Well, I searched around to find out what the head unit in the Studio E was.

It's a Sony WX-M7700MDX 2-DIN MD/CD Head Unit, and it's roughly $700.00 imported from Japan.

As of right now, I have one sitting in my living room. I plan on taking it to a professional installer tomorrow - I can't possibly attempt to install it on my own. I printed out all of eMass' directions.

Here are specifications in English of the head unit:

Sony 2Din MiniDisc/CD player with motorised faceplate, Unique Design, user selectable illumination color
user selectable illumination color with 728 color adjustments
SSIR-EXA Digital Synthesizer Tuner
FM12/AM12 Preset (Not World Band Tuner)
CD-R/RW Playback
5.5v High Voltage Pre-Out
AUX-In
HX-DSP III
DSO Dynamics Soundstage Organizer
EQ7 EQ7
MDLP MD Long Play (MDLP)
WBS WBS (Wide Bit Steam)

Visit Sony Japan's WX-7700MDX page with sample color adjusting illuminator

Specifications
Amplifier Section

Max. output power: 4 x 52 W
DSO (Dynamic Soundstage Organiser)
EQ-7 (7-band Equalizer)
Separate Bass, Treble control
Loudness
Pre-amp output: Front and Rear (HPF - swicthable Highpass)
Mono sub-output and swicthable Low Pass filter
Sub volume control
Telephone Attenuator

MD Player

MDLP
Shock Resistant memory: 4 Mbit, 10 sec
Wide Bit Stream
Data Compression: ATRAC, ATRAC3
Digital filter: 8 fs
D/A conversion: 1 bit
Frequency response: 10-20000 Hz
Signal to noise ratio : 90 dB
Repeat, Shuffle

Tuner section

SSIR-EXA ABC tuner
Can adjust the tuner bandwidth, depending on current environmental conditions. Improved sound quality and adjacent station interference result.
DAB control
FM-18/MW-6/LW-6 Presets - using BTM (Best Tuning Memory)
RDS/EON

Changer Control

CD Text
A compact disc and player feature utilizing disc, track and artist information encoded directly on the CD media. Both playback and media components must have CD Text compatibility.
Custom file
A feature package that provides intuitive and safe source management for an audio and A/V system. Examples include Disc Memo, Station Memo and Memo List.
CD/MD List function
CD Title/Scroll
Repeat, Shuffle


This is the head unit (not mine specifically):

http://www.audiocubes.com/images/f_sony_wx7700mdx.jpg (click, image link doesn't work)

If you remember correctly this is the one Honda of America put in their Studio E concept vehicle... Well, one's going into my E as well... :D

I will keep everyone updated. More than likely I will have to trash the rest of the OEM EX system as well, and build something that's fully custom. If you don't know already, I plan on tricking out my E with the same type of tuning style I'm using on my del Sol - tune it, but make it something Honda would release to the public, sort of like, I guess, a Honda Element Type S. I'm going to build something reliable, with an OEM look.

Here are the pics. Forgive my dirty Element.

http://www.hyalineskies.com/pics/sb/ellie_stereo1.jpg
http://www.hyalineskies.com/pics/sb/ellie_stereo2.jpg

looks interesting... how does it sound? Easy to control while driving?

Did you dimple your passenger vent ring?

The vent rings are an OEM accessory.

It sounds AMAZING. Overall, imported, the stereo was $700. My installer made everything work - AUX IN, the subwoofer, everything.

Honestly, it sounds so good, I don't really want to even change the stock speakers now. It's also LOUD - so loud I have not turned it up past 10% of the HU's volume.

That's really slick! How in the world do they get that whole face to flip down? Also, it sounds like your installer might have set the gain too high and that's why it's sounds loud at 10% vol., you should consider having him set the gain lower so you'll have better volume resolution. Yes, it'll take longer to turn up/down, but you'll have many more volume "steps" and it'll sound smoother when going up/down.

Have him work w/you - turn down the gain - then turn up the head unit volume about 90% of the way - then turn up the gain until it's about as loud as you'd ever want to listen to it *without any audible distortion*. That's it!

Thanks for the pics. Again - very sweet. :D

I really hate you for posting this as it makes me wanna budget my finances to buy one.

However, as cool as it looks, the MD player is useless to me and there's no mention of MP3/WMA support.

[quote:4cddc3c678=" "]That's really slick! How in the world do they get that whole face to flip down? Also, it sounds like your installer might have set the gain too high and that's why it's sounds loud at 10% vol., you should consider having him set the gain lower so you'll have better volume resolution. Yes, it'll take longer to turn up/down, but you'll have many more volume "steps" and it'll sound smoother when going up/down.

Have him work w/you - turn down the gain - then turn up the head unit volume about 90% of the way - then turn up the gain until it's about as loud as you'd ever want to listen to it *without any audible distortion*. That's it!

Thanks for the pics. Again - very sweet. :D[/quote:4cddc3c678]

How do you adjust the gain? Is it possible for me to attempt to do it?

By the way, my installer really has helped a lot. At first we could not get the powered sub working, so I pulled out the eMass directions and everything worked then ;)

Wait a minute!!??!!...

After all these years of just throwing the directions in the trash, all I had to do was pull the directions out and everything would work??!!??

Who knew?

[quote:dcc8803e50=" "][quote:dcc8803e50=" "]That's really slick! How in the world do they get that whole face to flip down? Also, it sounds like your installer might have set the gain too high and that's why it's sounds loud at 10% vol., you should consider having him set the gain lower so you'll have better volume resolution. Yes, it'll take longer to turn up/down, but you'll have many more volume "steps" and it'll sound smoother when going up/down.

Have him work w/you - turn down the gain - then turn up the head unit volume about 90% of the way - then turn up the gain until it's about as loud as you'd ever want to listen to it *without any audible distortion*. That's it!

Thanks for the pics. Again - very sweet. :D[/quote:dcc8803e50]

How do you adjust the gain? Is it possible for me to attempt to do it?

By the way, my installer really has helped a lot. At first we could not get the powered sub working, so I pulled out the eMass directions and everything worked then ;)[/quote:dcc8803e50]

Gain adjustability assumes your installer used an RCA to line level converter with an adjustable gain pot that can be tweaked with a small screwdriver.

I have seen double posts before, but never a triple post.

[quote:2191accc06=" "]I have seen double posts before, but never a triple post.[/quote:2191accc06]

So *that's* how eMass got his post count up! :)

-brendan

[quote:881dcae7c7=" "]Well, I searched around to find out what the head unit in the Studio E was.

It's a Sony WX-M7700MDX 2-DIN MD/CD Head Unit, and it's roughly $700.00 imported from Japan.

As of right now, I have one sitting in my living room. I plan on taking it to a professional installer tomorrow - I can't possibly attempt to install it on my own. I printed out all of eMass' directions.

Here are specifications in English of the head unit:

Sony 2Din MiniDisc/CD player with motorised faceplate, Unique Design, user selectable illumination color
user selectable illumination color with 728 color adjustments
SSIR-EXA Digital Synthesizer Tuner
FM12/AM12 Preset (Not World Band Tuner)
CD-R/RW Playback
5.5v High Voltage Pre-Out
AUX-In
HX-DSP III
DSO Dynamics Soundstage Organizer
EQ7 EQ7
MDLP MD Long Play (MDLP)
WBS WBS (Wide Bit Steam)

Visit Sony Japan's WX-7700MDX page with sample color adjusting illuminator

Specifications
Amplifier Section

Max. output power: 4 x 52 W
DSO (Dynamic Soundstage Organiser)
EQ-7 (7-band Equalizer)
Separate Bass, Treble control
Loudness
Pre-amp output: Front and Rear (HPF - swicthable Highpass)
Mono sub-output and swicthable Low Pass filter
Sub volume control
Telephone Attenuator

MD Player

MDLP
Shock Resistant memory: 4 Mbit, 10 sec
Wide Bit Stream
Data Compression: ATRAC, ATRAC3
Digital filter: 8 fs
D/A conversion: 1 bit
Frequency response: 10-20000 Hz
Signal to noise ratio : 90 dB
Repeat, Shuffle

Tuner section

SSIR-EXA ABC tuner
Can adjust the tuner bandwidth, depending on current environmental conditions. Improved sound quality and adjacent station interference result.
DAB control
FM-18/MW-6/LW-6 Presets - using BTM (Best Tuning Memory)
RDS/EON

Changer Control

CD Text
A compact disc and player feature utilizing disc, track and artist information encoded directly on the CD media. Both playback and media components must have CD Text compatibility.
Custom file
A feature package that provides intuitive and safe source management for an audio and A/V system. Examples include Disc Memo, Station Memo and Memo List.
CD/MD List function
CD Title/Scroll
Repeat, Shuffle


This is the head unit (not mine specifically):

http://www.audiocubes.com/images/f_sony_wx7700mdx.jpg (click, image link doesn't work)

If you remember correctly this is the one Honda of America put in their Studio E concept vehicle... Well, one's going into my E as well... :D

I will keep everyone updated. More than likely I will have to trash the rest of the OEM EX system as well, and build something that's fully custom. If you don't know already, I plan on tricking out my E with the same type of tuning style I'm using on my del Sol - tune it, but make it something Honda would release to the public, sort of like, I guess, a Honda Element Type S. I'm going to build something reliable, with an OEM look.[/quote:881dcae7c7]

Did you ever get the FM to work? Did you have to use an FM converter?