Thread: can a carputer compete with a head unit for sound quality?

Well if you think about it, if you bypass a headunit, you have less cables. The sound quality depends on the sound card. Skip the onboard sound. Creative labs products have a good reputation in the carpc group, but there are better sounding cards out there.

welcome, glad to see another potential competitor!

I'm building my second carpc set-up to compete in SQ events. Who is the sanctioning body that you compete (or will be competing) with?

My answer is absolutely yes! Think about it....a deck will never have the processing power that a computer will.....at least not for a while and not anytime in the near future. It does all boil down to your source unit, this is the case no matter if you use a computer or a conventional deck. It's all up to the sound card you use. yes, there are others that are greater than sound blaster, but I have yet to see any that have the wide range of products that creative has.....which can be helpful if you don't know which companies make good cards and which don't

BUT....with that said....it doesn't matter how good your sound card is, if the install, and/ or the quality of your wires and components isn't up to par it doesn't matter

what are you looking at running? what class? what amps? what speakers? ect....

Originally Posted by Red GTi VR6

My answer is absolutely yes! Think about it....a deck will never have the processing power that a computer will.....

and exactly how much processing power do you think you need to get quality sound?

for decoding...for imaging.....for setting up a sound stage, etc....

Think how the music is made in the first place... inside a PC (or mac)
computers are capable of producing sound many times better and more accurately than any cd you can stick into your head unit.
spend a few K on a pc and it'll rock harder than a normal head unit.

glad someone else knows what I am talking about

lol

and someone who is really INTO music at that

=]

Originally Posted by Red GTi VR6

for decoding...for imaging.....for setting up a sound stage, etc....

as i said, exactly how much processing do you think you need? it ain't a whole lot if you want to reproduce accurate sound, versus process the sound to make it sound different than the original source. this is because the information (imaging, sound stage, etc) you're using needs limited processing to begin with- it's simply included in the source.

I'd have to agree here a PC can produce better than CD quality sound, that is of course if your able to get that type of music.

If your competeing in sound competetions and you have a car pc, this might be a no brainer but make sure the sound your playing is at least CD quality. (128 K) With a pc in the car it's real easy to take your existing audio downloaded from the internet which can be ripped at less than CD-Quality and played over your car speakers...

It all starts with the Song file, if thats crap then it doesnt matter how good your audio system is...

Originally Posted by Caitlin

Think how the music is made in the first place... inside a PC (or mac)
computers are capable of producing sound many times better and more accurately than any cd you can stick into your head unit.

sure, more processing power can *produce* better sound, but not *reproduce* (i.e. play back) better sound. how do you suggest that a computer can produce better sound than the quality of your source (the cd)?

Originally Posted by Caitlin

spend a few K on a pc and it'll rock harder than a normal head unit.

i suspect that you aren't talking about accurate sound reproduction when you talk about it "rocking harder".