[lumpydog]

All - I've been messing with the Harman Kardon settings over the past month or so. The default settings are pretty crappy in my opinion, but I realize this stuff is subjective.

My beefs with the default settings:
- 2nd Row and Rear speakers are hard to get "involved"
- Front speaker bias
- 2nd Row and Rear speakers don't output high range at all
- Soundstage/voice is biased to the passenger side (sounds like vocals are coming from the passenger tweeter - maybe due to how each tweeter is aimed).
- No real punch all around.

After messing around with different settings, I found that using Logic 7 Surround with the max (furthest right) surround setting was the best way to get the rear speakers to "get in the game" - especially with regard to bringing out their higher end. But setting the Surround to max biased the speakers to the rear so I needed to use the fader to bring the overall sound back forward a little. To get the sound stage/vocals more centered, I nudged the balance over to the left.

EQ settings, I just messed with until it sounded good to me and had a little more punch. Below are all my settings. If others have settings they like, post them for others to try.

Logice Seven Surround: Enabled
Surround: +2 (all the way to the right)
Treble: +4
Bass: +3
Balance: Left 1
Fader: Left (F) 2
Equalizer:
100khz + 4
200khz + 2
500khz 0
1khz +1
2khz +2
5khz +4
10khz +5

[Doc5513]

Thanks for posting this!

[lumpydog]

Originally Posted by Doc5513

Thanks for posting this!

When I owned my E70, I found a similar thread and it helped.

I'd also recommend tuning your settings listening to:

a) A song you are very familiar with

or

b) A song known to have excellent production and range


I use "Rosanna" by Toto. Not my favorite band or song by a long shot but it's well produced and is an excellent track to make sure you are getting the entire range out of your system.

[denniss]

Thank you. Will try this out.

[Xeno]

With appreciation for this update, for a previous discussion one can go to:

https://g05.bimmerpost.com/forums/sh...ight=equalizer

[lumpydog]

Originally Posted by Xeno

With appreciation for this update, for a previous discussion one can go to:

https://g05.bimmerpost.com/forums/sh...ight=equalizer

Yup! PBG's EQ settings were what got me to try different things. I'm not sure if there is really much to carry forward from the F15... speakers will be different, amp will be different, etc. Also that thread didn't cover Surround, Fader, Balance, Treble and Bass settings. Figured I'd dig in a little deeper here!

[lumpydog]

Originally Posted by lumpydog

When I owned my E70, I found a similar thread and it helped.

I'd also recommend tuning your settings listening to:

a) A song you are very familiar with

or

b) A song known to have excellent production and range


I use "Rosanna" by Toto. Not my favorite band or song by a long shot but it's well produced and is an excellent track to make sure you are getting the entire range out of your system.

Another good artist to setup/test against is Steely Dan. Anything produced by them is exceptional recording quality (Hey Nineteen, Peg). Not a favorite band, but another good one to use when trying to dial in a sound system.

[iSlrsX5]

Sounds way better now!

Thank you!!!!

[goten11756]

Definitely gonna try this out! The default settings are definitely subpar~ Thank you!

[nZtiZia]

still waiting on X5MMMMM to post his EQ numbers 😜

[pavloPL]

Great, thanks for settings. Have very similar, just a tip fro iPhone CarPlay users: if you have EQ setup in Spotify or Music app it is working over CarPlay and outputting modified sound to BMW so you might have different results applying lumpydog settings. You would need to disable EQ in iPhone so the settings would produce great results.

[starlights]

I am glad I found this thread. I had been struggling with the sound for the past month. I installed a spare tire sub and whenever that sounded right in the front the back seat passengers complained of excessive thumping and no music. I have coded B&W settings so instead of Logic there are a few different modes such as theater, studio, lounge etc but the setting to increase surround still exists and I found good sound balance with deep bass using "lounge" and surround mode to max. My bass settings are a bit lower than those in the original post but that's because of the additional sub in the trunk. By setting surround to max the thumping is gone and now the sub is musical and goes much lower. I would have never thought to mess with the surround setting... Thanks! Appreciated!

Edit: One other thing - I have programmed one of my preset buttons to bring up the sound settings so I can raise or lower the bass on the fly depending on the music/song. "Hey BMW, show sound settings" also works :P

[TexAg91]

My settings

[swestland85]

Coming from a 2018 X3 with H/K I also find the H/K in the G05 bit lacking, I turned off Logic7 as in the X3 this wasn't giving any good results. Will try to play with the settings found in this thread and I have to give Logic7 a try again maybe it works better in the X5. The sound just lacks punch and overall 'bubble', sounds very canny.
So for now I'm quite disappointed with the H/K system and regret not getting the B&W upgrade. But I found €5k for this upgrade a bit to much so hopefully I can get it right.

[dombi]

Originally Posted by TexAg91

My settings

Big thumbs up for AIC.

[dombi]

Unfortunately there is just so much that you can do with EQ.
The system power is just not there...

And I think something is going on with the underseat Woofers too... I measured the frequency response of a BMW X7 with BW, and there was a huge dip in the Mids - Woofer crossover region. Kinda looked as if the factory polarity was flipped...

Unfortunately I did not have a chance to experiment with it. But maybe someone could measure it again, and check the polarities of the Woofers.