Car Audio

Eldarado

I have read many of your posts and think they are usually thoughtful and well informed, but in this case, you sound like you need a vacation.

I am not defending the fidelity of car audio because it "floats my boat". As an aside, I dont even OWN a car at the moment (see "what kind of motorcycle do you drive"), other than the family wagon.

Perhaps I am cynical, but I tend to adjust my expectations for all claims coming from car salesmen, used or otherwise.

The point of this thread is that car audio can be - and should be - very, very good and I, for one, am disappointed that the topic is not touched upon more frequently.

In the heyday of car audio, many enthusiasts claimed it could sound BETTER than the average home rig, because you could more easily pressurize bass and sound levels in a confined environment.

Now I dont know what you had in your house or your car that didnt sound "anything close" but I can tell you that I had:

Yamaha PX-2 with Dynavector ruby and Grado signature cartridges

Yamaha C2a
Audio Research SP-9
Hafler DH 500 and Adcom GFA 555
Magneplanar MG IIb's and MG IIIa's
Nakamichi LX-5 and Nakamichi DRAGON

Which were not exactly shabby for 1980.

And I can also tell you that my Nakamichi and a/d/s 2001, biamped "mobile fidelity" system sounded GREAT and in many ways, was more fun than my home system.

Since then, I have heard a lot of car audio that usually just sounds like crap, albeit suitable for open air reggae competitions and/or Fast and Furious parties behind the local McDonalds.

This shouldnt take "thousands" any more than you have to spend "thousands" to get decent sound at home if you know what you are doing.

Anyone?

Ha, ha - well put Cwlondon and yes, I could use a vacation to be sure. And so could you as well, but today's car audio innovations are lackluster at best and disappointing!

I owned a "Fast and Furious" aftermarket car parts business for awhile on the side - right before that movie broke out. I got priced out by hot/stolen shitte on EBay and just got sick of dealing with all of the kids and their lack of class!

You're correct that you shouldn't have to spend thousands on sound at home or in the car to get good sound and beware of the words "reference" when buying anything... The only thing you should reference in car or home audio is how things sound to the ears that God gave you. Everything else is a marketing tactic to drive up the price!

Car audio is not all boom and neon.....at least not for everyone. I just completed a system that any audiophile would love to listen to. Dynaudio system 340 and 360 are the best sounding three way car speakers I have ever heard. I also own MB Quart.....also awesome....but the Dynaudio gets my vote for best ever. The Focal Utopias are excellent speakers as well. All of these speakers are VERY sensitive to amplification. Old school Precision Power amps (art series) are excellent.....if you can find someone willing to part with one. For subs think JL Audio, and accept no substitutes. High end audio in your car is possible......is not easy to do......and will cost you plenty. By the way, I have visited a few car audio forums and I have to say the good advice is there, but hard to come by. Mostly just kids touting whatever they happen to be using at the moment. Yeah, I know, just like me. Except I have owned just about every brand you can name and have benefitted from the experience. For a quick list of what not to buy (except head units) just open a Crutchfield catalouge.

there is great car audio gear out there, you just have to have the passion to spend the time to make it sound worth while. my system in my car starts with eclipise deck, mb quart q's in the front, eclipise alum. woofers, xtant amps., stinger and phoenix gold cabling. trust me its not like your home system, but it is pretty damm goood! if your gonna use stock speaker locations and not get creative, then stay with your delco system. it takes a lot of time and creativity to get it right. check out iasca.com

It's true that road noise, engine noise and speaker placement will never allow a car stereo to sound as good as your home setup. However, these days i really have to find time to enjoy music on my home system, whereas i find myself stuck in my car up to two hours a day!

I have more than $10,000 into my home system, yet I now probably spend more time listening to music in my car. To this end, i have put about $2000 into my car stereo to bring it up to tolerable standards. I really enjoy mt car system now. It is not at all "boom" car. I have spent hours, days and weeks tweaking it to sound balanced.

At home i'm a bit of a purist. i adjust sound with speaker placement, careful matching of equipment cables etc and room treatments. I have no tone controls. Most preamps I've owned have not even had balance controls. In my car setup, however, I have 30 band 1/3 octave digital equalizer in my trunk it it works wonders! A car is a far from ideal place for high end sound. The car's irregular interior space with a combination of highly reflective (the windows) and highly absorbtive (the uphostery) surfaces combined with very poor speaker locations create wildly non linear frequency distribution that is best cured with an equalizer. I have a fairly modest subwoofer in the trunk to fill out the low end and give the sound some depth.