ERASE - First of all, thanks for sharing your intimate knowledge of this particular system and car audio in general. Let me give you some background.

Before I acquired the E500, I was on the verge of doing an overhaul of the stereo in my '98 CLK320. My original plan for that car was as follows:

Alpine CDA-7977
Focal 165W (front speakers)
PPI PCX-4125
a/d/s/ 312rs.2

I was going to power each of the Focal separates with 125 watts and bridge the remaining two channels to power the a/d/s/ sub in a sealed enclosure. No rear fill.

Unfortunately, the car was totaled in a high speed accident before the project could get off the ground. I had ordered the Alpine deck at that point, but was forced to cancel it.

Anyway, I bought the E500 to replace the CLK. The previous owner had installed a full aftermarket audio setup that was removed before the car was sold back to the dealer. However, evidence of the installation remains. There are holes drilled for tweeters in the doors, near the side mirrors. (The tweeters are no longer there, the space is filled with some sort of placeholder.) There are also holes in the trunk where amps must've been mounted.

Actually, when I first got the car, both the dash and rear deck speakers were inoperative, and the door woofers were blown. Needless to say, I was very unimpressed with what I thought was the factory stereo. Suddenly I missed what I had once considered to be a subpar Bose setup in the CLK. However, the dealer was kind enough to bring the entire system back to spec, including a new amp and a few speakers.

I am quite pleased with the mids and highs. I'm looking to add some clean, powerful bass to round out the sound. The reason I was looking to replace the head unit was because of my assumptions about the factory setup. I was thinking I could use a deck with a built-in amp to power the dash and rear deck speakers, while continuing to use the factory amp to drive the door woofers. The only reason I wanted an Alpine was so I could retain use of my CD changer. If the current deck is an Alpine, I would assume that an aftermarket Alpine deck could be adapted to control the factory changer. I am not opposed to keeping the stock head unit, but I doubt it has an RCA sub out. Is there another way to get a clean signal for the sub?

I've said enough. Frankly, I'm new to car audio, so I probably shouldn't be carrying on as if I knew anything of value. I bow to your wisdom in this field, and am ready to soak up whatever information you're willing to share. Thanks again.

__________________
1994 E500