I've got my B5, but the head unit is a little outdated. I cant find any cassettes, and the 6 disk changer in the trunk is nice but not easy to change CD's on the fly. My friends keep complaining how "hard it is to drop the seat and crawl into the trunk on the highway". What a bunch of whiners.

So, in the interest of my whiny friends, I would like to upgrade to an aftermarket deck. But the car already has the bose system in it, and I wouldnt want to put in a new deck and lose that beautiful bose quality.

Anyone have luck with this? I'm pretty sure a wiring harness will take care of the speaker connections, but the deck needs to be swapped. To keep the functionality of the amp and the cd changer would be ideal.

Tips, tricks, suggestions? Thanks

 

I have the bose stereo, i went to an audio "SUPERSTORE" in brampton, needless to say they sucked, dont go to them, he tried to tell me i had to take out everything to get a deck in because of the stock amplifiers...Right.... I sucessfuly installed an aftermarket deck in an 01 m3, and it had the same setup, for the most part. Anyway, where was i, OH ya, THERE"S A WIRING HARNESS! on ebay for about 80.00, well worth it. Comes with a double Din installation bracket, antenna adaptor, and wiring harness that will turn on the bose stereo. when i got it, i went by the diagram they give you, and it doesnt work. You need to connect all the audio's together, and i dont mean TOGETHER. but fl fr rr rl, etc. Your also going to need 2 things(sorry for my technicalness) that turn the 2 wires into RCA's. besides that it's a fairly easy install. They ALSO give you the tools to remove the deck!
i just re did my connections. solidered them. If you need a hand message me!
here are some pics

 

p.s i only have one 2wire to rca, because my deck has preouts' for front channels....but doesnt work so i have to get another THING!

 

so how long did it take you to install your stereo altogether?

 

Everything, afew hours,maybe 3. It was finding where to bring the power wire through the firewall that took the longest. i went underneath the pollen filter on the left side. just tedious, gotta take off panens, get through the firewall. it's fairly easy