I have complained of this system since I got my truck in nearly July. Recently in another post I saw that turning off the speed compensation feature helped. I turned it off and the sound quality improved greatly. However I still only have 3 speakers that I can tell are working without putting my ear to them or my hand on them. I can not hearthe front door speakers at all but cn feel vibrations in them and if I get out and lean down I can hear them but it is poor sound. The two front door speakers work but only play muted music and no vocals at all. When it is faded entirely to the backseat the volume drops by more then a half. and the sound quality is junk. So what I have are the three dash speakers doing all the work. If in stereo on older music you can hear the right and left. On Surround all you can hear is the center speaker. It does have a lot of bass when set for it. I can not believe this is right for a so called 18 speaker system. My question is this what you hear if you have the Unleashed system? My other F150s with the premium systems sounded much better and you could tell it had more the 1 or 3 speakers. If this is normal for the rest of you then I have to accept it. If not I will try to get it repaired. It does not seem like a speaker quality problem but more like a whatever you call the part or program that controls the sound distribution.

 

Although you will get a lot of responses complaining about the unleashed system mine sounds great. From the sound of it yours needs fixing in my opinion.
Also the source of your music will play a huge part of the sound.

edit: sitting here right now and was on WiFi doing some emails and I switched to CarPlay, it sounded awful.
I shut off WiFi and the sound came back.
I find plugged into direct gives me the best sound.
Hope this helps.

 

I will add I have a Bronco with the B&O and changing out the speakers with aftermarket speaker and made a world of difference. No mystery that a leaker that is $25 is better than a $1 speakers.

 

Common complaint. 95% of the time, I stream music through Qobuz for Hi-Res audio, I keep mine on surround and speed comp off.

More importantly, I swapped out the front door speakers and a-pillar tweeters as well as the rear door speakers and it made a HUGE difference. The system is tuned by B&O, but the speakers themselves are cheap cardboard motorcraft speakers. My advice to anyone that decides to swap them out: Do not go for 300 watt speakers or anything like that. Maybe 100w max. Otherwise, the factory amp will struggle to push them.

 

What brand/model number speakers did you buy? Do you have a link you could share?

I had a 2017 super duty with the “upgraded Sony” system and I threw in some decent aftermarket speakers and they also made a world of difference.

Thank you for the help and advice!

 

I had custom work done on mine, so they would not work for you. I added components to the rear doors to match the fonts which were done by an audio shop, and replaced all three dash speakers. I have amps/subs and all kinds of stuff done, so it would be too much for your scenario.

Pioneer TS-A693FH for the front door and TS-G650 for the rear doors will cost you about $150 for all and make a night and day difference. I believe those are direct replacements with no adapters needed. Also get 2 pairs of Metra speaker harnesses so you don't have to cut into the factory harness. They're like $10 a pair.

 

PowerBass does make a 3 Ohm speaker but I can't find more specs than that. It is in the same OEM design. Those would really wake the system up. I'm more than happy with the PowerBass OEM drops front and back even the 4 Ohm ones. They are rated at 89 db/watt.

Hopefully it is not something in your head unit but until you get your hands dirty and work on the audio problem I doubt anything will be done. Could be something as simple as an unseated plug or a half pinned connection. If it is in the head unit likely it can be tweaked with Forescan. If some the electronics in the head unit were bad I think there would be other defects present.

 

In most modern upgraded sound system from factory, what you are describing is NORMAL. Mark Levinson. JBL. B&O. Harman Kardon.

All do the same as you described. Why is it like that?

I have not look into detail of B&O. I will use JBL system in my LC as an example.

JBL uses “Distributed Subwoofer System” (DSS). DSS uses bass from the cargo subwoofer AND the two front door mid-bass speakers to provide bass to the whole cabin. So instead of one BIG subwoofer in traditional system, modern systems use small subwoofers placed strategically around cabin for bass. (Remember, most music bass rarely goes below 40 Hz.)

So, those front lower door speakers are more for BASS (or low end frequencies), not vocals. If you’re using the stock JBL amp, then that location is only getting mid-bass signals…thus, “muffled” sound that you’re getting.

Vocals and highs ALL come from the dash and A-pillar speakers. And this is intentional. Dash and A-pillars midrange and tweets are there to make the sound stage HIGH up instead of at your knees. And the dash mid-tweets use the reflectively coated windshield to bounce the midrange and high frequencies throughout the cabin.

The ceiling speaker and headrest speakers are there for “fill” and surround ambience. They are NOT there to pound music out.

The rear speakers in the rear door are NOT there to make much music. They are there to fill the rear seats with music…more fill than loud music bc the front dash speakers are the main ones to provide staging.

The idea is that all sounds come from the front “stage”, not behind your head, not left or right of where you’re seating. Think of sitting in a concert. You don’t want music behind you nor to your left and right.

Even though some system claims 7.1 surround, the surround effect is not like movie theater. It is so that every seat in the car gets similar sound.

So, while this setup may sound weird to folks who are used to the traditional setup, it is the correct way.

And IMHO, the B&O Unleash is a good system.

 

And since i have Googled B&O unleashed, yeah, B&O is under Harman Kardan. So, B&O is just like Mark Levinson, JBL, etc. in design.

https://assets.ctfassets.net/8cd2csg...English_US.pdf

Found this speaker layout for Expedition but is similar to us. We just have 4 less speakers. We don’t have the cargo midrange speakers nor 2 of the overhead speakers.

But the design is same as other modern sound system. 3 so-called “subwoofers;” probably better named as low frequency drivers IMO. One subwoofer in the rear of our cab. The FRONT two door woofers (6x9) are for mid bass. So the subwoofer and front door woofers all act together to provide midbass and bass to the cabin. This is common in automotive world because 3 small subs can move air quicker and provide quicker bass response….but downfall is that it does not provide DEEP bass such as in pounding rap sounds or heavy metal. But for most music that your average customer listen to, the 3 “subs” provide good quick bass.

The 3 dash midrange speakers provide the vocals and bouncing them off the windshield. The two door sail tweeters provide the highs. These 5 speakers provide the vocals and highs and provide the staging of the sound.

The rest of the speakers are for fill and ambience. The rear door speakers provide a little more sound (more “fill” if you will) because the rear passengers are father away from the front dash.