In the newly launched new generation of BMW 7 Series/i7 sedans, the in-car entertainment system has been raised to a new level. In addition to the 31-inch, 32:9 aspect ratio 8K screen on the rear roof, Bower & Wilkins, the "British Sound" brand hi-FI, provided a 36-speaker sound system with a total power of up to 1965W for the Bavarian flagship sedan.
In fact, the pursuit of car audio is far more than the traditional car manufacturers, thanks to the pure electric platform model in the electronic and electrical architecture of better functional expansion, in the car audio is also a new energy vehicle companies to increase the selling point of the "usual trick". For example, the FIRST NIO CAR ET7, which has just completed delivery, has a sound system that supports audiovisual content in Dolby Atmos format.
Car audio from scratch
In fact, the so-called Dolby Atmos is just a 3D surround acoustic technology that makes the direction of sound more clear through the spatial information in the audio signal than the traditional 7.1 channel. However, this technology is not new in the eyes of Hi-Vi circles and movie fans, after 2015, almost all mainstream AV amplifier equipment on the market have added the audio track decoding of this format.
From the single-function AM shortwave radio to the high-quality audio and video feast for the members of the car today, how has the car audio developed so far in a century of history, and what is the interesting story? I am afraid that we will start from the United States in the 1920s, during the "Coolidge boom".
In order to verify the stability of the new invention, Paul Galvin worked tirelessly to drive from Chicago to New Jersey to participate in that year's World Radio Conference.
At the beginning of the listing, the Motorola 5T71 radio asked for $130 per radio, which is an uncompromising luxury. You know, a Ford Model A was only $540 that year. Subsequently, Paul Galvin made a series of improvements to the Motorola radio, first eliminating the spark plug suppressor and then making the circuit more efficient, driven only by the car's built-in 6V battery. By 1933, the price of motorola radios had dropped to $50, and as the shrewd Paul Galvin chose to partner with the tire brand Bailuchi to sell the radio on the same shelf as the car's essential tires, it soon further increased the product's visibility and sales soared.
The golden age of car audio
Until the 1950s, radios were an expensive option for most cars. With the recovery of the global economy after World War II, the automobile industry ushered in a golden age of rapid development, and although the Iron Curtain of the Cold War has slowly fallen, it is still a good time to remember for the people of the Western world.
Therefore, it is especially suitable for listening to non-information content such as music and sitcoms. In fact, Blaupunkt had already conducted a lot of feasibility studies on FM launch and radio technology long before the war, but the outbreak of war forced to interrupt research and development.
Not only can the model switch between the two FM frequencies, but it is also equipped with a stunning "auto search" function. When the user presses the button at power-on, the pointer automatically stops at the radio frequency, and before the crystal circuit was invented, Becker Mexico only achieved this function by passing mechanical pull wires, which is as precise as a mechanical watch.
Interestingly, although the Becker Mexico on both cars has the same control panel, on the 300SL, the FM has an FM range of 87-108MHz, while the "low-end" version on the 190SL is limited to 87-100MHz. Sure enough, the golden rule of "Mercedes-Benz does not pit the poor" has existed since ancient times.
In fact, these high-quality recordings can indeed play the advantages of the FM band. In contrast, AM, although the sound quality is poor, because the medium wave it uses can be reflected by the atmosphere, it is basically unaffected by the terrain and travels much farther than FM. Therefore, most national radio stations will retain the AM FM band. To this day, most cars still retain AM radio in their audio systems. In addition to the entertainment function, it is also used as an emergency configuration to receive disaster relief information after receiving natural disasters such as earthquakes and tsunamis.
Not only is it huge, but it takes a long time to warm up after starting to enter the normal working state, in addition, the vibration of the car when driving is also easy to break, so the audio system became one of the components with the highest failure rate of the car at that time.
Since then, Becker radios have no longer been the exclusive configuration of Mercedes-Benz, from Porsche, Jaguar, Ferrari to Rolls-Royce, Becker radios with beautiful panels have almost become the symbol of high-end cars. To this day, in the field of classic car collection, whether a car is equipped with a working original Becker radio is also an important reference for determining the state of its interior and the level of repair.
The future of car audio
However, because the vinyl system can only guarantee the sound quality in a horizontal state, and once it receives vibration, the pitcher and the record itself will be damaged, so the car vinyl record player is only a curious work for car companies to win eyeballs, and the later promotion and popularization is not successful.
Since then, people listening to music in the car no longer have to listen to music like carpenters sang in the lyrics of the classic "Yesterday Once More": "When I was young I'd listen to the radio waiting for my favorite songs. (When I was young, I used to expect the songs I loved to play on the radio)". Choose from greasy Frank Sinatra to the catchy Beatles and deep Pink Floyd and Lou Reed.
The tape was originally designed as a store of data, but soon engineers discovered that it was much more effective at recording sound than an 8-track tape. What's more, due to its convenient ability to erase and write repeatedly, users can rip their favorite content to tape through a simple device.
In addition, the global popularity of tape has led more and more Hi-Fi audio brands to start introducing car tape card holders. From Pioneer and Kenwood nakamchi, owners are also keen to upgrade their own sound units after buying a car.
The principle of the system is very simple, once the host detects a power failure, it will automatically lock, the method of unlocking is to enter a list of specified sequence codes (usually written in the instruction manual). Although this has reduced the number of audio theft cases, for car owners, whether they change the battery or disassemble the interior, they must re-enter the CODE verification code, and once they accidentally lose the original factory manual, their own sound engine will "become brick".
Not to mention that compared with tape and LP vinyl records, the REPLAY effect of the CD has almost no bottom noise and current sound, and what is more magical is that listening to music on a CD finally does not have to practice the "golden right hand" that rewinds, just press the number button on the player, you can choose your favorite song at will.
Soon, CD records and players were all over the world. In 1983 alone, sales of CD players in North America exceeded 400,000 units. Meanwhile, British band Dire Straits' album Brothers in Arms became the world's first CD to sell more than 1 million. Finally, in 1985, Pioneer launched the first car CD player.
In the 1990s, car audio was frequently used, from CD replacement systems, to increasingly powerful independent amplifiers and more speakers, and more importantly, people finally stopped using car audio as a simple comfort configuration. The popularity of DAB broadcasting in Europe and other regions allows people not only to hear the sound, but also to learn about text information such as road conditions and weather from the radio screen.
In the 21st century, with the advancement of Internet technology and the wide application in the car, we have finally bid farewell to physical records, AUX interface, Bluetooth technology, CarPlay and even the massive online audio and video resources in the car machine not only make our time in the car more exciting.
Editor's comments: As an important component of the intelligent cockpit, today's car audio has long gone beyond the basic function of playing music, thanks to bose's active noise reduction system, the NVH performance of the vehicle has been greatly improved, and with the advent of the era of electrification, more and more brands will take the sound in the car as an important identification feature of the brand, such as Lincoln and the Detroit Symphony Orchestra recorded the whole car button prompt sound.
With the advent of the era of advanced driver assistance and autonomous driving, the future of car audio and even in-car entertainment systems may be far beyond our imagination. This reminds one of the words of charles Duell, the former director of the U.S. Patent Office, who shocked the world: "Everything that humans can invent has already been invented."
And that year was 1899, the eve of the 20th century.