Centre dash system on 8 speaker std stereo in vRS?

[twonks]

I'm in the middle of upgrading the factory sound system on my 2023 vRS with the std 8 speaker system in it.

 

Was surprised to find that after an initial turn on of my DSP/amp when there should have been no sound coming through, there was music coming out of the centre of the dash.

 

I've not dug around too much more in the car but came in to search google and found a few people have mentioned it but mainly relating to the Canton option - which I do not have,

 

Does anybody know if my car should have a centre speaker? How it is wired? and can it be removed/disconnected?

 

Seems a bit odd for Skoda not to use it as a sales feature if it should be there.

[Felix2021]

Yes, it should have. No, it can't be disconnected.

Was surprised same as you, when i was connecting external amp and heard sound from center speaker, when there should be no sound.

Thing is, that same speaker is used for other systems, like SOS. If you disconnect it, you'll get errors and some messages won't work.

Good thing is, that it's normally so quiet, that after connecting the amp i don't even notice center speaker is there.

[twonks]

Thanks Felix.

 

Good to know it's not just my car, although it adds a layer of complexity I didn't envisage.

I might disconnect the speakers from the head unit physically, as I can now do that from the boot, and see if the centre is spliced from the left/right or amplified elsewhere.

 

If it is elsewhere, I'll be using an external source into my DSP (Helix) for main music, so it shouldn't be a problem.

If not, more thinking needed.

Edited 26 October, 2023 by twonks

[Felix2021]

It's amplified elswhere. I have PnP amplifier connected to head unit using dedicated harness.

When amp was connected but switched off, i could still hear sound from center speaker, and that wouldn't be possible if it was simply spliced from left/right channels. In such case it would have be to also silent with amp off.

So when using external source you're good - center speaker will not work, however it will still work for any messages.

BUT even if you would be using head unit as source, don't bother with this speaker. It's really hard to notice it's there, and it doesn't decrease overall sound quality, sound stage etc.