This is strange, but worth noting.

I created a DVD-Audio disc from a 4 Channel reel to reel tape I had. This was an old quadraphonic James Taylor reel that I knew real well, and the mix has JT in the front channels, and the background vocals and other stuff exclusively in the rears.

Well, I took this disc for a test ride, and to check the audio quality of the recording, I spun the fader to the rears, and was shocked to hear the lead vocal. It is not supposed to be there! I went back, redid the disc, tested it on the PC, then took another road test, and the same thing happened. I was pissed.

After doing some testing, I convinced myself it was not the disc, because other discs did the same thing, so I figured the amp had leakage or something.

However, after further investigation, and finding the same thing happening in my wifes RL, I found that the FADER is not a true audio fader. It does NOT fade between the front channels and the rear channels. No, it fades between the front seats and the back seats!

It seems that the speakers in the rear doors actually play the front audio tracks of a surround recording, not the rear tracks! So, if you turn the fader to the back, you still have the front audio tracks playing in the doors of the back seats!!

Strange.

Anyway, most of you could probably care less about this, but I figured I'd throw it out there in case there are any other wacko audio dudes out there..........

:-jon

 

My first uneducated guess is that surround sound systems deal with sound distribution differently than stereo systems. I would expect that that Acura wants the sound to be good even if the people in the front seats decide they do not want to hear the music. Like when parents are talking in the front and the music is primarily for the children in the rear seats.

Plus, with ten speakers, the concept of front and rear would not be so cut and dried from a FARDER point of view, would it?

 

It probably considers the midbase drivers in both sets of doors as front channels, and only the tweeters in the rear as the rear channel, or something like that.

 

Yes, more accurately, all the door speakers are considered left/right, the front channel is the center center speaker and the rears are at head level in the storage area. This makes sense in a 10 speaker auto setup as most of the information is coming through the left and right channels most of the time.

If the rear doors and the rear storage area speakers were on the same channel it wouldn't sound right for all the passengers. Since the rear door speakers are pretty close to next to the front occupants, not too far behind, it sounds correct.