Audi's Sound Concept cabin defines auditory excess: 62 speaker surround-sound
By Tim Stevens 
posted June 18th 2010 8:03AM
posted June 18th 2010 8:03AM
posted June 18th 2010 8:03AM
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@bimmerfreak0
This is Bang & Olufsen. Too shabby for you?
Yea i wonder how the thought process was like yo we got 30 mid-range speakers I'm here..... Naw 40 is better... One person was like you know I think we should put 52. What a random number...
@Omegakaos89 It's more likely they ran out of space. I mean if the image above is any where near correct they have 5/6 mid's and 1 woofer per door. Then you have to get all the wiring and the stuff that actually belongs in door to make it function as a door.
@KAL326 So in essence they made the door a massive set of speakers first then remembered they were making a car and finished the door. Gotcha lol
Should sound good hope they have a good amp and the sound tweaking doesn't need a studio board.
OMG, boner!
*as Petey Pablo* It need some some more bass!
Very nice piece of gear. Wouldn't mind this in my Nissan Qashqai, even though the sound is good already!
I'm ready to assault the food stamp supported idiot next to me at the stop light with his DUB edition hoopty blasting music about how he's a real "N" and he's got the monies and honies, and I'm thanking God he can't afford this because I would go to prison for showing him a 1911 to the head. Punk ass.
Pure sex.
The first Audi to weigh more than a Humvee.
/me drools
I wonder if it will ever become an option on the GLI......... (still hoping)
If you going more useless should have more speaker like maybe some overhead and more subs
Q7 = ugliest car on the planet.
@AceMcLoud I wouldn't mind having one actually :)
@AceMcLoud Maybe if you have poor taste I could see this.
So many speakers, What species are they marketing it toward?
After all, humans usually only have two years.
@MAS Humans have two ears and a brain that can interpret distance and direction from those two. It is MUCH harder to project audio in a believable encoded surround method than it is to do it with hardware.
Now it needs an LED screen ;-). Car theater everyone? :-)
My fleshy bits aren't soft anymore.
I never understood surround sound in a car. The purpose of audio is to recreate a stage, or live performance. More often than not, the stage is in front of you (unless you have terrible seats). Its why audio-enthusiasts call it a "sound stage." A perfect sound stage will have a 3D effect (depth of sound field), it will be wide from left to right, and it will have perfect separation of instruments. The drums will seems as if they are coming from behind the other instruments in the center, guitar perhaps off to the far right, bassist off to the far left and the vocalist will be center/front. Again, the point is, when you are watching a live show--whether a symphony or death-metal, the stage (and sound) is directly in front of you. Its not coming from behind you. All of these (non-sub) speakers to your sides and back wreck the sound stage. Some of the best audio setups you'll ever hear in a car will have 5-speakers, with four of them in front of you: left/right midrange, left/right tweeters, and a sub behind you (with well adjusted cross-overs and plenty of wattage). Bass frequencies are difficult to localize, so putting the sub in the truck is fine so long as you have your crossovers set to
Replace the 62 throwaway speakers with 4 speakers, 1 sub and 4 tweeters of quality build and you save yourself a whole lot of trouble and get much better sound.
i wouldnt mind having sound like this in my 91 Miata. with the top down i can barely hear the sound from the speakers in the headrest behind my head!
"an in-car sound system so excessive it should be able to cause your soft, fleshy bits to pulsate in new and exciting ways."
No doubt, quote of the day.
I'm kind of an audiophile and all, but I can't imagine that's worth the extra MPG.
This would be awesome if they made it modular enough that you could swap out and replace components easily.
So this is what you do ok. You get this car then drive it really fast crash it into a wall and hopefully you become one with the speakers. Youll be like steve austin just with speakers. I wonder what will be your special powers?
@DahZihNahKuz superbark, but it's more like super-amplify-whatever-you're-saying
Pathetic or brilliant? It's like going to Europe and brag about how many countries you visited rather than appreciate the experience. What, they needed 62 speaker to play stereo? Sounds like epic fail to me. I'm sure it'll sell well, though.
speakers != channels
62 speakers in a car? now that's just ridiculous..
This is actually kind of interesting. For those waffling on about bass and quantitiy, you're missing the point. This system is not about pumping out your favorite tunes. Nor is it a surround system in the normal sense, and nor is it just for stereo playback. As the article clearly states, it's a wave field synthesis system, which offers by far the most advanced spatialization available. There is no definitive sweetspot with WFS - the more speakers one uses in a WFS system, the more clearly defined the spatial effect becomes for all listeners no matter their position. In other words, more speakers are required for the wavefront to be synthesized accurately. What I'd like to know is what kind of computing horsepower they have in this car - WFS can be quite processor intensive.