Custom Sounds – Burnet Rd.

stop by on 3÷10÷16 to get cost on window tint and back up camera install. got Price from Fadi, asked how long to do install, told it would be done by 7pm, told him that I would be back next week, needed to make arrangements for ride that I would be able to leave it with him all day and pick up @ opening next day, no worries we can do that. stropped in Monday 3÷14÷2016 10am worked out all that need to be done, sign contract for 1,035.00 + tax. again told it would be ready that day. made comment see ya in morning, no worries Mr. Farrell. came back Tuesday 11 am to pick up, no Fadi, Brandon tells me not ready and it will be sometime that afternoon, ask that Fadi call me, still have no truck and still no call from Fadi,
you do not get a copy of contract until they are done but just know it said estimated time. along with cost, but you don’t get that until they finish, so damn lot of good it will do.
but you signed it said Brandon, no shit jackass but you would not give me a copy and all I was concerned with with cost, I believed the man who handed it to me knew how long it was to take, and that seeing as he is the GM of all stores he should know, or at lest have someone call when it did not get done. make sure you get a copy before you leave. make sure you get all times and monies straight before you leave. make sure you go somewhere else that will honor there word, not just give you lip service

I have been waiting to write a review, hoping a manager would call me back, but it’s been a week so I’m writing this to hopefully spare others. I had new speakers put in the front of my car to replace what I thought were blown out speakers. I called first to ask how busy they were and Tyler said not too busy and to come on it. The guys working in the store were polite and friendly, helped me find what I needed for my car. My issue is with the installation guys. I left my car with them around noon and they said it would take a «Couple of hours». I was fine with that and took my stuff and found a nearby place to work while waiting on my car. At 7pm, they were still not finished, and when they finally completed the job I just wanted to be able to leave. They demonstrated the new speakers for 15 seconds with a song that didn’t have any bass in it so I thought everything sounded way better than my blown out speakers. The next day, the «rattling» sound was back. I went back to Custom Sounds and one of the employees sat in the car with me and did hear the «rattling» sound. He said I could pay $ 50/​hr to have a technician look at it but that the speakers worked fine and basically they don’t honor their work. I’m not one to complain, and I decided to give them one last shot, I called the store and asked to speak with a manager– and have not been called back. This place wants to sell you speakers but their work is not quality. My blown out speakers sounded exactly the same as the crappy job they did on my «new» speakers. Don’t go here.

I took my car the other day and they took 4 hours to install the fucking box and speaker even tho the wires were already ran thru.

Got a custom system 10 years ago (amps, speakers, console, stereo) for my classic truck. Needed a new amp 3 years ago, got it here. Updated the stereo a few months ago (for bluetooth and usb). Got it here. Good service, fair prices, keeps me coming back.

The last place you would ever expect to find me is in a car audio store. I have no desire to be that vehicle that you can hear from across the parking lot, or the one that you can feel coming from miles away due to the bass. However, I had just bought a 2015 quad cab f-​150 and was looking for the best deal on window tint. I found a Groupon for Custom Sounds and knowing their reputation for doing quality work had no qualms buying it. Called the South Lamar location and was referred to the Burnet location as they could get it done that day instead of having to wait a week. I called and spoke with Cole who booked me a spot for the following day as they were already overbooked for that day. Cole also explained the differences between the different types of tint. We decided on an upgraded tint from the Groupon deal, go darker in the back and also add an «eyebrow» on the front windshield. All and all it came to about the price I expected. Cole called back 15 minutes later and asked if I could come in around 5 PM and they would get me done that day!
I show up at the appointed time. Cole has just left to lunch so Tanner steps in and helps me out. We reconfirm the selections, agree on the price and work begins. In the mean time Tanner shows me several different in interesting things I could add to my truck enhance the sound quality. Unfortunately for Tanner, I am not the type to spend money on car audio. Tanner is very knowledgeable and was super helpful. If I was ever looking to purchase car audio I would definitely go to him!
A short 2 hours later, my truck is done. Cole is back from lunch and he gives me the once over do’s and don’ts of window tint and I’m on my way.
Fast Forward 2 weeks. No bubbles, orange peel or micro bubbles in the tint. Over all I think they did a great job at a reasonable price.

I got my sub and amplifier installed here and I have a pretty fancy car. I wanted it done clean and with it attached a certain way. It was done correctly and pretty timely. I would say the price for installation was a little high but overall 5 stars and the guys and the staff are pretty cool there. Want a good job done on your car and it done correctly you can go here.

I was moving to California the following day, and I called on Sunday morning to see if they could fit me in. I spoke with Tanner who was my liaison with the install techs and found a way to fit me in knowing my situation. Not only did they replace my warrantied component speakers, they upgraded me to the Focal and used the cost of my current speakers as credit. They also upgraded my wiring. Killer service. Killer guys. Sad to be moving on. Great work guys!

Today I stopped in and asked for their cost to install a parking sensor in my vehicle. (The manufacturer Curb Alert estimates 45 minute since there is no drilling, just a single exterior attachment and add-​a-​fuse connector to fuse block. They took my unit in the back, then returned with a price of $ 300! (I guess since I had an upscale car they thought I wouldn’t flinch.) When I asked why so expensive, the guy said it would take «at least 4 to 5 hours» to install if I wanted to have it done «right». Absurd!
I walked out, drove down Burnet a few blocks and got the unit installed at TXR neatly, quickly — a little over 20 minutes, and reasonably — $ 100. I’d echo other Custom reviewers… SHOP AROUND. price here can be totally unreasonable.

I have used these guys for years and years but, that was just for speakers and stereo equipment. I think that most of it was over priced. But I was told by them after they gave me a price on installing lights on my car that was double what any other shop would charge «please remember we are a sound shop». My advice to anyone SHOP AROUND before you go here.

I am a previous Custom Sounds customer so I am biased towards their work. When I bought my first car in 1991 I had them install a CD Changer and have used them ever since.
I scheduled an appointment yesterday to get a car stereo with blue tooth installed in the primary family car. So far everything is working great – the hands free is clear and the stereo components (CD/​DVD, iPod/​iPhone/​SiriusXM) are top notch. I was in and out on time.
Normally I would rate this a 5. However, initial inspection with one of the sales guys after the install was complete revealed that they had used the wrong kit to install the deck. The gap around the deck was glaring yet the sales guy acted as if that was normal. Knowing better I told him I was not leaving until it was fixed. He said he would talk to his installer and see if there was anything he could do.
Fortunately the manager intervened. He looked at it, agreed with me, and had the installer put the correct bracket on – eliminating the gaps. I appreciate what he did because the other sales guy was willing to let it go.
I rate this experience 2 stars because:
1: The installer should not have said the job was done when the quality of the install was obviously lacking. When you go to a place like this, you expect quality work and what I got initially definitely was not that.
2: The salesman could have made it right immediately instead of trying to «see» if there was something that they could do. If he cannot recognize that that the install was not indicative of the work that Custom Sounds is known for then he needs to get into a different line of work.
3: Manager intervention is the only thing that saved this review. I appreciate what he did and the immediate action he took.

A complete thumbs up!
I don’t know why people have been rating them so low.
I own a Ford Mustang 2005 and wanted to get my stereo replaced with touchscreen, bluetooth, Aux and USB. The Shaker 500 system in 2005 Mustang comes with just basic radio.
Following Unilocal reviews I figured Pro Car Audio was rated way better than Custom Sounds so I decided to go to them first. The sales representatives were not at all professional plus price that was told to me was exorbitant. Dissatisfied by the sales service I walked out. One of the friends suggested to try out Custom sounds anyway.
So Burnet road’s manager is James I guess. I forgot the name. I walked in and I was greeted very nicely and while I was waiting I observed they greet each and every person walking in to the shop. James showed me different options that I have, I ended up buying the Alpine ILX 007 and for Thanks giving I got $ 200 off on the market price.
I showed up the day I was told for installation and within couple of hours my stereo was ready. I got a 2 year warranty for additional $ 75 and if anything goes wrong with my stereo they ll replace it free of cost, send it to Alpine and take care of everything until then. I was really happy with the entire installation and my car stereo looks like it came built in with the Car. Here one catch was James was trying to sell me a $ 120 warranty which lasted for 3 years but in the third year I would have to pay for uninstalling the car stereo etc. It was only when I showed disinterest in buying the warranty he told me about the 2 year option.
Another complain I can have was service charge, brackets needed for installation etc, were costlier than I expected but I was told the final price before purchase and I can’t really rate them less for a higher price.
Overall a great store in terms of skillsets, knowledge and customer service. Just think about reducing your service charge etc a bit and you’ll have more and more satisfied customers walking out.
EDIT: After adding the image of customized home screen for apple car play by alpine ILX 007, I’m getting more and more requests on how I got that done. So instead of replying everyone individually I figured I’ll just post the procedure here:
You need following things for this.
a. A pen drive, Size 1GB or less.
b. The image that you want as the background with following specifications.
1. Resolution 800×480 (Can use MS paint on windows for this)
2. Format — 24 bit bmp (Bitmap image)
3. Name — openingfile. bmp
Steps:
1. Format the pendrive on windows with file format NTFS or FAT32.
2. Make a folder inside the pen drive called OPENINGFILE.
3. Copy openingfile. bmp to this folder.
4. Connect your pen drive to the USB port on ILX-​007
5. If everything goes well, your device should be recognized and you ll have a prompt on screen asking whether you want to change to custom background. Boom you are done.
Each and every step here is as important as other. So pay attention to detail. If something goes wrong you ll get a message «USB device not recognized.» Ping me back then.

Custom Sounds reached out to me about the customer service issue and I bought an alarm with remote start from them. Service from everyone was on a high level that is normally shown by Custom Sounds employees. They made sure that I was taken care of. Now I need to save some $ to get the Focal speakers

I recently visited Custom Sounds again and I think it is appropriate to update my previous review. The guys at Custom Sounds are very knowledgeable and have solid products and services. I am in need of a subwoofer solution for a small high end German sportscar. When I recently stopped by Jim and Mike and another technician gave their opinion that the best option is an additional amp and pair of custom subwoofer enclosures they could make and install for me. I’m still hesitant because the cost is 2−3x that of a powered sub with the same power and sound specs that I’m familiar with. The problem is space and because my little car won’t fit most solutions, it’s going to cost way more than I want to pay. I do understand that other customers driving these cars probably don’t bat an eye at this level of expense and probably ask for the best available. In all fairness to the guys at Custom Sounds, they probably don’t want to put in a low quality system and may just naturally upsell to premium brand owners. They are running a business after all. Last thing they need is upset people Unilocaling about a bad install. I am still considering options and shopping for the best solution but I wanted to be fair to Custom Sounds and thank them for their advice and offered solution. They are good guys, do good work, and it’s obvious they want to get their customers into sound solutions that they know they’ll love.

I had to go to 2 different locations to get my DVD player installed in my car. Customer service at Lamar location was not positive and the job wasn’t done right. I had to go to the other location at Burnet and did experience better customer service but it took a few tries to get it done correctly. I guess I was just hoping for better service all across the board. I really spent a lot of money and to have it go down the way it did was a hassle and just left me walking away with a bad impression of the business. I personally wouldn’t use them again.

In competence all over. I am a professional sound Enginer and i teach college level audio. Bottom line i know
amp blew on my mercedes (common issue) and it costs 2000 to replace it .So I decided to go aftermarket I did my research and found the perfect amp to drive the factory speakers. After being recommended by the dealership went there. They do not really understand electricity, ohms law nor know how to read amplifier specks. The have a quote for 2500k to do their (recommendation) This is with about 1200 worth of gear. When I insisted the Harman made speakers are perfectly fine and I did not wanted to replace them they became defensive, myosin ostrich and con descendent. By the way I am a woman. I took pen and paper and explained what I wanted and draw them the schematic. They said that that was impossible and went to blame the fact that they where 2ohm speakers. I already knew this and had done the math to determine the correct amp. I showed them the manufacturers instructions showing it was
are they in business installing sound systems and do not ponder stand impedance calculations?

Very happy with my stuff. Unfortunately I wrecked my car right after my purchase and installation, but it was great while it lasted. So I went off and purchased a new vehicle that has a really nice sounding factory unit already in it, I’m going to have the unit and speakers from the wrecked car installed in my wife’s car. Jim Skasgs helped me out a tremendous deal and helped me when I had questions about removing the old unit. He offered to take it out for me but I declined just because it was my «F» up. Plan to go back to this location for any future car upgrades which should be soon.

This is my favorite car stereo installer /​dealer in Austin.
I’ve bought several head units here over the years and the installation was always top-​knotch. Their tent sales are a good place to find deals on speakers that will beat internet pricing.
I’ve even gone back when I needed to pull a head unit out of the dash and had lost the metal keys and they pulled it out for me and gave me a new set of keys for it.
The stock at the Burnet location is much deeper than the offerings at their store in the Fiesta shopping center on I35.

For those of you who have read my previous review, I have made some errors.
There were words fired on both sides, everyone had their hand in this.
But as of today 10÷9÷2013, I spoke to the real CEO of the company, Mike.
He had me bring the sub in to the shop and put JL’s grill on the woofer. It did in fact clear by about .5″, and that’s the grill.
In the end, the damage done to the subwoofer was mine and mine alone. I’d like to formally apologize to Custom Sounds for the mishaps and the negative attention that they have received from this. All I wanted to do was make sure that it wasn’t a box error, and it wasn’t.
I’d like to thank Mike, because he’s a real customer service oriented person. Even though the damage was indeed caused by me, he went ahead and pulled a few strings, got the sub refurb’d at no extra charge, and is including a grill so that problems like this won’t happen in the future.
I’d also like to shout out to Fadi at Custom Sounds off of Research BLVD. He’s also a real customer oriented fellow and also helped me around while I was looking for a new 3 way set for my vehicle. Everyone at the Research BLVD store was extremely helpful and good to converse with.
I’m not being paid or swindled to say these things, I’m not changing my review just because they decided to take care of me. I’m changing this review because the president apologized and got on my level. He knows things are tough during these economic times, and I wouldn’t have minded if nothing was comped. All I wanted was reassurance that it was my fault, not theirs. or vice versa. I got that today, and I want to let you guys know that there are some motivated folks in the Custom Sounds stores that are oriented with their customers.
So once again, I’d like to apologize for the false information in this review, as to the subwoofer being damaged by a shoddy installation. Most likely the driver was already broken and a broken driver has a tendency to drive further than specification.
I will be going back to Custom Sounds in the future, and I definitly will be buying speaker grills for all of my future purchases.
Thanks again.

I worked with Randy, the manager, to have a new XM Satellite receiver put in that I had purchased from Amazon. He and Cody, the service manager, put it exactly where I wanted it and how I asked for it to be installed. A month later I returned because they installed it with the provided two piece mounting bracket which wasn’t very solid. They installed a new single piece bracket at no charge. Excellent customer service!
Now if they could just get wi-​fi for their waiting area…

The last time I installed a new CD player in a car, I did it with some help from a family friend Dave who worked in the industry out in El Paso. This install was way more complicated with my GM car needing adapters for even the blinker and key in the ignition chimes to work correctly. Today, I left it up to the professionals at Custom Sounds.
Forever ago, Brian Dorsey was my sales guy back in the 90’s with him at the helm of various locations around town. Same top notch service today thru Kyle with me wondering if Brian has as much or more gray hair than I do. Did I get a deal by mentioning the now owners name? I’m really not sure; but in regards to me getting choices on the installation hardware and picking my own location for the bluetooth microphone CS did quite well.
I picked what I thought was best for my needs. Bluetooth for hands free talk while driving, rear USB to keep the Ipod in the glove box instead of a cord draping the dash, rounding out the deck price at $ 189. I could have spent way more on a navigation double din touch screen; but I was realistic. Factor in the required conversion box for GM installation, another adapter to make the steering wheel controls work and I was just over $ 600.
First speed bump was they didn’t have or made a mistake in ordering my wiring harness. My two hour estimate now left me time to visit Shu Shu’s and Modia just down the road. The boy and I entertained ourselves by sitting on the floor and watching Ironman on the video screens in the middle demo room, Chinese inspired lunch, and the cushy home theater chairs at Modia paired with an 80 inch Sharp Aquos Quattron just a few blocks away proved better accommodations than the floor and a few chairs at CS.
More praise to Kyle and staff thanks to us comparing cell phones realizing that Little Rooster left is Iphone at knee level just under the main counter top. Finally, it was done. I should have insisted on more time in the car demonstrating the deck; as the simple treble and bass required more adjustments via a GUI than I was used to. Thirty minutes last night trying to adjust the sound to my taste.
I’m settling on 4 stars thanks to me not having to replace Rooster’s phone, and the quality of the installation. A fifth star would have involved a comfy waiting area with 2 month old Road and Track magazines. Stay tuned, my adventures in audio aren’t over just yet. Next trip will be replacing the factory subwoofer with something that has a little more punch.