer with the same size one that is better. If that doesn't work to your liking then get a dual subs in a box for $125.

Make sense?

 

I did not investigate playing around with the head unit.

As far as replacing the midbass drivers and tweeters, I would wait until after you do the sub. I thought I would have to do this as well, but taking the bass levels down in the stock amp (while bumping up the bass level and upping the sub crossover point) will do wonders, believe me.

I know the system sounded like crap before and I never thought it could sound decent w/o ripping everything out. However, after the sub install it sounds great.

I'm trying to tell everyone to save their money and start with an incremental upgrade.

 

The stock subwoofer on both the 380w and 825w is a 250mm with a Power Handling RMS of 2 x 70w and Power Handling Max of 2 x 100w.

Seems kind of low power handling rating?

 

I know it may be different, but the stock sub on my '10 XF S/C (B&W) was an oddball 10" with a square frame and very shallow mounting depth. Not to mention that a higher powered sub, if you can fit one and juice it up, will cause unwanted resonances in the enclosure itself (moderately thin molded ABS plastic).

There's a thread somewhere in this forum from about 4-6 months ago where I detailed out my solution for better overall bass. Understanding the OP's need for better overall sound, there may be improvements to the system merely by doing what jjsaustin said earler; bring your bass down to a couple of notches below the 0 (neutral) point and use a good trunk or spare-tire mounted sub/enclosure to fill in the frequencies below ~70 Hz.

Without a center channel and/or 3-channel processing (I dislike the Logic7 or whatever it's called), getting a good stereo sound with center-of-dash imaging may be a hard sell unless you can actually replace the stockers with B&W components. As mentioned, there may be fitment/crossover/impedance issues, but my initial guess is no, you would hope that the base speakers are the same size but of inferior quality.

Hope that helps a bit. Just my 2 pennies.

 

This is quite helpful, MobileAVC, and I just need to decide which is the path of best efficiency - a sub with all that entails, or a swap out of the door speakers, which it seems can be done for less than $400 plus installation. I also did learn that the center channel wiring is already in place, but not yet sure if a speaker would simply fire up if installed or not. Or, maybe I should just put the car in sport and use the paddles to create my own V8 symphony!

 

LOL! You would be amazed how often I turn off the radio and just enjoy the rumble of the V8.

 

Is the wires still there at add the missing speakers as my XF 2010 30d has the mid door ones not fitted and no Sub in the boot so would all the wires still be there add to upgrade the system.

 

glad to see that I'm not the only one doing this. the sound system is so bad that the V8 does a better job most of the time.