I pay for Pandora's HQ music and no recordings. My HU has Pandora built in, does this make a difference? I've actually listen/listened to a whole lot of 70-90s rock. I listen to everything that spikes the mood really. Sometimes I'm feeling so softer rock, sometimes I feel some straight up Death Metal/Dethcore. Some times I'm feeling gangsta and want slam some bass. I like the Alpines because, to me, they sound good with everything. Although I was trying to hear my "stage" and I think Its non existent. My guitars are clearly left and right, but IDK if they sound at a distance. On the driver side the left guitar is prominent, but not when I put my head in the center. Bass sounded like it was coming mostly from the sub or behind me. But the Drums were everywhere and sounded on the same level as the guitars, not centered further back.
I am very concerned with SQ. Money isn't really an issue. Now I'm not going to just go and buy a 300+ dollar amp off a whim. But if I want it, I'll get in within a few months. Power isn't an issue as well. I can get a HO ALT for the low (I work at a place that makes em). So power isn't much of an issue. And my goal is eventually to get it extremely loud, and extremely clean. I'm loud and clean now (to me) but I know it can get better. I've heard louder, so I want to be that loud, but with the lever of clarity I'm at, or even clearer.
Streaming is lower quality. Now people are running DVD players so they can play DVD-A. That's better than CDs but there are not a lot out there.
We are talking $500 amps at a minimum. Climbing to well over $1500 for the hard core guys.
Okay. Man. I hate CDs, its such a haste. And I hate repeating music. I have a 2 TB hard drive in my car, could I load that up with ripped CDs? or is that the same as streaming? I like Pandora because I load 10-20 stations and let it play. 9 hour trip... heard maybe 2-4 songs twice.
As you can tell from my build. I like stealth as well (but not too quite because of fans, I think I'll get some quieter fans at some point that illuminate red to got with the rest of the build) //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/smile.gif.1ebc41e1811405b213edfc4622c41e27.gif I think I'm going to go with a K9 (way bigger trunk) if I decide to go with Kia on my next car, but that'll be a few years down the line. About to get rid of a car payment, so I'm going to cram all the money I can on my car to get it paid of faster. The lady is trading in here '11 Soul for a '14 Soul because they are bigger. I'm not going to be paying for that car anymore which is pretty exciting.
Everyday listening is fine. I still play pandora some. When you are tuning, tweaking, demoing you want the best playback possible.
I already do that, but not from a quality point, from a creativity point. I play guitar, played in bands, played on stage with some bigger bands. Probably nothing you had heard of or listen to, but IDK you so maybe. Cannibal Corpse. I also write trap(D&B) beats and hip-hop beats. Actually did a commercial locally for a car dealership called "Bolt Motors" and got paid, so now I'm a professional //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/smile.gif.1ebc41e1811405b213edfc4622c41e27.gif. IDK if they air it or not, I don't listen to the radio. I'm about as new to the beat making game as I am the car audio.
I feel like I'm closer to the daily ground pounder over SQ at this point.
You can have both to a point. But your $5000 budget just doubled.
This may change for you, to the more expensive route. Last I checked, Pandora "premium" service streams at 192kbps, which is fine for bumping on stock stereos, but terrible for anything that concerns itself with quality. Highest quality mp3s are even at 320kbps. This thread actually opened my eyes to some things and I didn't realize I live so close to so many used CD stores, including Amoeba.
OP, 500 minimum is going to be used prices for a loud SQ setup and that's if you get amazingly hooked up. NoLoud, your amps (actual price paid) were about $800 to $900 for both? I've been throwing some stuff together, that range seems to be where it usually comes to for quality stuff without breaking the bank.
Agreed that radio and streaming are much easier...set it and forget it. I think if you go the SQ route, you'll have no choice but to step up to higher quality content. Many people have installed decent systems and wondered why their music library suddenly sounds like garbage. Good speakers are unforgiving when it comes to poor recordings. Just like you hear every nuance, you also hear every drawback. Good thing is that if you spend some time ripping CDs to your hard drives, when your collection is large enough, you won't have to repeat often.
Yeah, Pandora is 192kbps, and most of my MP3s are 320kbps. My HU doesn't play WAV files. I'm just simply not a fan of CDs (mostly if not 100% because of convenience). I never have been, when I was 10 I got my first MP3 and never looked back. But I also never had anything that I could distinctly tell the quality of a 192kbps over a 320kbps other than how loud the track played. This will likely change for me. I know my HD sounds better than Pandora, but I don't have the music I once had because I stopped collecting when Pandora came around.
