home audio compared to car audio technology?

[se7en]

which one do you think is more advanced? both or one or the other. my friend and i were debating this and he's into car audio and im home audio well you can see who we thought was more advanced, what do you think?

 

[jaxvon]

Home Audio, by far. The medium simply allows for the most advanced technology to be used. Car audio has too many limitations to be the most advanced. 12V DC Power is the only kind of voltage available. There are never any allowances for driver enclosure, so you get all kinds of bad reflections and such. I could go on and on. That said, there IS some good car audio, but it's still nothing compared to the home realm.

 

[Shadow_Ferret]

I'd have to agree with jaxvon. The interior of a car is just plain bad. Aside from unwanted reflections, exterior noise, etc. there is also the fact that, unlike a home theater, you are never perfectly centered in the sound field. Car audio is a compromise at best.

 

[WmAx]

which one do you think is more advanced? both or one or the other. my friend and i were debating this and he's into car audio and im home audio well you can see who we thought was more advanced, what do you think?

I'll take a good pair of headphones over anything possible with car audio, for sound quality. But if you just want to 'bass out', then I guess car audio is actually advantegous.

-Chris

 

[Francious70]

Car audiois "technically" behind home audio in the fact that digital audio transfer (e.g. digital coax, toslink) isn't very widely used. Hell, even balanced connections (XLR) are rare. But just because the tech. is behing (or lacking really) does not mean that car audio is inferor. My car sound hundreds of times better than my house, but that may be because I've spent about 5 times as money there.

Just remember, not all car "systems" are all about the bass. There are just as many people out there whose focus is SQ, you just don't notice because you don't hear them 3 blocks away (or even next to the car for that matter).

Paul

 

[cmusic]

I’ve been in car audio since 1991. I’m moving from of car audio and into home theater now. There are some pieces of car audio equipment that rival home audio but they are much more expensive than most car audio enthusiasts will pay for.

In my car my CD player is an Alpine F#1 Status CDA-7990. The 7990, when it was in production, retailed for $3000. It was partly hand built and has its own outboard power supply and Burr-Brown PCM 1704 “K” grade 24-bit/96 KHz DACs.

An Alpine CHA-S680 6 disk DVD changer is used as an additional source. It is controlled through the 7990 head unit.

My sound processor is the Alpine F#1 Status PXA-H900. A toslink carried digital signal comes from the CD player into the H900. The Japanese version of the H900 has coax digital inputs. Retail price was $4000. It has 11 channels of output; three way front left and right, center, left and right rear, and two subwoofer (LFE) channels. Each channel has its own digital crossover with independent varying slopes from 0 to 30 degrees, independent crossover points spaced 1/6 octave apart, and independent time delays from 0 to 20.0 ms in 0.1 ms increments. Each channel’s RCA output has 5 volts of power at 100 ohms to allow the amp gains to be turned way down. Each channel has its own Burr-Brown PCM 1704 “K” grade 24-bit/96 KHz DAC. For the 5 main channels it has 5 independent 31 band digital graphic equalizers. Or if you don’t like graphic equalizers it has 5 10 band fully parametric equalizers. The subwoofer/LFE channels get their own 10 band graphic or 5 band parametric equalizers. It has regular stereo, Dolby Pro Logic, Dolby Digital, DTS, HDCD, and MPEG2 audio processing. The H900 is ran by four 100 MIPS DSP processors that are more powerful than two 600 MHz CPU processors combined. The H900 is programmed from a Windows based computer program. It can also do auto eq and phasing processing, allowing the equalizer and time delays to be automatically set. It also can produce and out of phase signal up to 500 Hz to eliminate standing waves.

My amplifiers are from different manufactures. My front amp is a four channel Brax X2400, rated at 100 watts per channel. It powers Scan Speak Revelator 4.5” mids in the kick panels and Scan Speak 1” tweeters on the a-pillars. A 350-watt Kicker amplifier powers a JL Audio 8W7 8” sub. Currently I don’t have any center or rear channel speakers. I have a 5.8” 16:9 ratio LCD monitor made by Alpine but I rarely ever use it unless I am showing the car at a car show.

When I eventually trade cars I will keep all the car audio equipment. No one, save for other hard core car audio enthusiasts, would know how much this stuff is worth, let alone know how to use it properly. When that time comes I have thought about getting a 12V power supply and using the H900 processor in a second room 5.1 system.

 

[Francious70]

Hey cmusic, that's quite an impressive setup you got going there. I know that you're knowledge would be greatly appreciated over at http://www.the12volt.com. Those Scan Speak's you've got there are absolutly stunning, the only speakers I've ever liked as much as those are Phoenix Gold's Titanium Elite's.

Paul

 

[zumbo]

Home Audio. By far. I spent many years in car audio. It was fun, and a waste of a lot of money.

 

[annunaki]

Cmusic,

Are you the same Cmusic from the carsound forums?

Nice system in the car, impressive.

 

[WmAx]

Car audiois "technically" behind home audio in the fact that digital audio transfer (e.g. digital coax, toslink) isn't very widely used. Hell, even balanced connections (XLR) are rare. But just because the tech. is behing (or lacking really) does not mean that car audio is inferor.

This has NOTHING to do with it. What is relevant, is the acoustic spaces you are working within. A car is just about the most hopeless evironment I can think of, if realistic reproduction of music is the objective. Another poster pretty well summed this situation already.

-Chris

 

[guess88]

home audio's more advanced by far.. just even at the the quality price point. You can get nicer home theater gear cheaper than an equal quality car audio piece.

Cmusic... VERY nice setup. What car and how do you have it setup? Do you compete?

 

[zumbo]

I would also say that it has to do with a level of maturity as to how someone will respond to the question. Usually, in most cases, a teen to early twenties will answer car audio. And late twenties and up will answer home audio. When a car is the largest thing you own, well that is where the tunes go. When you get a home, the car audio fades away. And as you get newer, more expensive cars, you don't want to be trashing them out installing tunes. Plus, not much time is spent in them anyway. And also, it looks as though the auto makers don't want this done. My wifes '03 G35 coupe looks impossible, and so does my '05 Tacoma.

 

[guess88]

mmm... depends. Only reason a teen would say it is if they were totally oblivious to the home audio field. That goes for any age group. A teen would more likely go deeper into car audio however mainly cause it's the cool thing to do, and they'd rather be out cruising somewhere that's NOT home.

The thing with newer expensive cars... it really depends on the owner. A lot of the newer expensive cars suck in the audio dept. There are some decent offerings however, but they're still too few. It's not really trashing them to install tunes either. That's a big part of the difference between getting your work done at best buy, vs a custom place that knows what they're doing and has a good rep. A lot of times, the custom places will even take it to a level that surpasses the oem level, not just in terms of sound, but install as well. Nowadays to be even just a decent installer, in my opinion at least, you know gotta know your way with fiberglass, and custom fabrication. If it doesn't look clean it's crap. But that's me.

 

[cmusic]

Cmusic,

Are you the same Cmusic from the carsound forums?

Nice system in the car, impressive.

Yes I am. I have a 2001 Monte Carlo SS. You can see my car and competion system as it was in 2003 at the following addy:

http://www.cardomain.com/member_pages/view_page.pl?member_id=cmusic

I install and tune my own system.

I've competed in IASCA (International Auto Sound Challenge Association) since 1995. I have competed in seven of their world finals events. While I have not personally won a world championship title I have built and tuned on several systems that are world champions. They judge on sound quality (tonality, soundstage, imaging, linearity, noise for about 50% of the score), installation (proper wiring and mounting of components, creative aspects of the install), and in some classes RTA and SPL (Sound Pressure Levels) measurements. I am also a certified IASCA judge.

I am getting out of car audio competition because the shows are dwindling down. I have to drive 6-7 hours just to get to a show now. The car audio industry have moved away from promoting car audio shows to more car show/import shows/Type X games stuff where there is a wider market of consumers. Even though I have down sized my system from when it was in full competition form I still enjoy listening to it while I drive to work.

I have just started upgrading my home theater system a few months ago. Currently I have a Toshiba 57" widescreen RP CRT HDTV, Pioneer 563a DVD player, a Scientific Atlanta Explorer 8000 DVR cable box, Definite Technologies 15" powered sub, a Polk Audio C2 center channel, and Sony SSK front and surround speakers. Two weeks ago I bought a Denon 3805. I have it running in full 7.1 mode and love it. Future upgrades will probably be a Denon 3910 and DIY front speakers using Scan Speak Revelator drivers.

 

[guess88]

nice... you don't know Jason Ewing by any chance do you?

 

[sjdgpt]

Home Audio is significantly more advanced because Car Audio has other priorities.....


Besides the really obvious environmental and arrangement problems previously mentioned with car stereo, there is the added problem of HEAT, COLD, and MOVEMENT.

What does it take to keep the laser in the CD player focused on the revolving little silver disk? And do that at an inexpensive price point, and maintain cutting edge technology? Wow, what a job. I gotta say, the car industry is doing a heck of a job just getting a reliable product on the road.

 

[se7en]

my friend was saying that car audio makers, have to make the speakers to try to accomodate the car enviroment. because the car enviroment is so different like placement of the speakers, different door sizes, different cars, movement, engine noise he thinks its a harder job to build speakers compared to home audio makers for a house. also with subs because car subs trunks are different and etc... i agreed with him on this but what do you guys think?

 

[cmusic]

Most original equipment (OEM) speakers in vehicles are designed to produce an acceptable sound to most people, last the life of the vehicle, and most importantly be cost effective. The average cost of a speaker in a vehicle is usually less than $5 ea. I can buy some GM OEM speakers from GM’s supplier for less than a $1 ea. In most vehicles the sound system is not a high priority for the manufacture. All they are after is to please the average consumer.

The same goes for the audio electronics in the vehicle. Most OEM CD players are designed to play in varying conditions over the life of the vehicle. The transports, circuit boards, and other parts have been designed tougher than what you would find in a home CD player. This usually results in not as high of quality sound reproduction as you would find in a mid to high priced home CD players but unless you were able to test them side by side you probably would never notice the difference. Other factors such as paying attention to driving, road noise, engine noise, and other factors overwhelm the sonic differences for most consumers.

In the past few years some of the higher end vehicles (Lexus, Mercedes, BMW, Volvo, ect..) have improved their sound systems. Lexus has a system designed by Mark Levingston. Acura has a DVD-A system in one of their vehicles. Lincoln has several audio systems designed by JBL. Volvo has a Dynaudio designed system in one of their cars. These systems take “audiophile” qualities into account by paying more attention to tonal, soundstage, and imaging qualities. Some of these systems come close to the custom “audiophile” systems I have heard and seen at national level car audio shows.

At the level of car audio I am at the planning, engineering, design, and execution of the audio system has similarities to home audio. As with home audio, the most important factor in “audiophile” car audio is speaker placement. Mediocre speakers in the perfect location will always sound better than the best speakers in a bad location. The vehicle’s interior has to be thought of as a very small room. Imagine trying to put a home theater system in a small walk in closet already full of stuff and you get the idea. The best locations are where the speaker has very little interference with nearby reflected sound waves and has a similar pathlength (the distance from the speaker to the listener) as the matching speaker on the other side of the car. Considerations as the shape of the dash and center console, where the windshield and door glass is in relation to the speaker, the density of the carpet and seats (to absorb sound), and even the assembly fit and weight of the parts (to reduce vibrations) have to be taken in to account. Then you have to worry about the correct crossover points and slopes, proper gain settings, proper equalization, time delays, and other tuning areas that are mostly taken care of in home audio. I would say that “audiophile” level car audio is much more difficult than home audio or home theater.

 

[Francious70]

I agree with cmusic. Car audio is just a different sport than home audio. Many people think that because the car's interitor is reflective that it's impossible to have proper imaging and staging. And that's not true. The reason you see so many people with speakers in pods by you feet is because it's been pretty well established that that location will provide you with an unobstructed line to the speaker, near equal distance from left and right canells thereby minimising phasing issues, the best overall frequency response.

Just because it's more difficult does not mean it's inheriently any worse. I actually find a greater satisfaction when I build a greagt sounding car system than a home audio system.

Also, continuing on what sjdgpt and se7en were saying. Car audio has had it's own innovations as well as home audio. The speakers in a car have to be built to withstand heat extremes, humidity, actual water damage (how many of you can say that the voicecoils on your home audio speakers had ice on them in the winter), major avuse from the end-user. BUt car audio has made innovations that benifited home audio, and vice-versa.

In conclusion, there just different beasts. Neither costs more than the other, the money is just spent in different ways.

Paul

 

[guess88]

I agree for the most part, but remember.. there's some MIGHTY expensive home theater gear out there, and more expensive home theater gear out there available than car audio. Not to say car audio doesn't have it's price breakers. I remember back in the day PPI had their $25,000 amp and such.

The thing with car audio though... is that the sound is more heavily focused on the install than anything. To make a good sounding car, you have to learn so many variables about what type of gear, and how to place them properly, and how to setup the environment properly too. Also... with car audio.. you're pretty much always making a speaker box. It's just raw drivers with enclosures you setup for them. But while there are some design priorities in hardware design i still believe home audio has the edge in terms of advancement. There's just so much more higher end gear available at cheaper prices. Eventually car audio will get to that point, (when all the spl boys start getting tired of bass and start building sq vechicles) when the market demands it. Alpine, Clarion and Eclipse make some great HU's though, but i'd love to see more optical systems available. Maybe in the next 5 years or so....