The state of Car Audio... Musings on where we've been and where we've ended up in 20 years of car audio.

Car audio has come a long way.  When I first got into listening to music in cars in the 90s, car stereos were still in the dark ages.  Audio was largely an afterthought - Car manufacturers realized that just about everyone wanted to hear music, but most people weren't really willing to pay for really good music.  You had some cars that had decent audio systems, but even the best of them paled in comparison to even a moderate home audio solution.  Cars were inherently noisy environments, and most people didn't care enough to really warrant putting a lot of thought and effort into them.  There were lots of co branding with Infinity and Bose, but usually all that got you was a forced bass sound that made some semi-appropriate thudding noises.  The aftermarket car audio market was huge, since anyone who wanted decent sound ended up replacing the factory head unit, and adding speakers and often amplifiers and subwoofers.  These weren't just the boomers, people cruising down the street sharing music with everyone around them, even people who just wanted to hear the detail and nuances of music while driving at 60mph. 

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