The overall sound of the ML is superb. However, i'm not sure if i have defective door speakers, but they sound very weak compared to what's coming out of the dash/center speakers. Is that normal??

 

From my experience....yes.
ML has too much focus on the center channel- part of what you are hearing is also the door speakers / dash tweeter creating a center stage image. Throw a towel on top of the center channel and you will still hear it because of the imaging created by front door / dash speakers.

 

Thanks, i'll try that.

 

didn't really work. If the dash speakers are a 10, the output from the door speakers are like a 1 or 2 at best...not very distinct. I opened the doors to stick my ears to it, while there is sound, it's distant sounding. Blown speakers?
If they are, are they covered under warranty??

 

have you tried to go into the adjusments on the head unit? enabling the DSP for just stereo material will have the effect your talking about, turning that off can force the image back out and away from the center channel. Its worth checking to make sure you have a baseline to start troubleshooting from before you dive in deeper.

 

i'll try that too when i get home. I just did a lease take over buyout so i'm not sure what it's supposed to sound like. Could it be due to conversion of 5.1/7.1 surround into Itunes and then copying that onto a CD. Does it lose channels somehwere down the line?

 

i listen to my ipod through the aux port about 99% of the time, playing the stereo music on suround sound gave way too much power to the center speaker (the one in the dash), so i went into options and turned off the suround sound and that fixed my "problem", but my dads RX with ML (2007) doesnt have the option to turn off the surround, so not sure how long the option has been around, see if you have it and try with it off....