car audio?

[jk319]

Hey all, my good friend (musician/composer that I once mentioned in another post) is curious about good car audio. Its a hatchback Golf, I don't know the year. Anyhoo, I myself would be a little apprehensive of spending a lot on car speakers, perhaps for similar reasons I would be apprehensive of spending a lot on in-wall speakers. So, I decided to ask here, since we all have something in common, making it easier for me to trust your opinion Also, it is apparent that many of you are avid fans of cars and car racing. In any case, perhaps you would rather direct me to a different site more suited to my research. Not knowing anything about this area, I know that Dynaudio makes car speakers, and I also know that I happen to very much enjoy their home speakers. Should I forget about any such correlation?

Well without any specific budget, but undoubtedly a modest one (guessing 1k or less, but who knows), what would you guys recommend? Do speakers come as sealed enclosures at all? (probably not, I guess that would be a tiny cabinet!) Would you guys advise (in a manner not entirely unlike home systems) to invest in speakers, then source, then amplification? Any brands or lines for suggestions would be appreciated. I am curious! Thank you very much.

 

[Kenscollick]

You might check with Mike and his crew


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tHzitd9Se8I

 

[Dreamer]

I was once talking with an acoustic engineer (he designed concert halls and theaters) and the conversation drifted toward "high end" car audio.

He said that if he were given the task of designing the worst possible listening environment for tryng to set up a stero system in, it would look EXACTLY like the interior of a car--lots of thick overstuffed furniture, carpet everywhere, lots of little nooks and crannies and places for sound waves to reflect and reinforce each other in unpredicatable ways, and parallel glass vertical panels on all 4 sides. Put behind all that a LOT of variable lowfrequency rumble ad sporadic high-freq noise, and there you have it...

After that, I pretty much gave up even thinking about having my car system sound any better than a boom box in the bathroom. What's the point? I'd rather spend the money on my home system, where I can control the environment a lot more.

Get an iPod and fill it with lossless-compressed music and feed that (or straight CDs) through your car system and be happy with what it is--a worse possible scenerio for listening to music.

--Richard

 

[jk319]

Thanks for your input, and I figured as much. I basically told my friend the same thing, but he asked me, and I said I'll try to find out since I spend so much time on AV forums as it is. My own beat-up pickup truck would need a paint job, reupholstered seats, and fixed bumper before any stereo.

I would also like to see him invest in the home system first, but I guess he just wanted the best car system to listen to on his drives from and to his music teaching gigs at various schools and colleges... I'll just tell him to save his money. Thanks.

 

[amey01]

I was once talking with an acoustic engineer (he designed concert halls and theaters) and the conversation drifted toward "high end" car audio.

He said that if he were given the task of designing the worst possible listening environment for tryng to set up a stero system in, it would look EXACTLY like the interior of a car--lots of thick overstuffed furniture, carpet everywhere, lots of little nooks and crannies and places for sound waves to reflect and reinforce each other in unpredicatable ways, and parallel glass vertical panels on all 4 sides. Put behind all that a LOT of variable lowfrequency rumble ad sporadic high-freq noise, and there you have it...

After that, I pretty much gave up even thinking about having my car system sound any better than a boom box in the bathroom. What's the point? I'd rather spend the money on my home system, where I can control the environment a lot more.

Get an iPod and fill it with lossless-compressed music and feed that (or straight CDs) through your car system and be happy with what it is--a worse possible scenerio for listening to music.

--Richard

Well said - it is just the worst possible place anyone can imagine for audio. Add to what you said a wimpy fluctuating power supply.

 

[MotorToad]

While the car is the worst place to try to build an audio system, you're still stuck in the car and it's really not hard to improve on what's in there most of the time. When I put the system in my car I went with good component speakers, separate amps for each fader-controlled output, and new wiring everywhere. The differences between the mid-upper line component speakers like Infinity or Polk are nothing compared to the challenges of the space in the car, so whatever fits/looks/costs best with good amplification and he should be happy enough.

I'm sure you can find any number of forums where people disect every aspect of car audio components and will tell you that you can't settle for anything less than Diamond Audio or MB Quart or whatever they happen to like, but seriously, it's in a car with wind and tire noise, sirens, and nothing's going to sound good.

Oh, and the other thing... stock stereos aren't all that terribly bad these days. He very well might replace all of that and, while it'll sound better, he'll notice that it's not worth half the effort. Replacing all the wiring is rough work, and not replacing all the wiring is a waste of money as the new stuff will be choked on the stock wiring.

 

[IWalker]

While the car is the worst place to try to build an audio system, you're still stuck in the car and it's really not hard to improve on what's in there most of the time. When I put the system in my car I went with good component speakers, separate amps for each fader-controlled output, and new wiring everywhere. The differences between the mid-upper line component speakers like Infinity or Polk are nothing compared to the challenges of the space in the car, so whatever fits/looks/costs best with good amplification and he should be happy enough.

I'm sure you can find any number of forums where people disect every aspect of car audio components and will tell you that you can't settle for anything less than Diamond Audio or MB Quart or whatever they happen to like, but seriously, it's in a car with wind and tire noise, sirens, and nothing's going to sound good.

Oh, and the other thing... stock stereos aren't all that terribly bad these days. He very well might replace all of that and, while it'll sound better, he'll notice that it's not worth half the effort. Replacing all the wiring is rough work, and not replacing all the wiring is a waste of money as the new stuff will be choked on the stock wiring.

Agreed...not only is a bad listening environment...(hard plastic and glass are more of your worries than the upholstery) .... but you also have temperature fluxuations that cause drivers to react differently, and have fairly bad rigidity and resonance problems in an untreated car door space. And beyond that, road noise is going to always come through to some degree.

That said...A fairly small amount of money can go a LONG way in car stereo.
Get a decent tweeter ($25) a good 6-8" driver ($80-$200), and whatever subs you can manage, along with a reasonable electronics setup...and you'll make a night an day improvement over most stock systems. It won't ever match up to what you've got at home...but it can still sound pretty sweet. Making the best of a bad situation!

 

[Audiophiliac]

I always tinker with car audio as a hobby. Its certainly not a sonically friendly environment for sure. But with some decent parts and pieces, you can make those long drives and sitting in traffic a LOT more enjoyable than any stock system (maybe the new Levinson, Dynaudio, B&W OEM stuff is good enough).

I have recently been using some products from a fairly new company called Exile Audio (www.exileaudio.com). If you know anything about old school car audio, you know Phoenix Gold was the shiznit back when car audio was HUGE. Think early-mid 90s. Anyway, Exile was created by a handful of ex-PG engineers, R&D, and exec. guys. They make great sounding stuff at reasonable prices. All designed and engineered in the USA. I sound like an advert. but I am simply relaying my experience with their stuff.

 

[HopelessDFilms]

Car Audio-HIgh END

Having used to have my own car audio and performance shop, I am pretty deep into the car audio world.

I have to agree, that while not the optimal place to listen to music, the fact remains that we still are found alot in our cars, or at least i would hope you find yourself in your car alot if you are planning on spending $$$ on your cars audio.

With this said, there are plenty of great options for upgrading your car's audio. TO help cancel out the road rumble, you should first remove all paneling such as door panels, trunk, etc.... now install a product called dynamat, which is a sound deadening material to help rid the car of rumble sounds and also helps contain your music and not let as much of it escape the car. This is especially helpful for the systems built to play LOUD, expecially!!! with subs.

Brands to check out *yes there are high end brands for car* are JL, Alpine's V series, i believe, you'll know by the price tag.... and a small company called A/D/S from my experience I chose the JL over the others. Even the cheapy JL still sounds better than most stuff....kinda like logans, you can have the bottom of the line logan and it will mutilate other speakers out there costing way more!!!

The main thing to look for is speaker seperates, that include the woofer, a tweeter, and a separate crossover. JL has the Z line which is their top of the line stuff....and sounds excellent. Alpine has the Z or V somethings....and they are also very incredible with definition instrument separation, etc.

A/D/S has some of the most realistic sounding speakers I believe, although has many faults in terms of SPL, and amp handling..... like with logans, these speakers have very distinct reproduction values depending on what amp drives them.

As far as amps are concerned, I firmly believe in all of JL amps. Alpines top line are also again very excellent. I tend to prefer JL for their incredible performance with a fair asking price.


To wrap it up, car audio can definitely be upgraded to very high heights, and is not to be thrown out, in my system for example you can definitely tell the diff between crunched up mp3 and wav, or any other lossless.

Keep your minds and ears open to other options, after all its all just about the music right? Anything to help improve your enjoyment of the music is allways a good choice.

 

[bober]

HopelessDFilms, what do you think about McIntosh car audio or Focal component speakers?

 

[jk319]

Thank you to all of you. It's all very informative! Im sending a link to this thread to my friend right now...

 

[HopelessDFilms]

having heard the focal car audio speakers, I can say that of course they do sound good, although if I remember correctly, the price sure made them a wash in my book. I have always been extremely pleased with the performance from JL and the top end alpine. Focals sound very nice, but their top end is very expensive and I don't think that I could justify spending that much more $$$ when the difference in $ could go toward either more amps, a 5.1 setup in the car, screens, etc. The other things that $ could go toward are better mounting on the speakers and custom building of boxes and door panels for the speakers to better place the speakers and help with sonic qualities of the reproduction.


Just a thought.

As far as mac car audio, I haven't been fortunate enough to hear any of it, although I'm sure my final thoughts would be similar to the focal.

I have heard all types and brands of car audio stuff, and honestly speaking I really do think that the products that JL puts out are just phenomenal. To give you an idea, take for instance the JL Phantom sub for home theater, I believe somebody on the forum has one and swears by it! If they can transition that well into HT from Car audio, they definitely got something right going on.

I suppose it doesn't need sayin, but always try to audition before you buy. Although listening to speakers off a sound board are definitely not representing what you'll hear in your car, it does give you an idea on how flat the speaker is along the eq range.

good hunting.

 

[jk319]

Heh, that someone with the JL Fathom would be me. Yup, its a pretty ridiculous piece of audio equipment. I think it could happily use an SMS-1, but I have eyes on other toys first (I think) and it is only for HT use. (Summits don't need any help). For those that are curious, there should be the 10" model coming out later this year. No high level input, single-band ARO eq, very very compact considering what it does (or in comparison to other similar products), best transients Ive ever heard, and happens to have a pretty scary excursion. Honestly, I think its the best deal out there for top shelf subs (outside of possibly making your own). So transitively speaking, I imagine their car audio must be pretty damn good. Great success on their first try is impressive indeed. I think I read that they may be working on home speakers...

Did I just hijack my own thread?

 

[coolcobramatt]

I've owned the Focal Utopias in my last car, they run about $1600 new for a set of mids and tweets, but a good used set can be bought for $450 on Ebay. When I think true "high end" car audio, it ain't Alpine and JL (i've owned a bit of everything as I've been it in since I could drive and I am 38 now). While you can't make a car sound like your living room, it still can sound pretty damn good IMO. It is a case of the car ruling the sound though. A Lexus is obviously going to be quieter and more in tune for the best sound than say a mustang (yes my favorite car and the platform for most all of my last systems). Some good brands I can tell you from experience (not gonna get a full system for under 1k though not even used):

Zapco (amps), Focal (speakers), JL (subs only)

To get under that budget though Boston makes a helluva speaker (many choices but go seperates if you can) for a relatively good price, an Ebay JL amp, and a Kenwood or Alpine head unit. Kicker makes a good sub for a modest price too.

Man I could talk car audio all day lol.

PS...Focals require a poopload of power to sound "right"

 

[HopelessDFilms]

Thanks for the input of the other brands, I don't know why I didn't really mention some of the other "high end" I suppose I was merely placing my own thought process onto the post, I've listened to the focals and while I very much enjoyed them, the Z series of Alpine, roughly 4-500$ per speaker including the crossover and tweet, sound truly phenomenal, as well as the ZR from JL. These are of course cheaper then the focal, which lends more $ toward amps, which I'm glad to see you agree on JL. I have had XTANT, KICKER, BOSTON, etc etc and truly by far have never seen or heard something more reliable powerful and crisp and clean as the JL. Headunits I like are again the flagship alpines, eclipse or well that's pretty much all i like for head units. Eclips titanium subs are great as well.

On a side note I believe that the Phantom sub was largely based off of if not completely on their car sub the W-7, could be wrong though.

 

[jk319]

coolcobramatt, what do you think of JM Labs' home speakers? I ask because I recall that they are more different between their various lines than any other brand that I have heard, which leads me to wonder about their car audio.

From memory, Chorus/800's are warm with with adequate separation (not unsimilar to B&W 700 series, yet still not quite the same level of separation), and both their 900s and Be's I found to be extremely forward in the upper registers. I found both to be especially hissy/unforgiving/and/or/sibilant with anything less than a perfect and modern recording. Maybe I should say the Profiles to be very forward and bright, and the Be's to be rather similar, yet even more unforgiving.

If the Focal car audio speakers are like their hi-end home stuff, I would be even more particularly worried about those numerous glass panels in the car...

my apprehensive thoughts and present opinion. I wonder what a car speaker Utopia is like.... Be tweeter? Thank you for your input, fun thread!

oh ya, HopelessD, the Fathom is similar to the W-7, but I do not recall the differences.

 

[Beat_Dominator]

<- Huge car audio nut here. I am just heading to bed so I don't want to write you a book on the subject

Amazing results can be obtained in car audio but you need money, and to not be afraid to hack up the interior

Even if you just want to retain stock speaker locations, on a modest budget with the right combination of equipment a lot can be accomplished. In a suburban lifestyle, people spend a crazy amount of time each week in their car..... quite often listening to music. Why should it sound bad?!

 

[coolcobramatt]

coolcobramatt, what do you think of JM Labs' home speakers? I ask because I recall that they are more different between their various lines than any other brand that I have heard, which leads me to wonder about their car audio.
I wonder what a car speaker Utopia is like.... Be tweeter? Thank you for your input, fun thread!

oh ya, HopelessD, the Fathom is similar to the W-7, but I do not recall the differences.

I liked my Utopias but for the money a Boston Pro series would have done just fine. The tweeter wasn't berylium, but it was the inverted dome kevlar. I don't know much about the JM Labs but have heard good things.