Bose

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Equalizers are impure though. You should adapt the room and everything else for the speakers, not the speakers for the room. It's easier that way but it distorts the reality of the sound and in doing so throws the imaging off. I know an older guy who is a pure audiophile and he also hates equalizers but he's a lot more esoteric. He thinks CD's are no good and prefers vinyl, hates equalizers, like traditional tube amps only, stuff like that. He's a small but very high end audio dealer and he's had some ultra rare stuff. I've learned a bit from him, so surely that is influencing my views but I think for the better.

This was exactly my point earlier, when I said Bose isn't this bogus company that relies on marketing to push their products. However, almost the entire market of ultra hi-fi audiophile equipment is way more guilty than Bose in this respect. Instead of commercials to aim at the masses, they use equipment dealers to BS a small niche target market.

I'm not saying that good equipment isn't cool. It is. I want lots of stuff that I can't afford, or won't afford because I have my priorities in the right place. This guy who's telling you all of this great stuff. Take it with a grain of salt. Understand that he is influencing your views as you say, but it's not necessarily for the better. It is almost guaranteed better for him, though, because he knows when you have some money, you're going to consider giving it to him. Maybe all of it if he does his job right. I've talked with these types before. It's entertaining, but it's a lot of acting. Some of these guys actually believe what they're feeding you, because they understand the technology behind the principals... most of them aren't stupid by any means.

But you have to consider that a lot of info these audiophile types give you maybe be true technically, but not necessarily audibly. The amount of distortion created by a quality EQ is not audible. Any blurring of the stereo image or staging is either in your head, or it's a result of adjusting the wrong frequency bands. If you use an EQ for what it's intended, to smooth out response characteristics, the benefits far outweigh any audible errors. Same thing goes for THD ratings under .1%. In the hi-fi world, a pre-amp with .00001% commands a higher premium than one with .01%, which is complete horse shit because humans can't hear that well. This is especially stupid when you consider that even the best speakers play with 1-10% distortion at reasonable output levels. Also, tube amps are ridiculously distorted compared to solid state amps. That "warm tube sound" is actually distortion that audiophiles choose to be acceptable because they want to believe it (and sell expensive products).

When some hi-fi purist tells me vinyl surpasses CD in sound quality, I just laugh. It's just a bigger load of crap. The first CDs were not the best, but they fixed that, yet the old schoolers remember and won't let it go. Vinyl is cool and fun, no doubt, and the concept seems more pure because in theory the signal stays analog, but again, the benefits of CD far outweigh the downsides. Vinyl is just not practical anymore. I can give you at least 10 reasons why records suck.

So, while it's fun to chat with these quack audiophile types, and even to use some of their knowledge for good purposes, remember that what costs 90% more in price is probably less than a 1% improvement in performance compared to something damn good, like Bose product. If you think it's worth an extra $10k to get that .5% sonic improvement, go for it. If you think it's worth transforming your living space for sonic perfection, great. I'm going to design my sound around my life, not vice versa. My set-up will sound 99.5% as good, at a fraction of the price, and I won't have to arrange my furniture in goofy formations, drape ugly wall hangings on the walls, or calm a pissed off wife. Good sound is nice, but not so important as to make life difficult. This is one of the reasons I was drawn to car audio. I can manage the space more easily because it's all mine. It's also a place where I spend enough time that I can listen without being interrupted. I can also turn it up without bothering people, bass has almost infinite depth... there are so many reasons why the car is a better place to enjoy listening to music.

I've never heard anyone say vinyl surpasses cd quality. I love vinyls too. I might have more vinyls than i do cds , but i like them for the nostalgia , that crackling sound just adds character to old songs ( i.e. the beatles , jethro tull , etc.) Tube amps ( another guitar reference so if you're sick of them then stop reading now) are great in the guitar amp world because they add warmth to the sound ,not because of the quality or clarity. They give it a smooth texture, and is appreciated for its sound altering rather than its reproduction. The only old technology that i think is under-rated are reel to reels , given i havent heard one in a while , they sound quality was far ahead of its time and its still how many recording studios today record music.

I also agree that a car is the best place to listen to music. It has the least interruptions and i'm probably in my car more than i'm in my room. I dont even have a radio in my room but ive spent about 500 bucks on car audio.

I've heard the vinyl argument before. If you had the heaviest, best quality turntable possible, with the best tone arm stylus, and a great pre-amp... then find a never opened record (preferably a recently produced one), handle it with gloves and use in a level 10 clean room; I believe the first play of that record could produce a signal that exceeds CD quality. That's mostly an assumption, though. I've never had enough money or time to actually try that. But it doesn't matter, because from that point onward, the sound gets worse an worse, where as a CD continues to have 100% quality forever if taken care of.

I agree that tubes are great for creating character of music. Not good for reproduction. You don't want any added character added when listening. One argument that tube amps overload more gracefully than transistor units... this means to me that distortion is brought on sooner than a solid state unit, resulting in a less abrupt transition into clipping. But the solid state sounds better right up to the point where all heck breaks loose. This is good, because the amp's limits are more clearly defined.

It's entirely ignorant to put all that money into a car's audio system though. For one, cars have very limited space and any acoustic flaws you'll just have to live with. Secondly, how can you even upgrade the acoustic sound? You can make it louder but the quality of the sound isn't so easy. Just sticking in some Infinty speakers in there you won't see any difference. We used to have an old Maxima and the stock speakers on it were better than the aftermarket ones my dad replaced them with. You just can't see a difference, you're only paying for a name and any perceived difference is in your head.

When you waste money on car audio, that's the stupidest shit to me. You drive your car around everywhere. That's almost showcasing everything you have for everyone, inviting them to steal it. Like if I drove around with my HDTV and 360 and my computer and all that in my backseat.

People could break into your house and steal speakers and stuff like that but it's a hell of a lot harder to do since they're so big. Breaking into someone's house is a hell of a lot riskier than breaking into a car. I just don't see the benefit, there's no reason why a house isn't the best place to listen to music. If you're near someone with loud exhaust or you have your windows down you're adding more noise that shouldn't be there. Cars are horrible for audio since they're so open to the elements and outside noises.

Sure, I like CDs and they're the only thing you can bring around in cars but you can't beat a vinyl's sound. There's something about the analog sound it has comparative to a CD. CDs may acoustically be better, but I prefer a vinyl to a CD when given the option (except if I want to listen in the car!).

Saying its ignorant to put money into a cars audio system would be like saying its ignorant to put any money into a car period or drive a car thats worth anything because it can get stolen. people can steal your gas if they want to...that doesnt mean you shouldn't. The only part of your audio system thats visible is the head unit anyway. Ive had an aftermarket head unit in my cars for years and my dads had one too and yeah one of them almost got stolen one time the door was left unlocked) , but he didnt return it to stock because of it
As for the speakers in the maxima , did he buy good speakers? did he have a premium stock sound system?
If people really want something theyre gonna take it , and they know the risks involved. But me i spend a lot of time in my car so i wanna make the whole experience as pleasurable as possible.

I'm saying spending money on car audio over home audio seems ignorant to me. I don't see how they could steal the gas on our cars with the button release gas cap, unless they broke in to get it open. Anyways, the Maxima had a basic sound system in it and he put in what should've been nicer aftermarket speakers (No idea what the brand was but it was something kinda expensive). I just remember him saying that those stock speakers actually sounded better.

Expensive speakers? oh so you mean he didnt get a better product for the money? I'm sure its not too hard to pop open the gas cap door with a screwdriver. I spend more on car audio then home audio because i listen to music in my car a lot more than i do at home. if i listened to music at home more i'd put my money in a stereo here.

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When you waste money on car audio, that's the stupidest shit to me. You drive your car around everywhere. That's almost showcasing everything you have for everyone, inviting them to steal it. Like if I drove around with my HDTV and 360 and my computer and all that in my backseat.

It's not wasting, nor is it showcasing. I've had my gear installed for going on 5 years now. It's still there. It sounds better than any home system that could be had for the same amount of money. HDTV, 360, and computer, none of that is car audio. When you drive your car an hour or more each day, it makes a a lot of sense to turn it into a listening room.

There are many audiophiles who are into car stereo. It can actually be a better place for sound reproduction because of all of the irregular surfaces and soft materials. A small space isn't a bad thing. Speakers can be aimed and equalized for very good response in a car. Woofers play lower and more efficiently because of the cabin gain of the smaller space. It's very easy to overcome the outside noise by increasing the dynamics of the system. This doesn't require very much power, either. The first totally flat RTA response from 20-20kHz wasn't done with home equipment, it was done in a '90s Pontiac LeMans with 2 channels, 2-way components on each side, no subwoofers.

Probably the best reason for spending money on car audio gear is the value. You can get a good 500 Watt amp for under $500. Try buying a hi-fi 500 Watt power amp that runs on 120VAC. You'll pay over $1000. To create the same deep bass as my single 8" sub in the car, you'd spend at least a couple grand on a much larger sub/cabinet with a pretty big amp to drive it. My entire system in the Riviera costs half what a good home subwoofer does.

The reason why that Maxima sounded bad was probably because the stock head and speakers were made to play together. They're putting more attention towards good audio these days. You pull out the speakers not knowing if they're really that bad, you upset the balance, and now it sounds like mud. You put those same aftermarket speakers in a different application, and they could sound very good.

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Sure, I like CDs and they're the only thing you can bring around in cars but you can't beat a vinyl's sound. There's something about the analog sound it has comparative to a CD. CDs may acoustically be better, but I prefer a vinyl to a CD when given the option (except if I want to listen in the car!).

There's "something" about vinyl? Must be the experience of handling something so old and playing it on something mechanical. A CD isn't just acoustically better, it's dynamically better, too. And more reliable, portable, consistent. Good record players are expensive compared to good disc players. You can also record on CD. Other than the retro value, and the coolness of the ritual of putting it on, there's nothing about a record that makes any sense.

My $400 computer speaker setup has more quality bass than most of the cars I've heard which are just pure noise (Check me out dog, I can make my tires vibrate! That mean's it's good right!?). Btw, the Maxima had an aftermarket radio in it and one of the speakers blew (hence he replaced all the speakers with aftermarket). My dad has been into audio for around 35 years and has sold it for about 20 so he knows what he's doing and what he's talking about.

You all can waste all your money on car audio, I won't. It's entirely unsensible to me to waste so much money and effort cramming all that audio into a car than it is in a home. I come home everyday and I'd assume most people do so that's the perfect place to listen to music. Why would I waste ALL the effort it takes to disassemble the car just to make it sound a little better or louder?

According to what you all say, if you wanted to listen to some music you'd have to go out and sit in your car to do it. No thanks, I like to be able to sit in my chair and lay back while I'm listening to my music and not look like a werido who just goes out and sits in my car for apparently no reason. You cannot compensate for all outside noise either. Wind noise, rain, car horns, exhaust noise, all of that can't be ruled out and you'll either hear that or be destroying your hearing by listening to the music so loud that you can't - which will more than likely be distorting your speakers.

Most cars aren't that perfectly quiet that you could hear something like a clock ticking inside them with them on so that means you've always got something adding noise that shouldn't be there. In a house, you can essentially eliminate all noise and make it dead silent other than your music. There is more purity and clearness to the sound.

Not to mention, if you wreck your car there goes your "high quality audio setup". You're a whole lot less likely to lose a home audio system in a similar manner. You can't watch movies in your car either (or at least it's really stupid if you do and you're not taking a long trip somewhere).

Vinyl vs CD is something of a preferred taste. I personally like it better than a CD. To me it sounds better than a CD recording. Just FYI, my Pioneer turntable went for about $400 new in '75 which if you know the value of a dollar relative to the time was quite expensive.

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My $400 computer speaker setup has more quality bass than most of the cars I've heard which are just pure noise (Check me out dog, I can make my tires vibrate! That mean's it's good right!?).

You've obviously never heard a car audio system built for sound quality. If you sit in a car built for SPL output, it's not going to sound good. It's not supposed to. Seems you are listening to cars driven by kids who like to ride around the block blasting bass too loud.

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You all can waste all your money on car audio, I won't. It's entirely unsensible to me to waste so much money and effort cramming all that audio into a car than it is in a home. I come home everyday and I'd assume most people do so that's the perfect place to listen to music. Why would I waste ALL the effort it takes to disassemble the car just to make it sound a little better or louder?

Everyone has a different schedule and living situation. Some people go to work, come back home, every day. Others take long drives to get to work, sometimes you don't get to come home each night. Some live in houses where you can pump up the sound, while others have a condo where there is concern for volume levels. Also, not everyone lives alone; in a house you have to bothers others with your loud music, whereas in a car it's just you.

The effort exerted on installing sound equipment isn't that much. Not as much as you'd spend making the money to buy equivalent home audio equipment. Your opinion of your computer speakers is subjective. Someone else can listen to them and not be as impressed. As for clean bass response, a crucial factor for sound quality, cars can make deep flat bass MUCH easier than home subwoofers. My car is now a lot better and louder than stock, not a little bit.

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According to what you all say, if you wanted to listen to some music you'd have to go out and sit in your car to do it. No thanks, I like to be able to sit in my chair and lay back while I'm listening to my music and not look like a werido who just goes out and sits in my car for apparently no reason.

I almost never go out and sit in my car to listen. I listen while I drive. I like to sit up straight and pay attention, because that's the only way to appreciate a good stereo image without headphones. If you think sitting in a car makes someone a weirdo, try inviting people to your house and showing them how you arranged to the room so the speakers will sound perfect. I've seen pictures of hi-fi geeks who take listening to far. The foam blocks glued to the wall are a nice touch:

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You cannot compensate for all outside noise either. Wind noise, rain, car horns, exhaust noise, all of that can't be ruled out...

The Riviera is a quiet car. I never notice those sounds with the music on. But if someone did beep their horn, I wouldn't flip out over it. I'm not that obsessed that it would ruin the experience.

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In a house, you can essentially eliminate all noise and make it dead silent other than your music.

Maybe, until the phone rings, the dog barks, or someone knocks at the door. There's also other people in a house who make noise, walk in front of you, bother you, etc. My car is one of the quietest places I can be.

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Not to mention, if you wreck your car there goes your "high quality audio setup". You're a whole lot less likely to lose a home audio system in a similar manner. You can't watch movies in your car either (or at least it's really stupid if you do and you're not taking a long trip somewhere).

Audio gear is universal. I've taken mine out of one car and installed it in the next. Almost all of my equipment has been in another vehicle. In case of an accident, you take out the gear. It's that easy.

Houses burn down and flood. In either case, audio equipment is gone forever.

Since you can't drive and watch a screen, watching movies in a car is pointless and stupid. It also has nothing to do with car audio.

oh boy.............. i am OVER happy with my setup and will only swap sub boxes because i had an oppurtunitiy to make my own.............

100$ 1000W amp and 2 12 inch subs package

18$ amp kit

60$ 6X9's and 5.25 inch speakers

i have LESS than 200$ invested and am REALLY happy with the quality and what not of my sound system......... JUST MY .02 cents...... after reading all this i had to leave some input

There is no way that is true 1000 W. That's the problem, all car audio is overrated. They use PPO (Peak Power Output) which means how much power can it give for a fraction of a second. The actual wattage is much lower. All that BS audio stuff weights your car down and makes it slower (not much but it's extra unecessary weight). I'd just assume avoid worthless upgrades which do nothing and spend the money on things that DO do something.

Shintsu wrote:

There is no way that is true 1000 W. That's the problem, all car audio is overrated. They use PPO (Peak Power Output) which means how much power can it give for a fraction of a second. The actual wattage is much lower. All that BS audio stuff weights your car down and makes it slower (not much but it's extra unecessary weight). I'd just assume avoid worthless upgrades which do nothing and spend the money on things that DO do something.

I LMFAO at your reply......................................

Like Aaron, my sound equipment in my riviera has already been in 3 different cars, with the exception of the front speakers. In fact, I had the amp, cap, subs, and a cd player before I even had a car. I used it in my home. To get what I wanted, it had cost a little more than a nice home theater subwoofer but of course I knew It would go into my car. It worked out fantastic.

It would be foolish of me to waste money on expensive home equipment at this point of my life.

Vinyl..? Ok this is like 2008 man. I certainly do respect its elegance, historical nature, and pleasantly crappy sound quality that can be nice at times, but there is a reason why we don't really use them anymore. Pretty much the only records that are still manufactured are generally decorations that endorse bands we love.

Sound systems in a way can be a considerable asset to a car. I know a lot of people who have sold cars because of the sound system in it. To say that a sound system is worthless is just asinine. I feel that in ways, people not understanding what they buy and how it all works, causes them to make poor choices in the product and application, which means they are left unhappy with what they spent their money on. Nobody likes to be disappointed in what they invested in, so you may see a bad rep behind it sometimes.
ie:
If you buy a 500 dollar component system and install the woofers into a free-air suzuki safari vehicle and face the tweeters at the floor, It's going to sound like junk. Then your even stupider friend says you need an amp because it's just not powerful enough for the speakers so you spend another 400 bucks and you're still with the same problem. < witnessed experience. What's even funnier is when people do all that and they pretend it sounds great and actually are happy with it.

How can you claim to have an acoustically accurate sound if you've taken the speakers from a different car you had them in? The speakers must be custom fit and chosen based on the car. If you just carry over from something else, the acoustics are different. Because a car moves so much the acoustics are constantly in change and they're never consistent.

Obviously none of you have a semi-decent quality turntable. Vinyls do sound better than CDs. If you have a super cheap turntable or a horrible cartridge though, it will make it sound bad. Right now I've got a cartridge that costs about $150 on my turntable and it sounds excellent. The only vinyl that is really dated are those 78 rpm records. Vinyl requires careful handling that most people are incapable of doing. Why do you think they sell record cleaning machines and turntables that vacuum the record to the spindle to reduce distortion? It's pricey but it's because it provides some of the best sound you can get.

I can't see how you could think car audio is important at this point in your life either. Out of most sound systems in cars, the vast majority are bass only. It doesn't take a genius to figure out most people just turn their cars into moving boomboxes. If you're actually looking for a truly good sound, home audio is far more suitable! Unless all of you live in apartments or something, I see no reason why home audio isn't more suitable. It's not near as complicated and difficult to get a decent sound.

It's not like you can buy aftermarket equipment that has vehicle specific use other than the size of it. Most of the aftermarket car audio stuff has similar ideas for sound and design versus the factory system. Pioneer is not used for Buick cars any more than it's used for a Ford.

What I've personally found with factory systems is that whether it's manufactured by AC delco, Bose, Infinity, JBL, etc., to a point you get what you pay for no matter who makes it. Boses system that's found in a tahoe, for example, looks just like a delco system and doesn't sound a hell of a lot better in my opinion. If GM decided to call it delco, I don't think it would make a huge difference. Looking at a lot of premium option factory sound systems in various cars by all and more of the brand names that I listed above, they all look painfully similar, and I'll add that they never look anything like the name brand aftermarket product. Without doing a lot of difficult research, I couldn't say if they are in fact just a low-budget name brand solution or if they honestly do supreme over a basic factory grade system.

Changing the vehicle while maintaining the same equipment is generally no problem. The head unit is a give-in universal swap. Some adjustment in equalizer settings may be called for especially If you switch speakers but for the most part, like Aaron already said, most cars offer favorable acoustic imagining to begin with. If you have component tweeters, you can aim them how ever you need to. In the case of drastically changing the body style of the car or truck, a different subwoofer enclosure may be more ideal. That's about it.

My last car was a 2000 mitsu eclipse. That system was quite a bit more complex than the riviera because it had a fully remote amp that powered 7 speakers in 5 channels. It was an Infinity system and it sounded great but it still had its short comings. It didn't get all that loud and there was no way (I liked) to add subs without putting in a head unit. So I got the special loom to adapt the aftermarket head unit to work with the factory amp but also used the head units amp to power the added tweeters and the aftermarket rear speakers. This resulted in what I would call a hybrid system. About half was factory and half aftermarket and It worked out better than I had thought. It got loud when I wanted it and the factory front 5 speakers were kept in the protection of the proper amp.

Point is that this was a case where I had added exactly what I needed to achieve the sound I wanted and kept what factory components I could. Obviously I wouldn't have done any of that If it didn't improve the system enormously. Quite frankly, if you think you cannot improve on the factory system in at least most cars, you're gravely wrong.

You keep advocating home audio. If you are never in you home with time to enjoy it and take long trips in your car, why in the world would you go for the home situation. I think you're missing the whole factor of utility. Whether or not you can make a "better" system in your home versus a car is irrelevant. What matters is what you can use and enjoy. You are trying to sell expensive headphones to a deaf person here and I'm saying you should sell them a hearing aid.

I'm no expert on Phonographs. I think mine is pretty nice - It's a Techniques straight out of japan and its basically like a CD player as far as controls go and it has a digital display that shows some kind of track information but I can't remember exactly since I haven't used it in like 8 years! Even then, it was more of a toy to me than a medium for music. It sat in my room next to my 8track player with stacks of zeppelin and pink floyd. At least I had good music on the 8tracks that I actually didn't have on CD at the time lol.

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How can you claim to have an acoustically accurate sound if you've taken the speakers from a different car you had them in? The speakers must be custom fit and chosen based on the car. If you just carry over from something else, the acoustics are different. Because a car moves so much the acoustics are constantly in change and they're never consistent.

This isn't true. Custom matching to the environment, it's just more audiophile propaganda. More important is aiming the drivers correctly, phase alignment, and EQ. This is the difference between real sound quality and theoretical BS: Some audiophiles believe that a certain material used in a driver cone will be "acoustically matched" to the room, based on what some "hi-fi guru" told him, whereas the knowledgeable listener (home or car audio) knows from experience that good sound can be tailored to perfection from installation, tweaking, and tuning.

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Obviously none of you have a semi-decent quality turntable. Vinyls do sound better than CDs. If you have a super cheap turntable or a horrible cartridge though, it will make it sound bad. Right now I've got a cartridge that costs about $150 on my turntable and it sounds excellent. The only vinyl that is really dated are those 78 rpm records. Vinyl requires careful handling that most people are incapable of doing. Why do you think they sell record cleaning machines and turntables that vacuum the record to the spindle to reduce distortion? It's pricey but it's because it provides some of the best sound you can get.

This is all more evidence as to why vinyl is inferior to digital music formats. The concept of mechanical pick-up is flawed in so many ways, it's not even a valid argument anymore. The idea that you are a superior human because you can pick up a record and put it on a turntable is a delusion... similar to the delusion that you can hear better than others (actually worse hearing may help to enjoy records; you don't hear the imperfections). Users of records aren't any better than normal folks, they only have extra time on their hands to spend enjoying something that the rest of us can enjoy in a more convenient and efficient manner. This is fine. It's a hobby. It's okay to have a hobby, but it's not okay to think the average person is inferior because they choose not to enjoy your hobby... and they do choose. It has nothing to do with ability or intelligence. Anyone can enjoy records if they want..

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I can't see how you could think car audio is important at this point in your life either. Out of most sound systems in cars, the vast majority are bass only.

Clearly a generalization based from your personal experience, and simply not true. It would be like me saying, "The vast majority of home audio systems are home-theatre-in-a-box deals driven by $200 receivers." That is in fact true, but it doesn't mean someone who invests in good audio equipment can't have something better. Same applies to the car.

Anything from today's technology an improvement over the CSII speakers.


But don't mind me. I'm having fun.

AA wrote:

This isn't true. Custom matching to the environment, it's just more audiophile propaganda. More important is aiming the drivers correctly, phase alignment, and EQ. This is the difference between real sound quality and theoretical BS: Some audiophiles believe that a certain material used in a driver cone will be "acoustically matched" to the room, based on what some "hi-fi guru" told him, whereas the knowledgeable listener (home or car audio) knows from experience that good sound can be tailored to perfection from installation, tweaking, and tuning.

There is no BS, there are millions of factors that affect the way sound comes at you. Lots of it is unseen and you can not get measurements. Just because you can't see a statistic somewhere doesn't mean the sound isn't better or noticeably different. Listen to some speakers in a bathroom, then take them into a concert hall, then take them into a gymnasium, then take them into a living room - you'll get a different sound every time because of all the different materials in the room, the way the sound reverberates, etc etc.

Records are not a hobby, they're a medium for music. That'd be like saying listening to a cassette is a hobby as well or using an older PC is a hobby or driving an older car (Muscle cars) are only just a hobby. You know, they still make turntables. I've even seen some that are USB. Records have been the preferred choice for DJs for many years as they're easier to que up and mix together as well as spinning them to make the cool sounds.

I don't claim to have superiority over anyone else. I'm just speaking the truth, a lot of people are such dumbasses they can't even handle a CD without scratching it all up so obviously they'd never last with a record. You have to be more cautious when using them. Just because something takes more time or care to use doesn't make it worse (Unless you're impatient or careless). I've got a high quality CD player and a high quality turntable, I listen to both regularly. There is a foreign artist who I love to listen to and her latest album released on CD and vinyl (Came out in Dec '07) so don't act like no one listens to them or they wouldn't release brand new albums onto the format.

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Listen to some speakers in a bathroom, then take them into a concert hall, then take them into a gymnasium, then take them into a living room - you'll get a different sound every time because of all the different materials in the room, the way the sound reverberates, etc etc.

You forgot one: open air. Sure rooms put their influence on sound. That's why rooms suck. Car interiors aren't rectangles made with hard, flat walls. Instead you have a mixture of multi-shaped panels, textures, and angled glass. In other words, it's harder to get echoes inside a car. And when you open the windows and sunroof, you improve the quality even more, as you're now in an anechoic environment. It's more like a sound recording studio with the angled sound absorbing panels, or even like being outside, the best of all listening places.

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Records are not a hobby, they're a medium for music. That'd be like saying listening to a cassette is a hobby as well or using an older PC is a hobby or driving an older car (Muscle cars) are only just a hobby. You know, they still make turntables. I've even seen some that are USB. Records have been the preferred choice for DJs for many years as they're easier to que up and mix together as well as spinning them to make the cool sounds.

Go to Amazon.com and look for albums. You'll find that 72% of music is sold on CD, 13% MP3, 7% cassette, 6.5% vinyl, and 1.5% other. I'm being considerate of vinyl here, because Amazon sells both new and used records. Still, even with all the old vinyl out there, it's only 6.5%. So basically, NO ONE buys vinyl records for new music.

And this doesn't take into consideration Apple iTunes, which saw its 4 billionth download recently. This is the new medium. It will eventually put CDs in the same place as records: gone. Vinyl should not be considered a recording medium any more because the only people who buy them are the niche market (audiophiles), the specialist market (DJs), and the collector market (hobbyist). Collecting is the most popular form of hobby, and audophilia is a form of leisure activity, which defines what a hobby is, so listening to records is a hobby unless you are a DJ and can make money from using them.

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I don't claim to have superiority over anyone else. I'm just speaking the truth,...

I can't believe you actually said that.

I can go on and on about why vinyl is so bad. Go to Wikipedia and research "Gramophone Record". It's basically a ten page list of negative attributes. One of particular interest is how vinyl-recorded music must be severely equalized using preemphasis and deemphasis to compensate for the playback process and manufacturing weaknesses of record cutting. If EQ is bad for sound quality, just listening to vinyl is much worse than feeding sound through an equalizer. The vinyl recording process is much like Dolby noise reduction in cassette tapes... deconstructing the sound, then putting it back together to hide noise on playback. This isn't a bad thing in my opinion. If it wasn't done, music on records would sound horrible. I find that a little funny.

For the same reasons audiophiles think tube amps sound good, and speakers have to be made for a specific room, they like the sound of records. Why is this? The problem really isn't vinyl, it's the audiophiles. Too many of them like stuff that actually sounds worse, because they interpret distortion as quality. A little reference I found online:

"The "warmer" sound of analog records is generally believed on both sides of the argument to be an artifact of harmonic distortion and signal compression. This phenomenon of a preference for the sound of a beloved lower-fidelity technology is not new; a 1963 review of RCA Dynagroove recordings notes that "some listeners object to the ultra-smooth sound as … sterile …"

I couldn't agree more with this statement. Some audiophiles have a lot in common with "bassheads". Both believe their sound is high quality because they are attracted to the "warmth" of harmonic distortion, which happens to be most prevalent in extremely loud bass frequencies. Perhaps the audiophiles are better listeners, because they are able to appreciate the distortion in the mid and higher frequencies, whereas the bassheads don't notice.

You will not convince me. Records are good and nothing you can show or tell me is going to convince my ears otherwise. You seem to think cars are a perfect audio platform which is on the entire other end of the spectrum on my own personal beliefs. Home is where the audio belongs, it's a mere accessory in a car and this is why a lot of the time I wouldn't even care if I had no radio in my car. Please also tell me how VHS is supposedly better than Beta as well...

We have a 150 dollar turnttable in my house. which will undoubtedly sound better than a 33 year old one that cost more still. And i LOVE vinyls, but not for sound quality. i think its outrageous to think that they have better quality. it gets scratched with a needle ,which inevitably distorts the sounds. You are buying into a lot of bs. Speakers dont have to be specific to the application , they need to be pointed correctly and balanced right and "eq" ed as well... EQ is important because it adjusts for the difference in the speaker sizes and materials. In order to get a sound close to what was originally produced , you must account for where its coming from.


As i said before , i spend a lot more time in my car than at home , i have a sub but its a very tight sound and not too intrusive at all , and i get yelled at by my mom when i listen to music loud at home. My car is the best place for me to invest into audio for me.

I'll give a little leeway as far as vinyls being perfect, but they're still a perfectly viable source of music. I will NOT however change my stance on equalizers. They are horrible devices! If you don't have enough bass or enough treble you need a subwoofer or better speakers. Equalizers make any sound that comes through them fake and as such ruin the sound of anything that comes through them as it alters it's true sound. It's like people using the loudness button on a receiver and then turning the volume up - the loudness button is meant to add bass when listening at low levels. Turning it up can damage your speakers.

That's more understandable as a reason. My parents never give me any crap about having it up loud, not that I really have it that loud. However, I would say if you're listening that loud it's probably not a good sound you're getting. Quality of sound is more important than volume - that's why I don't like Cerwin Vega. All their speakers are overly bassy and high volume but no good for imaging.

If eq is so horrible than why is it used in live and recording audio from the source on several levels? Guitars , Mics , PAs, all use eq. Every good recorder uses EQ. It helps produce a more natural sounds as speakers alone cant perfectly replicate something they are not such as instruments and voices , so to compensate for the "color" so to speak that the speaker adds , we have EQ.