Showcasing the Best in the Mobile Enhancement Industry
I should stop looking at posts in car audio groups on social media. I’m not opposed to answering a few questions to help enthusiasts, but the constant barrage of untrue statements and misunderstandings about what matters in choosing a product like speakers is overwhelming. Let’s look at some typical speaker specifications made by companies that don’t understand speaker Read more
I consider myself extremely fortunate to have one of the most amazing jobs in the car audio industry. One aspect of being the editor in chief of BestCarAudio.com that I am particularly fond of is researching and performing experiments to create the content we publish. Unlike most of the hard-working folks who develop products, drive all over the countryside visiting retailers Read more
While browsing car audio groups on Facebook or Reddit, I see the comment that “distortion damages speakers” at least once, if not 10 times, a day. There can’t be many statements that equal this one to demonstrate an incomplete understanding of how speakers, amplifiers and distortion work. If you’ve been told this by professionals, don’t fret. Most of them don’t understand Read more
It’s time we start putting together the information from a selection of the articles I’ve created to help sound quality enthusiasts get the most from their car audio systems. In this article, we will discuss why it might be best to choose a low-power, high-quality Class AB amplifier to power your tweeters. We’ll look at this from both a noise and distortion perspective, as well Read more
What in the world is a coincident coaxial speaker, and how do we measure intermodulation distortion? We know both of these questions were the first thing you thought about when you woke up this morning. But, don’t fret; the BestCarAudio.com team is here to answer these life-altering questions, calm your nerves and, of course, help you choose the best solutions possible for your Read more
For car audio enthusiasts who’ve invested time studying the Thiele/Small parameters of speakers and subwoofers, you’ll know there is a specification called Xmax. This variable, typically expressed in millimeters or inches, is intended to describe the one-way excursion capability of the driver. Put another way, it’s the distance the cone can move forward or rearward from its Read more
In the car audio world, terms like subwoofer box rise and power compression are relatively familiar to those who push their sound systems to the limit. So, after extensive research (three minutes) and a detailed planning session (another two minutes), we decided that it would be worth doing an experiment to explain and quantify these elements. Let’s Talk About Speaker and Read more
Welcome to the BestCarAudio.com 2020 Car Audio Speaker Buying Guide. If you’re shopping for new speakers for your car or truck, the information in this guide will help you choose a solution that offers the best performance for your budget. If you’re an avid reader of BestCarAudio.com, then you know we consider speaker design and performance as the most important elements in Read more
Have you ever purchased something, then regretted your decision a few days later? We recently ran into a situation regarding car audio subwoofer amplifiers where the answer to “Which is better?” became a complicated discussion. We’re going to look at two amplifiers – one is a consumer-grade product that’s extremely popular, the other seems to offer too much bang for your Read more
If you’ve browsed any of the online car audio forums or Facebook groups, you’ve inevitably run across someone asking if you have to upgrade the speaker wire in a vehicle to support a new car audio system. Unlike a sure-fire upgrade like new speakers or adding an amplifier, the answers to the benefits and drawbacks of speaker wire upgrades are far more complicated. Please don’t Read more
Though it seems contrary to what I’ve preached, sometimes it’s better to avoid purchasing car audio speaker upgrades based on specifications alone. The information most manufacturers provide does very little to describe the actual quality of the product. A prime example of this are speaker Xmax specification numbers. Does this linear measurement tell us how loudly a speaker Read more
When it comes to correlating how the parameters of a speaker translate into music reproduction, well, the details are often somewhat sparse. One speaker characteristic that’s often overlooked when searching for new subwoofers or woofers is Q. This unitless number is a key component in describing how the suspension and motor work to control and damp cone oscillation at its Read more
