cali TL

Hey guys long time no talk, ever since i sold the TL i havent been on here much... but i know that you guys will be able to give me more info than i ever wanted on a topic like this... I just bought a mb quart amplifier and subwoofer on clearance, the sub retails at 450 and the amp retails at 700, but crutchfield was selling them for 119 and 300 respectively (seriously)... so i went ahead and bought the stuff, but now im nervous, ive heard good things about this company, but do you have any input on personal experiences with mb quart products? the deal just seemed too good to be true.

dark inspire

I haven't had first hand experience with MB Quart's Amps and Subs, however there is one member here who recently got 2 MB Q amps installed w/his W3v2. I think he posted a few pages back along with pictures.

optomos

There are worse & there are better. Dont know to much about the their amps, but I would of bought a JL sub over a MB Quart sub any day.

elduderino

Yeah, the amps are basically rockfords inside, and the subs are designed by rockrod, NOT by MB Quart Germany.

So you got a good deal for decent amps and a so-so sub, but better looking than if they said Rockford.

Rockford is blowing out all that MB Quart stuff... something going on over there.

cali TL

haha well ya i would have picked a 10w7 over this 15 crap any day, but itsa matter of funds

Tyzing

i've heard an 8in w7 that could hit as good if not better then a ton of 12's

jpswanberg

i read somewhere about the original mbq reorganizing their finances and starting up business again but not under the mb quart banner (which was bought by rockford). i also read somewhere (its that dreaded "sometimers" that happens when you can't remember shit after you hit 40) that rockford is moving "their" mb quart production overseas. i was never a fan of the the mb quart sound (way too in youe face, and their aluminum tweeters could be murder on your ears), but they won a lot of trophies and had a huge following back in the day. jps

elduderino

I have heard that MB Quart as a trademark in the US is owned by Rockrod, but that Rockford let the German company go broke. So the German company is trying to come back but will not have ownership of the MB Q name in the US... which will probably be used by Rockford on offshore stuff.

Interesting to see how it goes...

elduderino

THis broke Friday I think?

http://carsound.com/articles/publish/article_643.shtml

optomos

Hm, I wonder under what name they will sell their product.

I'm Batman

As I understand it MB Quart and Rockford had an agreement that would give the rights to the name back to the Germans for some cash. Yet there is a hang up. The germans are prepared to bring a new name "Third Acoustics" to the US market. I would hate to see them promote that name, it is too close to Third Riech. More to come on this issue.

The Germans want to bring product to the States that is like the old high performance Germans built speakers.

SpeedyV6

"Third Acoustics" = Third Reich + Boston Acoustics

Why not just keep the MB Quart name?

I'm Batman

They sold it to Rockford a few years back and they might not be able to get it back.

elduderino

And they announced wanting to use this name without having secured the .com url or the US trademark... both now owned by Rockford.

cali TL

maybe they announced it purposefully as PR move.....

xX24Xx

I don't think Rockford spent all that money just for a name. I'm sure they got everything. As for the original MBQ creators, I haven't heard anything about coming back with a new label. Personally I never liked MBQ to begin with. I think they have always been overpriced for the quality they give, and the highs they produced were harsh. Rockford Fosgate on the other hand was once a good reputable company. They actually used to hand assemble their amps in the USA. Now ... in my opinion ... everything they touch is garbage. The last thing they ever did right was produce the Symmetry EPX3. And for the sub and amp, the MSRP on both of those items is outrageous, and you actually paid a little more than they were worth.

elduderino

I remember when Rockford was a cool little company instead of a public company losing money and willing to sell their children to stanch the flow...

I agree about mbq sound but not their quality... a well made product, if not my taste in sound.

Latest is that Rockford has sold/relinquished all interest in MBQ as of sometime this month and they will ahve a new US dsitributor. Sounds as if the German gov't found a way to keep MB Q in Germany...

dark inspire

so is there still a chance that MB Q will build the quality products of yesteryear, or is all hope lost?

elduderino

Too new to rate...

Zasker1

I have had MBQuartz RSC-216 speakers in my accord for 3 years and they sound awsome. Not sure about the amps but they make good speakers, very common in the VW world. You could ask a question on the Vortex.

nbagadio

I'm the guy who did the MBQ Amps (thread)

FOr what it's worth, I think they're great for the money I spent (the Crutchfield deal...$510 for the RAA 1000 and the RAA4200).

When I did a little digging around researching these amps and from what the MBQ techs told me, MBQ did "design" these amps, but picked most of the parts from the RF parts bin much like Acura picks from Honda. And, like Acura, MBQ performed a few tweaks and added a few extra parts to make just a bit better.

Not saying these are the best-in-class, but for me, they were a great value.

Just my

elduderino

I am sure they were a great value. I am also sure that they are good amps.

Unfortunately, I am also sure that these amps were 100% designed by Rockford.

Reading the bullet points on the web site shows that they are al Rockford design features with even the same names (which shows that as a public company, Rockford carries their brand and IP equity on their balance sheet and has to show it as creating some return : )

Back when Rockford first bought Hafler, Rockford had a Power series of amps - the Power 300, the Power 650, andeventually the Power 1000. Many, many drug dealers had these back then, and I understand some law-abiding cits did as well.

Well, Hafler had had a 100w x2 amp from before that they continued to make. Sounded great. But they came out with a 40w x 4 also. I bought one, sounded great. Loved that amp.

But it was the Rockford Power 300, without a fan, without the bass and treble controls, and in the same extrusion as the other Hafler amp - and with more expensive higher tolerance components in some parts of the schematic.

But make no mistake - not only was it the same schematic, it was almost exactly the same board layout.

Not a bad thing... but I doubt any German-speaker ever touched a proto before they went to production.

cali TL

has rockford really deteriorated that much in the past 5 years, i still have a lot of respect for them and was pretty excited when i found out that MBQ was owned by them. by the way my setup sounds great, ive got the sub in a custom sealed box firing upwards in into the cabin, vol. is approximately 1.6 cf.

elduderino

Their amps are Ok, not great, but OK... they just went public and then started cutting corners.

Last year they bailed on the head unit and Mp3 business and stopped putting any money into Quart, to avoid bankruptcy. I guess all those returns Bust Buy shoves up their ass don't help the P&L.