HD Radio and RDS have nothing to do with each other. HD Radio is a trademarked name for a company that started digital radio signals. RDS is Radio Data System which basically just adds a radio stations type of content, call sign, etc. RDS adds this info through a digital signal but that extra signal doesn't affect the quality of the broadcast like HD/digital does.
That is one ugly a$$ radio. I didn't think people even steal car stereos anymore. That looks like it is from the 70s. If I saw that in a car I would think "poor bastard" It is sad all people want now is features and not GOOD sound, "can it hook to my iphone" I came from the era of awesome car audio, when Richard Clark dominated all, (if you don't know who he is or ever heard heard his car you will never "get it") not "I want it to look stock." Car audio has gone so way down hill. If someone thinks MP3s sound good they are REALLY missing out, there is nothing like the "DDD gold master cds" anymore.
Fierosound I still have the mag your Fiero was in from the 90s The good ol' days
Yup - it does look kinda plain, but it was designed to look 70s-80s factory, and it does sound great powering the new speakers. The owner is happy with everything, so I don't feel bad that I recommended it to her. She thinks it looks fine (or she wouldn't have bought it).
Thanks on the "ole days" - I was invited to IASCA Nationals two years in a row with the Fiero GT. It had the Denon deck and amplifier then. Now I'm running with an Eclipse deck and Mcintosh amplifier - but all the same speakers. MB Quart (German), Oz Audio (USA) - changed 4"x6" Alpine to Eclipse 4"x6" plate.
All IASCA competitors knew about Richard Clark. The car only had 6 speakers. The front stage were 2 wave guide compression drivers with 22" horn under the dash, 2-12" midbass, 2-15" subwoofers and careful tuning.
In 1988, another superstar car was introduced to the car audio world. The 1986 Buick Grand National (Installations April '89 and August '92) built by SpeakerWorks in Orange, California (and later sold to Richard Clark), is believed to be the only vehicle ever to retire undefeated from the pro division of the national sound-off circuit.
The bad black Buick won the Alpine Car Audio Nationals II Pro Unlimited (751 watts and up) division in '88, and IASCA's Pro unlimited title in '89, '90, and '91 before being retired by Clark.
"It's the winningest car of all time in the Pro category," said Clark, who keeps the car in storage in North Carolina. "It was totally undefeated, and its design had a big impact on the way things are done today."
The system featured two 15-inch subwoofers behind the rear seat, and a 12-inch sub in each rear side panel. According to Eric Holdaway, whose family owns SpeakerWorks and designed the original system, the speaker locations in the Buick were a pioneering concept.
"People thought we were nuts to put speakers in the kick panels," said Holdaway. "Our goal was to maximize the pathlengths for better imaging and staging. It was a groundbreaking approach that most top installers are following today."
The all-stealth Buick, equipped with only six speakers and nearly 5,000 watts of power, won four national titles and consistently hit 140+ dB. "I won $60,000 in prize money in one year with that car," said Clark.
HD Radio and RDS have nothing to do with each other. HD Radio is a trademarked name for a company that started digital radio signals. RDS is Radio Data System which basically just adds a radio stations type of content, call sign, etc. RDS adds this info through a digital signal but that extra signal doesn't affect the quality of the broadcast like HD/digital does.
HD radio has flown under the radar for a long time, but I'm giving it a second look because the future of radio is digital. Many radio stations are selling their transmitters and moving to an HD digital side channel, the internet or a TV digital side channel. Or you will have to connect...wait for it...your iPhone to your radio and listen to them on an APP. I listened to Houston radio stations on my phone all the way from Texas to NY and back.
HD radio has flown under the radar for a long time, but I'm giving it a second look because the future of radio is digital. Many radio stations are selling their transmitters and moving to an HD digital side channel, the internet or a TV digital side channel. Or you will have to connect...wait for it...your iPhone to your radio and listen to them on an APP. I listened to Houston radio stations on my phone all the way from Texas to NY and back.
I don't know that I've ever listened to HD radio. I assume it sounds just like an SD signal but without any hiss. There's an app for everything.
I don't know that I've ever listened to HD radio. I assume it sounds just like an SD signal but without any hiss. There's an app for everything.
I have never listened to HD radio either, but I imagine it sounds better then FM and certainly better than AM. On my cross country trip I listened to Sports Radio AM on my APP and it sounded a lot better than locally over the air. The only problem with the APP is that if I lost signal I would have to kill the APP and restart it. It would not regain the signal automatically.
On my cross country trip I listened to Sports Radio AM on my APP and it sounded a lot better than locally over the air.
I don't know if this is comparable to what you guys are talking about, but I've also noticed that AM radio stations sound a whole lot better when listened to online rather than over the air waves. Much crisper audio, probably in stereo as well.
That's all good and all, but driving across Nevada, about half of the state has no cell service, I least where I go. The last of the old west. (Nothing like camping where people can't call you )
[This message has been edited by sardonyx247 (edited 10-13-2015).]
I have HD Radio in my BMW X5. It is obvious when the radio switches automatically between the analog and digital signal. The digital signal has more 'high end' on FM. More like listening to a CD. On AM, there is more fidelity, but it still doesn't sound as good as plain ole FM.
The real beauty of HD Radio, isn't really the sound quality, but now a single station can broadcast, 2, 3 or 4 different channels of content. So you have at least doubled ,maybe tripled the number of stations to choose from.
I have HD Radio in my BMW X5. It is obvious when the radio switches automatically between the analog and digital signal. The digital signal has more 'high end' on FM. More like listening to a CD. On AM, there is more fidelity, but it still doesn't sound as good as plain ole FM.
The real beauty of HD Radio, isn't really the sound quality, but now a single station can broadcast, 2, 3 or 4 different channels of content. So you have at least doubled ,maybe tripled the number of stations to choose from.
^^^^^ That's exactly it. A few years ago, I installed a JVC head unit that had HD Radio into a friends truck and was amazed at the difference. It really is "CD Quality", noticeably better than standard FM. Both high's and lows are much better. The fact that you can now have up to 4 separate stations where before you only had one is just a bonus. It's nice to see that it's FINALLY becoming standard on most factory radios now.
Now, if you want to talk about settling for less than stellar sound, Sirrus XM takes the cake on that one. They must be using some crazy high compression. IMHO, it sounds like an old 128KBps MP3. <sigh>
-Chris
[This message has been edited by Chris_narf (edited 10-13-2015).]
^^^^^ That's exactly it. A few years ago, I installed a JVC head unit that had HD Radio into a friends truck and was amazed at the difference. It really is "CD Quality", noticeably better than standard FM. Both high's and lows are much better. The fact that you can now have up to 4 separate stations where before you only had one is just a bonus. It's nice to see that it's FINALLY becoming standard on most factory radios now.
Now, if you want to talk about settling for less than stellar sound, Sirrus XM takes the cake on that one. They must be using some crazy high compression. IMHO, it sounds like an old 128KBps MP3. <sigh>
-Chris
Showing my age here but I lol at "old 128KBps" I remember when music was written onto wax discs and a needle scratched across the surface. Compared to that any bitrate MP3 sounds pretty good. For car audio, especially noisy Fiero car audio, I don't think it makes much difference on compression schemes, bit rates or whether it's even digital or analog.
With HD radio they have the ability to transmit up to 300Bps but not if they have HD1, HD2, and HD3 in addition to analog all going at the same time, which most do nowadays. So you rarely if ever will get CD quality from HD radio.
Showing my age here but I lol at "old 128KBps" I remember when music was written onto wax discs and a needle scratched across the surface. Compared to that any bitrate MP3 sounds pretty good.
Again I agree with monkeyman, good vinyl sounds amazing, no D/A converters involved, (A D/A converter is a digital to analog converter, ALL music is analog) So no, any bitrate does not sound better, they still make vinyl you know(records). To convert digital to analog is steppy IE not a pure wave form, speakers don't play digital, it has to be converted to analog, then amplified, then sent to the speakers. So no, mp3s sound like crap to good vinyl. A good example is to think of a roller coaster going up and down, now think of stairs going up and down. The roller coaster is analog and the stairs are digital converted to analog.
Again I agree with monkeyman, good vinyl sounds amazing, no D/A converters involved, (A D/A converter is a digital to analog converter, ALL music is analog) So no, any bitrate does not sound better, they still make vinyl you know(records). To convert digital to analog is steppy IE not a pure wave form, speakers don't play digital, it has to be converted to analog, then amplified, then sent to the speakers. So no, mp3s sound like crap to good vinyl. A good example is to think of a roller coaster going up and down, now think of stairs going up and down. The roller coaster is analog and the stairs are digital converted to analog.
Sounds like a good analogy.
Though in a car, people would have a tough time with vinyl
I was thinking there were cars in the 50s/60s that had factory record players. Did a quick search and found them! In this case it is a 56' Plymouth. So, if you are really wanting to rock out to vinyl, I'm SURE it could be adapted to the Fiero.
Again I agree with monkeyman, good vinyl sounds amazing, no D/A converters involved, (A D/A converter is a digital to analog converter, ALL music is analog) .
I see your point, but if I want to nit pick I could argue that music is not really analog. At some microscopic level everything is quantitized. Whether it's air molecules or quarks of matter, or photons of light. There is no continuous analog spectrum of anything.
Yup - it does look kinda plain, but it was designed to look 70s-80s factory, and it does sound great powering the new speakers. The owner is happy with everything, so I don't feel bad that I recommended it to her. She thinks it looks fine (or she wouldn't have bought it).
Thanks on the "ole days" - I was invited to IASCA Nationals two years in a row with the Fiero GT. It had the Denon deck and amplifier then. Now I'm running with an Eclipse deck and Mcintosh amplifier - but all the same speakers. MB Quart (German), Oz Audio (USA) - changed 4"x6" Alpine to Eclipse 4"x6" plate.
All IASCA competitors knew about Richard Clark. The car only had 6 speakers. The front stage were 2 wave guide compression drivers with 22" horn under the dash, 2-12" midbass, 2-15" subwoofers and careful tuning.
In 1988, another superstar car was introduced to the car audio world. The 1986 Buick Grand National (Installations April '89 and August '92) built by SpeakerWorks in Orange, California (and later sold to Richard Clark), is believed to be the only vehicle ever to retire undefeated from the pro division of the national sound-off circuit.
The bad black Buick won the Alpine Car Audio Nationals II Pro Unlimited (751 watts and up) division in '88, and IASCA's Pro unlimited title in '89, '90, and '91 before being retired by Clark.
"It's the winningest car of all time in the Pro category," said Clark, who keeps the car in storage in North Carolina. "It was totally undefeated, and its design had a big impact on the way things are done today."
The system featured two 15-inch subwoofers behind the rear seat, and a 12-inch sub in each rear side panel. According to Eric Holdaway, whose family owns SpeakerWorks and designed the original system, the speaker locations in the Buick were a pioneering concept.
"People thought we were nuts to put speakers in the kick panels," said Holdaway. "Our goal was to maximize the pathlengths for better imaging and staging. It was a groundbreaking approach that most top installers are following today."
The all-stealth Buick, equipped with only six speakers and nearly 5,000 watts of power, won four national titles and consistently hit 140+ dB. "I won $60,000 in prize money in one year with that car," said Clark.
Didn't it also have servo controlled gains that increased the volume about 3 db when the windows were opened to compensate for the outside noise? It might be a different Buick I'm thinking of but if it is I'll go look for the magazine it was in and who owned that one.
Edit: Doing some looking around on that Buick, I'm thinking it was a different one but I'll try to find the magazine I'm thinking off this weekend.
[This message has been edited by Khw (edited 10-14-2015).]
Fellas, Is this RetroSound radio compatible with my stock amplifier and Pontiac sub-woofer system? In other words, is it plug and play? Cordially, kevin
Fellas, Is this RetroSound radio compatible with my stock amplifier and Pontiac sub-woofer system? In other words, is it plug and play? Cordially, kevin
Hey Kevin! This really close to plug and play, it will require some soldering to make the harness adapter. After that is done the adapter will plug right in to your car's wires and the other side into the head unit. So you won't have to do any tampering with the wires in your car. That's all you would have to do.
By the way, I'll be back home next month! Let's get together and Fiero. -Jason
"Vinyl Disciple" handed to me by the very person who invented "skip proof vinyl"
The good ol' days 
