Tone Up Your Listening!
Digital Signal Processors (DSP) are very much part of the modern-day car audio upgrade. Although not compulsory, people have quickly come to understand the importance of untangling the mess that is music in a car. Here we look at what they can do for your sound.
A modern car is a sophisticated beast. A centre of technological innovation providing safety and comfort to the driver. As a knock-on effect, car manufacturers have worked hard to discourage any modification of their products by car owners and specialist aftermarket customising companies. However, the country is filled with brilliant brains who won’t let a bit of mass-produced technology stop them from putting their own stamp on a vehicle. Therefore, car customisation continues.
Unlike aesthetic changes to vehicles, Car audio is an area where the final look is generally not changed. In fact, installers go to huge lengths to cover their tracks when upgrading the sound in a car.
Despite many advances in speaker design, car manufacturers continue to employ a cost lowering target when applying audio and entertainment to a car. The plain financial costs of using a decent pair of front speakers for instance can run into many millions depending on the number of cars produced worldwide. However, electronic signal processing has helped them to fundamentally change the performance of very basic speakers and amplifiers to make them sound “bearable” under certain conditions and to help them survive under less favourable conditions.
Unfortunately, motor manufacturers attempts have led to greater challenges to aftermarket installers looking to create a more pleasing sound in a car. Sometimes, simply upgrading a pair of speakers and adding some proper sound treatment to door panels can offer a huge improvement. However, sometimes the manufacturer employs DSP technology which can ultimately get in the way of a simple speaker upgrade. In order to make the basic speakers sound better, they often boost or attenuate certain frequencies in order to present a pleasing sound on first listen. Take the car on the road and open it up however, and the sound will change dynamically with speed. Most typically, the bass will be reduced in order to protect the standard speakers when the volume is turned up to compensate for road, wind and engine noise.
When this is done, the first job any installer has to do is to unpick this stealth-tweaking of the fundamental sound curve being fed to the speakers. Using an aftermarket Digital Signal Processor (DSP) is one of the most effective ways to achieve this.
Typically, an aftermarket DSP will include a number of channels of equalisation or tone control. This is generally adjusted via computer in order to keep button count down. Some of you may remember the Graphic Equaliser of days gone by. Although functionally, a DSP uses elements of a graphic eq, using software controls keeps the cost and the size to a minimum. Of equal importance for tailoring the sound in a car is time-alignment.
Time-alignment allows the installer to set delays on the speaker outputs closer to the ears of the listener in order to achieve a near perfect stereo image. The centre of the image can be set wherever you like and many DSP’s have the ability to store separate settings for the number and position of on-board passengers too. When driving alone, I like to set the image centre right on top of the steering wheel. However, when I have company in the car, this can mean the image is seriously skewed for those in different positions so I have a multi-setting that allows everyone to enjoy the same or similar stereo image.
A modern DSP will have many other highly technical features and may even be able to set the sound in the car in response to tones “listened to” using dummy head-style microphones. Final tweaks are generally done using the skill and experience of the installer however, who will take the users musical preferences into account.
DSP’s are incredibly powerful and sophisticated devices and setting them up is best left to a professional. Their importance to the final sound of an audio upgrade is in some cases absolutely essential while in some cases may not be necessary in order to create a perfect sound in the car.
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