Mr.DatSubishi

I meant speaker wire grounded out on metal body/frame of car or each other. Not something you'd really worry about if speakers are stock. Factory wiring is almost never to blame in a situation like that, so if nObodys been messin around with speakers or wiring it's prob nothing to worry about. Make sure there's no bare wires behind deck.

Unrelated to your issue but speaker phase (+to+, -to-) on all speakers is important for good sound or you'll have cancellation issues, lack of bass and all around bad sound. Maybe buy a harness, don't open the package but match the wires to your factory harness(if you still have it) to make sure wiring is all correct. This will give you the correct amp turn on wire etc. Then take the harness back

Natban

I haven't read the whole thread but Madwarrior has a very good idea. Why not buy a wiring harness and reinstall you head unit? It will be worth the time (1/2hr - 1 hr) and money ($20).

Sinemeup

Usually when someone doesn't use a harness, its because the vehicle has already had the stock wiring butchered.

420guy

iTrader: (5)

I would place my bets on it having a factory amp and the remote wire needs to be connected. Just went through this exact scenario last week in a 99 Chryler LHS. Replaced factory deck with aftermarket, turned on but no sound until remote wire was hooked up.
HTH
Nick

lyledperry

So here is what wires are left -

On the car side, there is a blue/black wire, and a blue/white wire.
On the CD stereo side, there is ONLY a blue/white wire.

All of these are currently not connected.

So i on the wiring diagrams I have for both the car and the CD stereo, it says:
the blue/black wire from the car is the car radio illumination wire (am now not even sure if that is correct). I cannot find what the blue/white wire from the car is for (it says nothing about a blue/white wire.)

On the CD stereo diagram, it simply says "Control signal is output through blue/white cable when this unit is powered on. Connect it to an external power amp’s system remote control or the vehicle’s auto-antenna relay control terminal (max.300 mA, 12 V DC). If the vehicle is equipped with a glass antenna, connect it to the antenna booster power supply terminal"

So which wires should I connect?

Mr.DatSubishi

Try looking on the12volt.com for wiring diagram. They're not always accurate but may lead you in the right direction. Does your deck have an internal amplifier shut off in the menu somewhere? Do u still have the vehicle side plugs that were cut off? You could match this plug up to an aftermarket adapter harness to find the wire.

You could well test speaker output with a DVOM set on low A/C volt setting across a pair of speaker wires. This would at least tell you if the deck is putting out "sound". You can also test the illumination wire on the car for 12v and see how it reacts when u turn lights on. If it changes it's your illumination wire. The vehicle side remote wire should prob read ground. Test it on all settings and it should stay the same pretty much anything you do (turn lights on, ign, acc, etc.)

Dilatory

iTrader: (1)

That blue/white wire sounds awfully suspect.. Logic tells me it's a remote wire..

And that black/blue could be a ground but I'm not 100% on that

/shrug - Definitely a wiring issue though.

In all honesty though *IF* the stock wiring harness has been cut off, go to the wreckers and get one, install it properly, go buy a $40 plug and play harness and for $50-60 and two hours of your time everything is properly wired and in the future you won't have to pull it apart and try and figure out what the funk is what.

Sinemeup

So I checked into the link I posted for you. By the looks of it the 2003 Rio does not have an external amp. I compared the Rio's schematic to another Kia that had the external amp (which was labeled "amp"). The entire schematic is there, but the zoom in/out functions don't work the way I would like them to.