Any - I'm getting old

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Tue 18 Oct 2022 11:14
Any - I'm getting old - Crickleymal

I was just looking at a post on another forum where someone was asking about alternator output as his headlights were dimming when he turned his amplifier up. Turned out he had a 3000 W RMS amp for the bass and a 480 W amp for the rest of the range. My immediate thought was why? Music at that volume would render you deaf very quickly. My next thought was that he's the sort of person who delights in "sharing" his music with the entire neighborhood.

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Tue 18 Oct 2022 11:34
Any - I'm getting old - Adampr

There is a, largely incorrect, school of thought that having more power creates a better sound quality because you don't have to turn it up so loud.

With bass, you need to move a lot of air to get the full depth. The bigger the driver, the more bass and the more power needed to move it.

Equally, for reasons beyond my level of knowledge, car speakers tend to be low impedance and need a lot more power going into them for the same volume.

However, 100w should be plenty in terms of volume if you're using 8 ohm speakers and there's little point chasing the last little bit of quality when you're running off an unsteady 12v supply and sending sound into a metal and glass box.

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Tue 18 Oct 2022 14:16
Any - I'm getting old - Andrew-T

... there's little point chasing the last little bit of quality when you're running off an unsteady 12v supply and sending sound into a metal and glass box ...

... which is making a lot of extra noise of its own ....

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Tue 18 Oct 2022 15:59
Any - I'm getting old - nellyjak

Yes...you are getting old.!...me too.

Given what I can hear coming from a car entertainment sytem at 50 metres OUTside...Gawd knows what the decibel levels must be INside.?

I much prefer to listen to the purr of my V6...now that's music...lol

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Tue 18 Oct 2022 16:55
Any - I'm getting old - galileo

Yes...you are getting old.!...me too.

Given what I can hear coming from a car entertainment sytem at 50 metres OUTside...Gawd knows what the decibel levels must be INside.?

I much prefer to listen to the purr of my V6...now that's music...lol

Years ago we often told a teenage son to turn his ***** music down when in his bedroom and in his car. "You'll go deaf"!, we said, he said his kind of music had to be played loudly.

He's in his early 50s now and has bad tinnitus, he wishes he'd taken notice of our advice..

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Tue 18 Oct 2022 20:05
Any - I'm getting old - John F

Deplorably antisocial. A few weeks ago I was waiting at a red light on my bicycle (yes, there are some cyclists who observe them!) when a black blacked-out BMW pulled alongside, every panel vibrating with sub-saharan jungle drumming. I turned to face the driver, put my fingers in my ears and gave him a death stare till the lights turned green.

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Tue 18 Oct 2022 22:23
Any - I'm getting old - Metropolis.
Lol!
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Tue 18 Oct 2022 23:13
Any - I'm getting old - ExA35Owner

The IQ of a driver is in inverse proportion to the volume of his stereo system. Discuss.

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Wed 19 Oct 2022 00:11
Any - I'm getting old - FP

"The IQ of a driver is in inverse proportion to the volume of his stereo system."

I was thinking that the body part whose size might be in question is not the the brain.

Edited by FP on 19/10/2022 at 00:12

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Wed 19 Oct 2022 01:22
Any - I'm getting old - Terry W

You can't hold back time - we all age physically.

50 years ago, aged 17-25 I would have regarded most of the views expressed above as coming from "boring, out of touch, old, f4rts".

Getting behind the wheel after a few pints was the norm. Some of us may have been perfect, many or most indulged. Large straight through exhausts, wide wheels, boy-racer kit, big stereo turned up loud, driving like loons etc was aspirational for a young lad.

I now prefer relaxed, smooth quiet, sober progress, but we should not deny others the freedom do precisely as they wish unless it is persistently and dangerously anti-social.

Better that intolerance is not inevitably associated with aging - along with failing eyesight and hearing, joints failing, and the risk of descent into dementia.

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Wed 19 Oct 2022 00:56
Any - I'm getting old - Warning

It gets annoying when people roll down their windows and have their music at full blast.

My neighbhour has an BMW X3, and when he plays his music or has his handfree. I can hear everything. They must make BMWs with wafer thin metal, if I can hear everything.

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Wed 19 Oct 2022 12:54
Any - I'm getting old - Engineer Andy

A local Amazon Prime delivery driver did that a few months ago - and as he was delivering to several addresses in my locale, the noise continued for about 10 minutes. Needless to say Amazon got a email from me reporting the driver. Unlike other firms, they actually replied,. apologised and said it wouldn't happen again, which thus far it hasn't.

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Thu 20 Oct 2022 07:45
Any - I'm getting old - Bolt

My neighbhour has an BMW X3, and when he plays his music or has his handfree. I can hear everything. They must make BMWs with wafer thin metal, if I can hear everything.

Its a lot of sound pressure on any car which its not designed for, these competitions for instance, highest recorded Decibels in a car/hgv was iirc 130db-and are best listened to from a distance but the sound shakes the car/hgv to pieces, most cars I have fitted high power Hi Fi to complained of interior parts coming loose, in some cases panels falling off the interior as the vibration shakes all screws and bolts loose

thats without electrical wiring issues where the incorrect cable is used to supply power to the amps and speakers, and I often wondered why they bothered in a car

Personally I think 20 watts rms is more than enough in a house, let alone in a car

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Thu 20 Oct 2022 08:58
Any - I'm getting old - bathtub tom

Personally I think 20 watts rms is more than enough in a house, let alone in a car

Hear, hear. Can you speak up?

;>)

Edited by bathtub tom on 20/10/2022 at 08:58

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Thu 20 Oct 2022 09:04
Any - I'm getting old - Terry W

For some, music is an emotional as well as audio experience.

The physical sensation of one's body vibrating in sympathy needs LOTS OF POWER

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Thu 20 Oct 2022 10:50
Any - I'm getting old - Bolt

For some, music is an emotional as well as audio experience.

The physical sensation of one's body vibrating in sympathy needs LOTS OF POWER

With a top end system you do not need the power, the music should sound live, and not coming from the speakers as most do. but then the best sound comes from analogue not digital as we have now, though analogue is coming back, at last..

cars cannot sound good in any way due to vibration, no matter how much the volume is turned up, so to feel it as vibration is not emotion

I watched a decibel competition in Florida years ago in a Chevy pick up, all panels had massive base units in the cab- and loads of tweeters hanging from the roof, when the system was turned up full blast iirc it registered 130db (could be wrong there) but with several people keeping the doors from opening as they were moving about with the base, driver sitting in the cab with the shakes and smiling, what a ------

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