Back in the 80's I also had a great car stereo, I worked at an audio store and I had Concord front end and a clean power amp with AR speakers all around. The tapes I recorded on a Nak sounded great. But I agree with millercarbon, car and home quality just are too far apart now-a-days. I currently have what comes with my ML350 SUV and usually listen to, and no hate emails, Sirius radio or play MP3's off a memory card. It's good enough for the road in my opinion.
Car Audio and the High End
I am both an automotive hobbyist and a dedicated audio geek, and something that has always struck me is the difference between the two when it comes to music reproduction.
The car guys often spend a huge amount of money on 'improving' their car audio, which mostly means creating a bass heavy unnatural (usually loud) sound that gives them some sort of satisfaction.
The audio geeks like me may make some slight improvements in the stock car system (a notable one is swapping out the speaker drivers that perhaps cost the factory $5 for something that cost 10 times that and calling it done) but don't seem to be bothered by mediocre sound (by high end standards). Personally, I view car audio as having to be good enough not to annoy me while driving home to listen to some really well reproduced music on the home system.
Then of course there are the outliers of car audio who load up the vehicles with some much amplification that they win SPL level contests at levels that preclude anyone actually being inside the vehicle lest they have their hearing seriously damaged (the audio equivalent of those people that like to watch cars spin their tires on the spot until they burst, IMHO)
I wondered whether there were any that hang out on this site that overlap their interest in audio between cars and home, or whether they mostly stuck to home use.....
The car guys often spend a huge amount of money on 'improving' their car audio, which mostly means creating a bass heavy unnatural (usually loud) sound that gives them some sort of satisfaction.
The audio geeks like me may make some slight improvements in the stock car system (a notable one is swapping out the speaker drivers that perhaps cost the factory $5 for something that cost 10 times that and calling it done) but don't seem to be bothered by mediocre sound (by high end standards). Personally, I view car audio as having to be good enough not to annoy me while driving home to listen to some really well reproduced music on the home system.
Then of course there are the outliers of car audio who load up the vehicles with some much amplification that they win SPL level contests at levels that preclude anyone actually being inside the vehicle lest they have their hearing seriously damaged (the audio equivalent of those people that like to watch cars spin their tires on the spot until they burst, IMHO)
I wondered whether there were any that hang out on this site that overlap their interest in audio between cars and home, or whether they mostly stuck to home use.....