IMO real world daily driving environments include:
-road and engine noise , more so with windows down
-rattles ranging from a few panels to everything in the car making lots of unwanted noise
-every cars acoustics being different thus dealing with peaky frequencies (sealed boxes reduce but don't completely eliminate these peaks).
-other elements of the install that aren't perfect, thus causing some kind of unwanted acoustic result.
as much as we enthusiast try sometimes we cant get everything perfect every time. then take a person who isn't as dedicated to getting every last detail double checked. cancellation, improper tuning, a less than optimal box quality can happen. IMO if you're really dedicated to your hobby and install or you pay alot of money for it, you can get most elements of the install optimal. I think the average person looking for some bump cant tell much of a difference between 1% and 5% distortion on a sub stage, especially with the road noise etc....
Ive used many many subs of different calibers. Even with all elements of the install **** near perfect, there's not much of a noticeable difference in sub stage sound quality between my btl / 3hp-mt hybrid / 4hp / destroyer/ mt / 9512g, in a well designed low tuned ported box compared to other SQL oriented subs with respective setups. Ive heard w6v2's and w7's in both shitty and optimal setups and to my ear the "sq" difference to my btl in a great setup is barely noticeable IMO. When playing the btl well under it mechanical limit to be more on the dB level of these w6's and w7's, its pretty much all the same. Even at full tilt my btl sounds pretty **** clean on every note. The "dog shit" sound described to you previously was probably in an install that was poorly done or the btl was in a fartbox...and there's a reason we call them fartboxes.
Anything can sound good with the right setup
This is the point i'm trying to get at. Unless you're a total SQ nut most of the time if you do the install right the first time, it'll sound great and you don't need expensive name brand shit to do so. granted it helps having nice equipment, but no one can sit here and say this sounds good always or this sounds bad always since every car, every box, and every install is different.
In my experience you'll be amazed how nice you can make equipment sound that you would normally not expect to sound nice. Even my stock HU and speakers sound great with a few tweaks of the 3 band eq and some bass blocker caps for the speakers. Yes i've used equipment that has sounded better, but there's a lot of work that goes into marginal SQ difference aside from the equipment being used. its just not as simple as woofer x will always sound better than woofer y.
if im wrong. crucify me
