2001 A6 C5 Stereo Install Issues
 

Im sure that I pulled a nub moved and over-looked something. But I purchased a Sony XAV-63 with the correct Metra 70-1787 wiring harness.
The factory setup is the Symphony Cassette - Single CD with Bose integration.

From what the directions on the wiring harness state, if the system is powered by bose then only utilize the RCA connectors. Upon doing so - the Sony radio has 4 outputs for front and rear audio.

Im only getting sound from the front left speaker and the sub. Anyone have any ideas on what I might be missing?

Thanks!

How many of the RCAs did you plug in?

Also, does the regular plug (is your adapter) have the speaker wires still plugged in?
You may have a conflict...

All 4 as stated on the instructions listed in the package. I move the rears to the front and the front to the rear. Whatever location that one RCA was plugged into, no audio..
I got a replacement from Amazon and waiting to install the new harness, to determine if the old one was bad. Which it seems to have just been an faulty RCA plug.
Also I waiting for my 4 channel ground loop isolator to install.
Hopefully the new harness works.. Ill post some pics of the install once its all done.

So I got the new wiring harness in - got everything wired up correctly. Plugged in the 4 RCA's for the front and rear speakers. Again.. All speakers work execpt for the front driver side speakers.
I moved the plugs around and tested to see if the channel from the radio is broken and it is not.
It seems to really not like the one channel from the Metra Wiring harness. Where ever that is plugged in - no sound.

Im baffled at this point.. This is a new harness from Amazon (2nd one / replacement) I have the ground loop adapter setup and its working just fine.
Yes i have the setting for the RCA's on the head unit to Rear and not Sub.
Anyone have any ideas?

Just to be clear:

1) You get sound on 3 of the 4 speaker positions?
2) You can get sound from all 4 speakers, but only 3 at a time by shuffling the cable connections?
3) Your original Audi Symphony radio displayed "BOSE" at startup?
4) With your original Audi Symphony radio connected all 4 speakers work as expected?

I've not looked at this stuff in a LONG time, but I thought I remembered non-Bose cars had a rear amp only with fronts driven directly by the head unit, and Bose cars had a 4-channel amp but used a little 2"(?) speaker in the driver's side B-pillar for phone and Nav which is driven off the Front-Left speaker connection. It seems an odd coincidence that your Front-Left speaker doesn't put out audio. Have you checked the Nav Mute and Phone Mute connections on your harness? I don't recall if either feeds into the Bose amp, but if they did that could explain it - if the Bose amp thinks the Nav/Phone is in use it could be muting the driver's side channel to allow the B-pillar speaker to be heard....

Packed everything up and getting ready to return it all... Not sure what could be missing as everying from the Metra harness is plug and play. No matter what order I have the RCA's connected, theres no sound from one speaker... UGH.

No such thing as plug-and-play, only plug-and-pray. Check the harness - visually at the least. There's a sticker on the Symphony if you're not sure which connections are which....

At the moment I suspect one of your mute connections is grounded and disconnecting it may solve your problem, but I need you to answer the #'d questions above to be sure we're saying the same things....

Thanks you for your help!! See my answers below.

Very true.. At this point i want to set it all on fire.. lol
Anyways I checked the harness again all connections seem solid. There is one harness that is not plugged in which is the block for Navi/Phone etc. My A6 does not have Navi or the phone installed. Also the metra harness does not have a female block for the factory harness to be utilized.

Maybe I'm confused by the late hour .... I think we're saying the same thing:
-when wired "correctly" you get sound from RF, RR, LR speakers, but not LF.
-when you shuffle the connectors, you can get LF sound, but then some other speaker is off

Have you looked at the Symphony sticker and compared the connected pins?
https://forums.audiworld.com/picture...ictureid=66313
That's from RNS-D Nav+ but Symphony is similar - though I don't seem to have it online, it had a NAV mute and a Phone mute. What was connected to those mute inputs before and what's connected now?

What happens when you disconnect whatever dangling connectors from your Symphony? That is, hook up the Symphony with the same connectors as the Metra uses - leaving the Nav/Phone/whatever one dangling. If we can prove the dangling connector causes the problem we can figure out why.