Does anyone actually shop around for Car Audio anymore?

[stratusrt01 10+ year member]

I've noticed a serious increase of people asking questions that they should be answering themselves. "What subwoofer sounds best?" "What amp should I get?" With as many of those questions running around I've been wondering if anyone actually takes trips to the local audio store anymore, or does everyone just order based on reputation or price?

Does anyone actually go out and listen to demo cars, customer cars, etc anymore? Even if you are going to order over the internet, at least go listen to as much as you can before you make a purchase. I'm sorry, but 400 people could recommend something to me, and I'd still want to hear it before I bought it.

Everyone has a different idea of what sounds good, and everyone wants something different from their mobile audio.

I can understand "Brand X vs. Brand Y" threads, because then customer service and durability come into play, but all these general questions are getting pretty annoying to weed through lately.

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[THUNDERBIRD 10+ year member]

"What subwoofer sounds best?" "What amp should I get?" QUOTE]well in a sense that is considered shopping around. kuz ur researchin the item that u would like. i still go to the store and look. but i want to know as much as possible about the item as i can before i go and look so i can ask questions at the store and see how there answer line up with the info i already know. you seemed kinda salty in ur post did u not shop around and were dissappointed?

 

[Rattlebrain 10+ year member]

I've noticed a serious increase of people asking questions that they should be answering themselves. "What subwoofer sounds best?" "What amp should I get?" With as many of those questions running around I've been wondering if anyone actually takes trips to the local audio store anymore, or does everyone just order based on reputation or price?
Does anyone actually go out and listen to demo cars, customer cars, etc anymore? Even if you are going to order over the internet, at least go listen to as much as you can before you make a purchase. I'm sorry, but 400 people could recommend something to me, and I'd still want to hear it before I bought it.

Everyone has a different idea of what sounds good, and everyone wants something different from their mobile audio.

I can understand "Brand X vs. Brand Y" threads, because then customer service and durability come into play, but all these general questions are getting pretty annoying to weed through lately.

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[southstylestang 10+ year member]

I agree. I wanna hear the subs b4 i buy them. But i only paid $6 a piece for my subs so it didnt really matter to me what they sound like. But if im gonna spend $100 or more for subs i wanna hear what they sound like but its also gonna matter with what car its in, box, amp, and other speakers and all that. So if possible i try to see if people will let me hook their subs up in my car b4 i buy from individuals or somthing.

 

[guy022077 10+ year member]

i have tried that but no shop around here(that i know of) has anything in a "show car" i have not been able to hear anything of the last 4-6 systems ive owned including the one i am buying now. Ive never heard arc but i have their subs , never used dei but i bought their amps, never seen an eclipse hu but i bought one, never heard diamond audio but i may buy their comps or WCC or crystal. Its just not an option anymore to go to your local place and hear a decent setup in a car. The last place that i know of that did do that only used their HIGH END stuff. MCintosh,JL, and i dont remember what speakers but the total system cost was well over 3k without install.

 

[stratusrt01 10+ year member]

"What subwoofer sounds best?" "What amp should I get?" QUOTE]well in a sense that is considered shopping around. kuz ur researchin the item that u would like. i still go to the store and look. but i want to know as much as possible about the item as i can before i go and look so i can ask questions at the store and see how there answer line up with the info i already know. you seemed kinda salty in ur post did u not shop around and were dissappointed?

No, I shopped around for months before I bought my stuff, and listened to probably 50 cars. I started in Car Audio in 1988, before we had message boards to go to, so I've kind of stuck with my old school ways throughout the years. I actually had my amps from a previous build, and I knew I only wanted a single 12" subwoofer, so I had a general idea of what I wanted, it just came down to a couple choices between components. I also wanted to buy locally, so if I had any problems, I could go straight back and talk to a person, not rely on email communication and possible shady internet dealers.

 

[Prowler573 5,000+ posts]

I've noticed a serious increase of people asking questions that they should be answering themselves. "What subwoofer sounds best?" "What amp should I get?" With as many of those questions running around I've been wondering if anyone actually takes trips to the local audio store anymore, or does everyone just order based on reputation or price?
Does anyone actually go out and listen to demo cars, customer cars, etc anymore? Even if you are going to order over the internet, at least go listen to as much as you can before you make a purchase. I'm sorry, but 400 people could recommend something to me, and I'd still want to hear it before I bought it.

Everyone has a different idea of what sounds good, and everyone wants something different from their mobile audio.

I can understand "Brand X vs. Brand Y" threads, because then customer service and durability come into play, but all these general questions are getting pretty annoying to weed through lately.

....says the man who has been a forum member since last month //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/laugh.gif.48439b2acf2cfca21620f01e7f77d1e4.gif

They're not getting annoying to weed through, friend. They've been annoying for quite some time.

Since the 'Net has invaded the majority of homes across the country (and to some extent the world) it has seemingly become a "License For Lazy" to countless people. While I cannot say that any of the points you have made are invalid I will say that there are too many places where a 'show car' or other example of products you're considering actually being used are simply unavailable options.

We can tell n00bs or whoever else //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/search.gif.e79a63b2b580b39b282dff402646b704.gif 'til we're blue in the face...it won't stop the flood of unnecessary questions at all I can't imagine. //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/crap.gif.7f4dd41e3e9b23fbd170a1ee6f65cecc.gif

 

[NhustlaR 10+ year member]

most the reason is because shops around here(at least, im sure it happens elsewhere) sell JL and eclipse. I rarely see anything else. CC with a couple kickers and MTX, but that's it. No shops around here have even heard of Resonant Engineering or Ascendant Audio. A few have heard of adire.....thats why i think people ask ?s around here, there are NO shops that sell the stuff people are looking at purchasing.

 

[Prowler573 5,000+ posts]

I had never heard of RE, AA, or Adire until I started wandering online forums. There are certainly no shops around here (that I am aware of) carrying their gear...

 

[ballstothewall 10+ year member]

Since I don't do car audio anymore, just home audio... I cant find ANYWHERE around that has what I want, so I'm forced to buy stuff blind and hope that I got good stuff.

 

[negativezeroz 5,000+ posts]

I had never heard of RE, AA, or Adire until I started wandering online forums. There are certainly no shops around here (that I am aware of) carrying their gear...

Same here. Recently a store has come up in my town w/RE. Funny cuz he was like "Check my shop! We just opened!" He had an RE amp on one of his display walls and I was like "so that's who the RE dealer is.." and he said "what's RE?" Nevertheless, I got an SE without hearing it before and I'm please with it's SQ but it isn't loud enough for me. Very clean though which is more important for me.

 

[twoohfour 10+ year member]

All the shops around here are Quality Auto Sound or Car Toys, which carry JL / Alpine /Eclipse / DUAL / Kenwood collectively... Not a whole lot of use to me in that. Besides, all the subwoofers are improperly mounted in some random wall, essentially running IB or in some cases a leaky plastic box.... That's not even close to a "proper enclosure".

Combine that with the fact that speakers, yeah you can hear them in store, but again midbass production will be innaccurate, off-axis response and imaging can't really be determined from being in a wall, and you have a storefront that is basically useless to figuring out anything about what you actually need....

 

[stratusrt01 10+ year member]

I understand that not everyone has what they want near them, and to be honest, I am one of those people, I live miles away from anything, there isn't even an Eclipse dealer within 2 hours of my house.

I didn't express myself very well either. My general gripe is that I was basically sitting reading threads, and there are 20 threads on the same page that ask almost the same question.

I agree that displays are not a valid way to hear what something is going to sound like, but most shops have a few installers and salesmen who have components installed in their vehicles, and if you are serious about buying products, they'll fire them up for you from what I've experienced. But then again, I'm in my 30's, so when I go looking for something in a car audio store, they figure I'm serious unlike the 400 teenagers they get window shopping everyday.

I may be new to this forum, but not to car audio BTW. I have been an active audiophile since 1987, and even worked in the industry for a few years.

 

[tRiGgEr 5,000+ posts]

Sure would have been hard to hear a RE xxx before I bought it.

 

[Prowler573 5,000+ posts]

I understand that not everyone has what they want near them, and to be honest, I am one of those people, I live miles away from anything, there isn't even an Eclipse dealer within 2 hours of my house.

I don't know if I have an authorized Eclipse reseller locally or not. Never looked into it. *shrug*

I didn't express myself very well either. My general gripe is that I was basically sitting reading threads, and there are 20 threads on the same page that ask almost the same question.

Basically all I can say is "Welcome!" I assure you ~ you are by far not the only one with this particular gripe.

I agree that displays are not a valid way to hear what something is going to sound like, but most shops have a few installers and salesmen who have components installed in their vehicles, and if you are serious about buying products, they'll fire them up for you from what I've experienced. But then again, I'm in my 30's, so when I go looking for something in a car audio store, they figure I'm serious unlike the 400 teenagers they get window shopping everyday.

That's a phenomenon I have noticed as I've gotten older as well. I can walk into a car audio shop and get treatd like a real person who might actually make a purchase as opposed to basically ignored when I was a teenager (I have a story about an afternoon with $1500 to spend on car audio gear when I was 17 but I'll save that for another day)

I may be new to this forum, but not to car audio BTW. I have been an active audiophile since 1987, and even worked in the industry for a few years.

I made no assumptions on how long you've been active in aftermarket mobile audio - I was just referencing your join date for this forum and marveling that it didn't take long for you to notice what is all too painfully clear to those of us that consider ourselves somewhat "regular" here. //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/wink.gif.608e3ea05f1a9f98611af0861652f8fb.gif
'87, eh? I wasn't even driving then! I turned 14 that year....