Well I wish I would’ve found this before I pulled the trigger on my 24 TB LT.
I have had (8) previous Yukon XL’s Suberban variants with the Bose systems. Always was just enough to keep me happy. My daughter has a 2021 Terrain LT with stock ( not Bose) and it sounds way better than my TB. I test drove a certified 21 with the “ premium “ system , and that system was on par With the sounds of the old. Decent highs with enough bass to keep you happy. My 18 Yukon X l with the board and woofer was again just enough above average to keep my happy.
This 24 “premium “ system is hot garbage. Muffled and next to zero highs. I can’t believe in 24 on a “premium “ system I’m going to have to gut it. I do know lot of boat mfg are moving to closed “factory” tuned system you need files to change settings for. All of them sound terrible and you as a consumer have zero ability to customize outside of bass terrible and mids in most cases. No gain controls or other adjustments available on the amps. Can’t understand how things are going backwards when the code is going upwards
Yup! The "refreshed" 2024 "premium" stereo is a BIG step down in quality from the mid-line options Dodge, Jeep, Ford, Honda, and Toyota. I've had four rubber-floored commercial Chargers over the last ten years and they all had much better stereos. I now have a Tahoe at work, and I'm not convinced the GM premium is any better than that.
The good news is the sound system can be fixed, and you can keep the OEM head unit. You just need similarly efficient speakers. Focal and Hertz both make decent options, and I'm sure there are others. There isn't much power going to the rear speakers*, so I opted for Hertz separates in the front and dash, Hertz coaxials in the rear doors, and a pair of amplified 8" Polk Audio subs under the back seat. The stereo now sounds similar to the stock Jeep Alpine, but not as good as the Jeep premium system on the Overlands or Summits or the OEM stereo in our former Ford Raptor. (You can buy a separate component that takes the output and reorganizes it so you can send it all through an amp and get good power to all of the speakers. If you do that, you can build a much better stereo, but we're not that sophisticated, and I didn't want to spend over $2,500 just to get a notch above decent.)
My wife and I are in our 60s. We're not fancy stereo people, and we haven't had to mess with factory stereo systems in many years. At the same time, we've been spoiled by all the manufacturers moving to decent sound systems over the last ten years, so the crappy GM system was a real shocker -- especially in a truck that's much more expensive than our first house. It's also a bite in the ass that GM determined we no longer need 12 volt outlets or upfitter switches -- so there's nowhere to plug in the spotlight, battery charger, radar detector, refrigerator, etc. I haven't seen a vehicle without either a cigarette lighter or a 12 volt plug in the fifty years I've been paying attention, so it didn't occur to me to look for one.
Upfitter switches are now available for my new truck. By the time you get the wiring harness extension, which is required to mount the switches in the recommended location, it's over $500 -- and you're expected to mount the switches in the trim panel, facing down, immediately above the gauges. If you want to turn on a switch you reach through the steering wheel. I'm not kidding. (See photo below). Also, the switch panel doesn't plug into a convenient wiring harness that provides power leads inside the cab and in the engine compartment (like Ford/Jeep/Dodge). If you want to run fog lights or backup lights, for example, you have to fish the hot leads through the firewall. That's a colossal pain in the ass, especially if you have a Duramax, as there's almost no room to get your hand down to where you need to access the firewall. Basically, GM doesn't give two sh@ts about our wants/needs/conveniences...
