Car Audio - Choosing between Mild and Wild

For many people, car audio is as much about show as it is about sound. After all, chrome wheels won’t make your car go any faster, but they look good, they’re fun, and they tell people you care about your car. Nothing wrong with that. After all, people have been pimpin’ their rides for years.

If you want a flashy car audio system, go for it. Just keep in mind that there are trade-offs. If your car is a daily driver and you use it to haul people and other things, then going with a flashy system may be impractical. For instance, I once put a show system in my 1996 Chevy Impala for a cross-country promotional trip I did for a magazine. It was the first time I installed a huge system in my own personal car after nearly 10 years in the car audio business. Although the interior was kept pretty low-key except for custom door and rear-deck panels for the speakers, the car’s trunk was turned into a veritable car audio showcase.

It included five amps in a rack in the floor and three 10-inch subwoofers in a bandpass box with a see-through Plexiglas panel under the rear deck. A massive 100-disc CD changer was installed against the driver’s side trunk wall, with a bank of capacitors and power-supply accessories on the other. It was all trimmed with custom vinyl-covered wood and Plexiglas panels.

It sounded great and looked awesome. The car was a hit at the shows I attended and my neighbors would bring their friends over just to see it and listen to it. It was covered in magazines several times, and it was cool to have a celebrity car.
But the car didn’t handle and accelerate the same due to all that extra weight from the car audio components. About a year or so later, after my first child was born, my wife and I couldn’t even fit a baby stroller in the trunk because of all the car audio gear.

The reason I relate this story is to show you both sides of the coin. You can go with a mild system, like the one shown in Figure 1-1. Or, go nuts with a system like that in Figure 1-2. If you want that showy system, by all means, you should have one. But a great-sounding but more discreet system can usually serve the same purpose. Plus, with a showy system you run the risk of attracting the wrong kind of attention: from thieves.

                   Figure 1-1: A mild system can sound good and leave you with trunk space.