At this point, I've read a good number of reviews on the Insight, and I've been amazed at the disparity between the reviews and reality. I'm a little suspicious of reviewers that can find no indication on the dash that the electric motor is being used, given the prominent charge/assist indicator, to cite an example. This same reviewer listed the stereo as an example of the Insight's full appointment of equipment. This suggests a good metric for measuring the accuracy of Insight reviews: if they don't complain about the stereo, they're probably not as, uh, informative as you might hope.
The stereo is awful. Actually, the stereo itself is really quite good, with good sound and good controls (including a volume knob!). But the speakers just don't do the head justice. One of the pleasurable dimensions of the Insight is its consistent dedication to fuel economy, which manifests itself in the funny rear wheel skirts, the aluminum body, and the lightweight door materials. I understand the traditional door pockets were deleted (replaced with the behind-the-seats map net) to save the weight required to reinforce the door interior to support them. So the lightweight doors don't make the most stable platform for mounting the speakers, which contributes to the problem.
But the real issue is the speakers. It would take a good bit of space to convey properly my opinions about making speaker cones out of construction paper, trying to get good treble out of a 6 1/2" [construction paper] driver, or covering any speaker with a centimeter thick piece of plastic. Listen to the Insight for yourself for the full experience.
The prospect of spending five hours straight in the car with those speakers
sent me racing to my local Tweeter, Etc. one Thursday afternoon. [I was
considering a drive down to Pennsylvania.] After getting over my lust for
a pair of Boston Acoustics Professional Series components that would have
required first cutting apart the door and then massive door reinforcements,
I picked out a pair of Eclipse 8262 6 1/2" co-axial speakers. [The 8262s
are last year's model; these had just come out of the showroom display--
cheap and already broken in!] They fit in the Insight doors without
modification, and are reasonably light but still sound dramatically better.
Here's the new and old side by side (the Eclipse is on the left):
I pulled the connectors off the existing speakers and soldered them to the
new. Getting the old connectors off required drilling out the rivet that
held the connector to the speaker frame. I made no attempt to secure the
connector to the new frame (though I was tempted!), and I simply pulled the
old braided wire out of the old drivers and soldered it to the new speakers'
lugs. Since I'm relying on the solder to keep the connector roughly in
place, I'll need to be careful when disconnecting the speakers in the future.
But in the meantime, I've got something that works pretty well, and hasn't
torn up any meaningful part of the car. Note the relatively shallow mounting
depth available and the lightweight door panel material.
Installed it fits beautifully, and the tweeter angles up nicely.
I decided to keep the stock grille, at least for the time being.