Who has Dynaudio?

[simonpolly]

I have dyno audio in my golf and its pretty good,if you are alone in the car the clarity is pretty good,the whole system is matched and is set up for the car.A car is not the best place to listen to music,if you want perfection you would go and listen to the music live.

[AdrianM]

There isn't a huge difference between class units.  And nowadays, there's a lot of blatant nonsense surrounding high-end home audio, like little stickers you can put on your speakers or "treatments" for CDs to give them a better class of bits and bytes - homoeopathy for the audiophile.

However, nobody is going to pretend that a pocket tranny is going to sound as good as a Linn system, for example.  The big question is, is the difference between the 310, the 510 and the 510 with Dynaudio in the "pocket tranny vs. Linn" bracket, or in the pink stickers for your speakers bracket.  I suspect its somewhere in between actually - that there is a difference, but it may not be as enormous as we like to think.

Listening tests are very subjective, particularly if you can't switch instantly from one version to the other, and they're enormously affected by volume - we're all inclined to rate the louder sound as better irrespective of anything else.

I'm not disappointed by the 310, but I'd like a listen to the Dynaudio some day.

Rolfe.

Between the electronics, no, or at least incredibly unlikely, at least not to the human ear.

Between the different speakers, Dynaudio and standard, yes, in all probability there is. How much, well that would depend on various things and only a (double) blind test would be much use determining that given the problems associated with audio testing and comparisons. Then there's preference to add to that; not everyone likes the same speakers for good reason. And then to top it all, you have the considerable amount of ambient noise in a car to add to the mix.

My (educated) guess is that when a Golf is tootling along, even if you could tell the difference between the standard speakers and the Dynaudio, there wouldn't be the awesome difference that the exorbitant price disparity would imply. Certainly not enough for me to shell out that kind of money and this is coming from someone that spent 6K on the front 3 speakers in my living room at home.

[DL]

I run a high end A/V business and I have listened to both standard and Dynaudio and there is a fair increase in performance with the Dyaudio. What I would add is that if you play all your music through an ipod the quality will always be compromised than if you listen through CD. If for example I sat in a standard GTI and played a well recorded CD in the RCD 310 or RCD 510 then downloaded the same album onto an ipod through itunes and played it through the Dyaudio system it would sound better in the standard car.
Itunes compresses the music down to around 128 kbps, dependent on your settings, whereas a standard CD has a compression rate of around 1600 kbps.
If you want to get a better sound with your ipods go into the itunes set up and select the download compression to max which I think is around 320 kbps which is a lot better than default settings.

[matchboy]

If you want to get a better sound with your ipods go into the itunes set up and select the download compression to max which I think is around 320 kbps which is a lot better than default settings.

i did not know that, v helpful, ta!

[DL]

Anything else about A/V I'll be happy to answer, about cars though.....erm......let's see.....erm over to you lot!!!

[Rolfe]

Indeed, thank you.  I find the sound quality OK with iTunes, but that sounds worth doing.  I may decide at some point to re-scan my CDs to try to sort out the mess that is the music folders, so if I do that, I know what else to do.

This is part of why I much prefer to buy CDs rather than download from the iStore.  I get the music in the least compressed format, I get it in hard copy off my computer so I don't really need to back it up, and I get the informative insert booklets.

Rolfe.

[DL]

There's still some life left in CD's!

You can get certain Mp3 players that allow you to put the music onto them at Windows Media Lossless which is as near to CD quality as you can get but you wouldn't be able to use itunes to do this.

 

[AlanH]

iTunes does in fact offer the Apple Lossless Encoder. Obviously with a lossless (as opposed to "lossy") encoder, the file size will be considerably larger.

[DL]

Or alternatively put all your CD music onto a HC SD card at Lossless compression and stick it straight into the car hifi. Personally I can't be arsed with all that as it would take hours and hours depending on your collection but if you have the spare time go for it.

Word has it from a reliable source, me, that in the not too distant future VW will offer the same Bang & Olufsen upgrade to top of the line models as found in the current Audi A4. It is planned for GTI, R20, top Toureg ect. I don't know exact timings but would expect an announcement within the next 6-8 months. This will make a big difference to the sound as it is tuned for the specific car and in the Audis sounds fantastic. It won't however be the same as the A8/Aston Martin versions which are minimum £5000 upgrades

[matchboy]

that in the not too distant future VW will offer the same Bang & Olufsen upgrade to top of the line models as found in the current Audi A4.

This will make a big difference to the sound as it is tuned for the specific car and in the Audis sounds fantastic.

my missus has this in her A4, I can confirm also that it does indeed sound awesome!