Do you think you have to spend more, less or the same to get a car system of comparable sound quality to a home hi fi set up?
Personally like the warm sound of Musical Fidelity stuff. Anyone know this and know of similar gear for cars?

Cheers, Amanda

 

Not sure if you can......

Think you have to spend a huge amount on car stuff to even get close to the sound of a reasonable home setup....

 

£200 on floorstanders, £150 on amp/receiver, £150 on CD player, £50 on cabling = £550 which is budget land for home hi-fi - these are Richer Sound type prices - ie very discounted. But I get all my ICE at big discount also. The home kit sounds much better than the same amount spent on ICE by quite a long way. I don't know if you would ever achieve what you are looking for in a Scoob even if you soundproofed the lot and put amazing amps, speakers and source in. Cars just mess about with the frequency response. Posh people try DSPs or 30 band equalisers and real time analysers to compensate. But I suspect they never quite get there?

However, ICE for £500-2000+ depending on what you want to spend can sound MUCH better than factory and acceptable to most audiophiles.

 

You will be hard pushed to get anything like a home hi-fi set up in your car.

I use Kef Q35s at home powered by a Rega Mira amp, and the primary source for me is a Rega Planet cd player. Cable is QED Silver Anniversary, and I'm biwiring. Cost? Less than a grand if you buy judiciously.

In car? CD Technologies HD62s for the front, Soundstream 604 amp driving them, 2xJL10W6 for sub with Rockford Fosgate Punch 200 driving them, Phoenix Gold bass cube, Kenwood PS minidisc and old but good KDC803 changer. Plus 5 1/4 inch CD tech midrange in the rear parcel shelf. Plus spare active x-over if I can be bothered to use it. Plus serious amount of install time.

I almost get a reasonable stereo image but, no matter how long I spend tweaking it, I haven't got two floor standing speakers with a single sound point positioned ideally in front of me like at home. Takes around half an hour to tweak your home set-up...

You can get something excellent in a car, but it will not be as good as in-house - or if it is, it will have cost 10 times as much as the home set up.

Saying that, Mr de Banke swears that one of the best set-ups he's ever heard, home, car or otherwise, was in a Harmen Kardon equipped Jag.

Of course, it also depends what you consider your priorities to be.

Back to your second question, if you like warm then you'll have fun replicating that in a car. Most speakers that I have tried vary from bright to neutral - though Adam M has tried many more so he may have a better clue.

The CD tech stuff is, IMHO, good and underrated. You're welcome to have a listen.

 

Thanks for info.

Had a feeling you'd need to spend more on car hifi.

Chiark, thanks for the offer. May take you up on it if I decide to go along this route. Presumably listening to other people's set ups are the only way to check out the true sound that you'll get.

Amanda

 

You could spend £oooooo of pounds and still not achieve home set ups.
My last scoob had about £2500 spent on it. which complied of Alpine head unit with 2 x 12" alpine subs (1000w each) 1x 1200w mono amplifier, 1x300w Pheonix gold amp couple onto some Pheonix gold componants.... Sounds very good and loud.

 

My home hi fi cost significantly more than the present set up in the scoob.

However the wife doesn't know that and if she comes home and reads this then I'm dead meat

I have a Linn Karik cd player with numerik dac, majik amp and Keilidhs - bi wired. Thats a total of 3 black boxes. Do you think I could sneak in a 4th while shes away without her noticing - its not that she ever dusts them

What do you think Amanda?

Martin

 

I thought your hi-fi kit looked a bit posh. Shame I'm not amongst the audiophilic cognoscenti. However, I do know that people with Linn usually either 1) fancy themselves or 2) know a thing or two about good sound. So which is it?

BTW, why is there a "k" in every name of that Linn kit?

 

John

Definitely 1) hence the unfeasible large number of mirrors in the house

As for the "k" - I think so = trying to think one that doesn't

Certainly I think home hi fi has been a bit anally retentive over the years - hence my rebellion by having all from one manufacturer

Plus they make them just down the road

I think with surround sound we have seen the likes of subwoofers moving into the living room and people moving away from the sitting in front of 2 speakers - the hi fi missionary position

 

Martin,

No, I dont think your wife would like it. You'd best send that 4th black box down to me. There's a very handy slot for it
Anyone heard of the designer who refused to make hifi for cars cos of the acoustics until he got in a new Lexus?

Amanda

 

LOTS LOTS LOTS MORE..

I would say that you need to spend in excess of 5,000 to match a 1500 home setup..

I would say that my setup is pretty good... or was in last car... yet to try Acoustics out in sub.. as not installed yet..

But have front to back..

2 Gauge Power Cable
125A Circuit Breaker within 12" of Battery.
Nakamichi MB100 (Car Hifi Gold Award £999)
Phoenix Gold PLD1
Phoenix Gold EQ213 or 215ix
2x Rockford Fosgate Punch 100's
1x Rockford Fosgate Punch 200
6.5" Rockford Fosgate Fanatic P's & Q's
2x 12" Rockford Fosgate XLC Subwoofers (Box type to be decided... but will be sealed)
DLS & Phoenix Gold Cables
Lots and Lots of SoundProofing

Would not like to think what I have spent... but if I count old things that have been replaced... probably in excess of 7,000.

May also add new alternator and battery when I begin installing this lot... currently waiting for car to have alarm fitted first.

Not saying my setup is best but its what I like... I know people have criticised these for being to harsh... but I may replace one amp with a genesis dual mono.. and possibly get some focal's for up front..

David

 

Amanda

I think you just have to look at the amount people will spend putting a sub in

Sub+box+amp - all of which are't needed at home

Maybe if I hadn't bothered with the car I could have had little black box 4 and 5 - hmm active Keilidhs

Martin