Well, a couple weeks ago I picked up a 2011 Accent GL for my daughter. The idea is that it'll last her for the next 4 1/2 years commuting to med school, a total of about 125,000 miles. The only option she cared about was AC and I was able to get the GL with AC for $8900.
I drove it for a few days (and loved it). It only took her a couple hours to learn how to drive the 5 speed and the other few days she drove around with me so she'd feel comfortable. Of course, her 1st real trip with it, and she got hit broadside by an idiot just a couple miles from our house. She's recovering fine. So, now her car is in the body shop so I can't open up the radio compartment. I want to install a radio. It's a pull from a 2008 Entourage or Sedona and in new condition. Unlike the 2010s, the new GL's only offer 1 option, and that's AC. But, they're ready for a radio. I know how to get the trim plate off but I'm not sure if I'll need a radio DDIN trim plate or not. We'll see. For wiring, it would be easier to make the harness now. The radio I have doesn't have a harness but I believe a Metra 71-1004 will plug into it. If I'm not mistaken, the Accent radio wiring should plug into a Metra 70-7304. I have written down what the wires in both harnesses do, so it should just be a matter of connecting them. I'd like to get this ready now so I can install it when the car comes out of the body shop. Any helpful comments, pictures or advice are welcome.
Thanks,
Gary

 

I think you would be better off with an Accent head unit but here are the pin-outs for the 2:

2007 Entourage:


2011 Accent:

 

Wow, that's really great. Thanks. It looks like I'll need an adapter for the antenna, too. My radio has a Motorola plug.

Med school is expensive so we're trying to keep the cost of this whole car project down. She wanted CD and AUX. She's been using a cassette adapter for the AUX and hates change, so this looked perfect. Also, it cost me $12.96 with shipping.
I suppose I ought to see if it powers up before I do anything else. Power to the BAT+ and ACC, and then grounding it should do it, right? I wonder if it'll light up without the Illumination connected.

Gary

 

Shoot. The CD player doesn't work. It doesn't want to take them in or push them out. I'm usually pretty handy with these things, but so far I can't tell why it won't pull the CD's all the way in and down. Something must be binding somewhere. The radios are easy to take apart and the CD player pops right out. I'd get a new one, but the dealer wants a ton of money for them. A lot to spent just to get blue lights to match the rest of the dash.

Gary

[edit]
FIXED IT !!!

 

Sorry to hear about the new car and your daughter's accident. I hope she heals up and finishes her schooling. We need good doctors.

On the stereo front, i really do like the stock unit in my 2010 Accent. The XM and the iPod interface work great. The big display really helps. Not trying to twist your arm too much (saw your reasoning above) but if you can get a good deal on one of those units used, i think it would be worth it. I'm quite impressed with it, as far as factory units go.

I'm trying to keep my Accent as stock-looking as i can. I may do audio upgrades down the road (speakers/sub), but man, this stock system is WAY better than the stock audio gear that Honda put in my 99 Civic. Kudos to Hyundai for a pretty decent little sound system.

Anyways, good luck in your project and be sure to share photos of the finished product.

 

I got the Accent back from the body shop today and it's time to start the stereo installation.
So, the first thing to do is lower the glove box so I can reach the clips on the back side of the bezel. I should be able to squeeze the clips and pop the bezel off. First problem, I can't let the glove box hang because I can't figure out how the remove the clips on the sides of the box. I see the clips and have seen the diagrams. I can squeeze the clips, but it doesn't help. Any ideas?

Gary

 

I thought I do an update here. I installed the M455 radio shown in the first post. Here's how it went.
Basically, the radio I installed is a Kia/Hyundai OEM unit used in 2006-2008. Since I got it without the plug, I had to order a Metra 71-1004 to plug into it, and a Metra 70-7303 to plug into the harness of my 2011 Accent GL. The 2011 GL doesn't come with a radio, but it is radio ready. This means it has the speakers, antenna and wiring harness installed.
After reading around on various sites, I also determined I needed to buy an antenna adapter and dash facia kit. As it turned out, I didn't need these 2 items. The '11 Accent GL has a Motorola plug for the radio, and the storage trays that take up the double DIN (DDIN) radio space were held in with a bracket the fit my radio perfectly. The radio also didn't need the front trim plate as it fits perfectly in the dash. In other words, it's the same size as the DDIN stock radios.

I couldn't get the dash bezel off by squeezing the studs on the back side, so I just pried it off from the front, the old fashioned way. I put duct tape on the dash and bezel and used a butter knife and putty knife to pry it off. I started in the top right corner. It started hard, but went pretty easy after that. I worked my way around counter clockwise. No damage was done.
I soldered the 2 plugs together to make a wire harness and covered the connections with heat shrink tubing.

The Metra plugs are good quality, but the wires and labels aren't always accurate. The 71-1004 package said the orange/white wire was (-) Illumination, but that color wire didn't exist. I used the black/yellow because of it's position on the plug, and later saw on a website (sonic?) that it was correct. And, the 70-7303 didn't have a + Illumination although it is provided on the harness in the car. It was easy to add it, but I can't see any reason why it was omitted. Another thing that needs to be mentioned is that some "professional" installation websites said that the Illumination is used to turn on the radio lights when the headlights are turned on, as if it's always true. It may be true in some rare cases, but I think normally the Illumination wiring dims the display when the lights are turned on. Without any Illumination wiring, the radio should light up to full brightness as soon as the radio is turned on.

Unfortunately for me, the ****/button lights on my $13 radio don't light. The display lights perfectly and the other lights should all be on the same circuit. The lights are actually tiny LEDs. There are probably 24 to 30 of them and none of them work. I'm sure they're not all burned out. I checked the PCBoards and can't see any problems. My daughter wants to be able to see the buttons, so I guess I'll be buying another radio. This one works great, just can't read the buttons at night.