We bought a new RAV4 a month ago. We like it a lot. But, to both of us, the stereo is way overbalanced to the Bass. There is a way to turn both Treble and Bass up or down but even with Bass turned down to zero, we still get boom-boom, thumpa-thumpa. This would be fine for listening to old Tupac jams, but my wife likes Smooth Jazz and I like Classical. My wife took the car back to the dealer’s repair department and the guy there listened to it and said “It sounds just like every other Toyota stereo.” Are all new Toyota stereos balanced like that to reflect current tastes? Or are we nuts? There is an audio instrument (pardon my ignorance, but I don’t know the name of it) that has a dozen or so fluctuating light bars, each tuned to a different frequency range. It is used to balance the sound of a given piece of music. Is it possible to easily find someone with one of those who could test our car stereo? It would be nice to have some objective information before we start bitching to Toyota.
You could install an equalized (I think that’s what you are referring to) so you could manually better balance the sound.
Another thing to investigate is that you may be able to put sound absorbing baffles behind the speakers. You may be getting some booming resonance from the open area in the doors. Check with Crutchfield. The are really good with this kind of stuff. If they have something available it wont be expensive and they can give you detailed installation instructions which should be be fairly easy and straightforward.
Is there an equalizer function on your stereo you’re not finding? Or maybe a sound enhancer that has settings such as Hall, Church, News, Stadium, Club, Annoy? Typically a lot of thought it put into modern stereo systems, even if it’s not the most loaded version of a particular model.
There wouldn’t be any available equalizer that you could add to a factory stereo. Is there a factory subwoofer perhaps stuck somewhere? There are software programs that professional car stereo installers can use by sticking a microphone in the car, then running frequency test sweeps through the cd player, and then analyze the response curve, but this is typically for competitive stereo installs where the vehicles owner is entering the system in a competition.
The equalizers that you have seen with several bars that are adjustable have to be placed in between the source sound(the CD unit) and the amplifier(s), so in a factory stereo situation, there is nowhere to put one, since the only amplifier is the one on board the in dash player.
IF there is a factory subwoofer installed, you might be able to turn down the gain on the amplifier if there is one, or disable it altogether.
Even though you are sure you have adjusted the unit correctly, read the manual, and make damn sure you are not missing anything.
It may save you some embarrassment at the dealer.
Also when you take it in, make sure they listen to your type of music, not the Metalica CD the technician has in his tool box.
My wife has a new RAV4 also.
Working in consumer electronics for many years and always having an aftermarket system in my current vehicle I know what a good system sounds like.
The RAV4 unfortunately has a poor sound system.
Of course you can put an aftermarket system in but then you forfeit the nice looking dash for an oval piece of aftermarket plastic with a rectangle car deck in the middle of it (yuck) and the loss of your steering wheel controls.
They Toyota decks aren’t very “expandable” either meaning adding on an equalizer isn’t easy and isn’t going to do much.