I bought a Boss stereo for my 1997 Honda Civic DX 2 Door. It had a Pioneer stereo in it but it was in bad shape so I decided to replace it. When I opened up the center console the wires for the stereo were not connected by a harness, but done the hard way (cutting the wires then attaching through wire nuts). So I had to do the wiring the hard way. Once I finish I plug in the new stereo and it does not turn on. I test all of my wiring and check all of my fuses, everything is done correct. I try again and it fails to turn on again. So I reconnect the old wires to the old stereo and it does turn on. I decide I must have gotten a faulty stereo so I go and buy the Boss 460BRGB. I get everything wired and this doesn’t turn on either. I’m at a dead end here and cannot figure out what’s happening. Is the stereo not getting enough power? Anybody have any suggestions or have some help? It’s starting to get really frustrating since I want to move on to other things in the car.

 

There is your problem... you bought a Boss stereo. Try a quality product and see if you get better results.

 

The fuse for the "always hot" wire is in the box under the hood. This is the white and blue wire in the car or the yellow wire on standard aftermarket color coding. Working on the wiring without disconnecting the battery is very prone to blow that fuse. The stereo needs power on both the yellow wire and the red wire to turn on. Also many aftermarket units will not come on if the speaker wires are shorted or improperly wired.

For the future you should get the radio plug out of a parts car and splice it back into your car so you can do future swaps the easy way.

 

Don't EVER buy or use BOSS crap. It's basically flea market junk with a stupid *** name.

 

Did you ever hear the old stereo work? I had a similar problem in my 99 ex. The issue was that the newer head units have a sort of protection mode, that if they detect something miss wired it wont work. Mine would turn on, but give an error. After I checked all my fuses and and power to the head unit etc., it ended up being the speaker wire from the driver side door to the floor harness had broken. Once I fixed the broken wire no issues since. Also, as others have said, buy a good brand unit, you can get quality models for cheap that have stripped down features. I ended up with a Kenwood, which I have been very impressed with.