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A lot of today’s aftermarket head units are just offensive to look at and operate............No flashing disco lights.......
While they are slooooowly getting back to normal, most units, especially in the under-$200 range, still look awful to me, as if their designers used the "Transformers" movies as their styling inspiration. And that glaring ice-blue colored illumination so many of them have is one of the worst aspects for me - doesn't blend in at all with any of our cars' dash lighting. Not to mention according to some scientific articles I've read that point out that the human eye has trouble handling blue light, resulting is loss of resolution (or focus, can't remember right now), which probably helps explain why whenever I look at blue LEDs on various gear they almost always look "fuzzy" unless I'm right next to them.
I know many head unit now include various source formats i.e. USB ports for flashdrives, SD card slots etc etc but what I wish somebody would include a built-in memory system for my music, which seems like it would be easy to do. This way I could just load it up, then I wouldn't have to drag along my MP3 player like I'm doing now, or a flashdrive.....and have the drive get ruined in the washing machine when I forget to take it out my pants pocket at the end of the day - arrgh!!
Its a pain in the ass to make put an aftermarket radio in my G6, hell even just to add an Aux input...
I am considering putting something in my Camaro, but for not rocking out with my **** out, streaming pandora through my phone, through a 1992 style aux input/via tape deck adapter.
My front speakers were blown, I put a junkyard aftermarket ones in but theya re junk. Once I unpack a little more, I believ have some 4 way 6x9 Boston accoustics somewhere, alont with some pioneer stuff as well.
you indicated that ...if you buy a new cd, rip it to your computer, and load the songs you want to your mp3 player, thats what i do.
Flash drives sound way better and don't skip.
I go on eBay and buy up old sound stream amps... used ones that were built back in about 1988... as they were built in Semi Valley California and not that junk made in Taiwan.
Then I rip out those factory paper cone speakers, put in some Infinity 6832s... IIRC ... and put in a Kenwood deck with a flashdrive USB port, and rip out that internal "power" and hook my speakers up to one of my amps.
I get a 10" Diamond sub and hook that up to a 500 watt soundstream amp and you got some sound.
Your Kenwood deck comes with a remote... so no need playing with the steering wheel.
You've got a front channel, a rear channel, a fader, an amp that can handle 2 ohms 1 ohm... heck, you can weld with these soundstream amps... you've got a power wire, a constant hot wire, a remote wire for your amps, an antenna wire and that's about all you need.
When I did my stereo for my Infiniti G35 to tear out the horrible Boss stuff.....
You're gonna hate this, but the first car audio system that I thought sounded close to a home system - close, but not identical - was a factory Bose system, all the way back in ancient times , in other words around 1983 I think. GM offered this system in the Eldorado, Riviera and Toronado.
It was the first time I heard a car system that could form a half-way decent stereo image from the driver's seat, not to mention bass that wasn't boomy, highs that weren't "tizzy" and mids that sounded smooth & pretty realistic.* It didn't look impressive though, because underneath the fancy cloth covered grills were - this is from memory so these aren't exact numbers - just one 4" full range driver, but inside the bass-reflex enclosure - yep each driver operated in an actual enclosure and wasn't just bolted naked to the door panel/rear deck - was a 25 watt amplifier and a multiband EQ. Each EQ was configured for that speaker's specific location in the car and even for what type of upholstery, cloth or leather, that was present. A car presents one of the absolute worst environments for sound, so using an electronic EQ isn't cheating but is really a necessity to get some decently accurate sound (and BTW a well-made FR driver can sound good - that's why so many DIYers use them for their home systems).
That four speaker system - one each in the front doors, two in the rear deck - could get pretty damn loud, enough to drown out any normal conversation, but no it wouldn't win a loudness contest; and the bass wasn't thunderous but at least it was clean and nicely punchy. So IMO like most Bose home speakers it had a "pleasant" sonic personality which made it easy to listen to for long periods of time, though at the cost of some accuracy and resolution (actually, many home speakers sold by many other brands were designed like this til around the late 80s, but nowadays boom-n-tizz is what seems to get noticed in the demo room, but at home you can end up with irritating sound that I personally want to turn way down or completely off after just 30 minutes. Do a search for "East coast sound" for more info on this design choice).
BTW I've never owned any Bose gear but I have to give credit where credit is due (speaker brands I've owned: Infinity, Boston Acoustics and Advent).
* this is just theory on my part, but the more focused stereo imaging was possibly a result of the fact that FR drivers in general have a tendency to "beam" their higher frequencies (because their radiating surface is much larger than the high frequency wavelengths they are creating), which in turn results in fewer reflections from other parts of the car's interior and that means there are fewer later-arriving waves that can "smear" the primary waves emanating directly from the driver. This is also the reason most better home speakers have flat or smoothly curving front baffles with no sharp edges, though beamy/directional tweeters aren't desired because unlike a car, most people at home don't sit in the same exact spot every time.
Nah, but I think the sound in my wife's G35 is okay for a stock system. Her's is the upgraded version available in 2008 - however if I were driving it everyday I would most likely replace everything because that's just how I am. BOSE has always been notorious for being pricey and proprietary, they are kind of like the Apple Macintosh of the audio world.
Next Big Development In Car Audio: more and more head units available without CD playback capability. What will luddites like myself do when they buy a CD from their local music store and want to hear it while driving home?! And yes, I own an MP3 player, so I am not that old skool.........
The MP3 format doesn't cut it for me! The audio quality is not there to me. I will rock the compact disc as long as I can.
I hear that. I'm going to buy an old deck with a phono out and install a turntable into my sled.
Or not. I've got a turntable with a USB port and AVS Audio Auditor, then either burn that to a CD and/or just slap it onto my 8 gig flash drive.
Are we going to have to start installing McIntosh tube amps, Meadowlark Swifts and Swallow speakers, and an OPPO blueray disk into my vehicle to keep up with you audiophiles?
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And that glaring ice-blue colored illumination so many of them have is one of the worst aspects for me - doesn't blend in at all with any of our cars' dash lighting. Not to mention according to some scientific articles I've read that point out that the human eye has trouble handling blue light, resulting is loss of resolution (or focus, can't remember right now), which probably helps explain why whenever I look at blue LEDs on various gear they almost always look "fuzzy" unless I'm right next to them.
, in other words around 1983 I think. GM offered this system in the Eldorado, Riviera and Toronado.
Do a search for "East coast sound" for more info on this design choice).
do when they buy a CD from their local music store and want to hear it while driving home?! And yes, I own an MP3 player, so I am not that old skool.........
