Seems to be the day for Intro threads, so I guess I'll throw one up as well.
If you're reading this for the first time, I tend to cover the Car Audio side of the house for CF. Not by design, but that's just where my interests lie.
I'm also somewhat the "old man" on the forums since I saw 40 come and go a few years ago. CF started in 1974, and I got my first car in 1981, so I probably started reading the catalogs in 1978 or so (before some of the current administrators were born).
I'm also somewhat of the budget-conscience of CF. (I wonder how often the admins regret inviting me on the forums when someone has picked out $2500 of car audio gear, and I post "You know, you might really only need $130 for a new HU and $100 for four new speakers"). And my wife would be amazed at the irony of that, since she thinks I "wasted" $200 just to be able to see the song name and artist on the HU (HD-tuner).
Fist car was a 1974 Olds Omega (think Chevy Nova). It came with a single 4x6 in the dash and two 6x9's in the rear deck. I bought one of the "new" Craig HU's with ESP (blank skip for cassettes) no preset buttons, dial tuning (not digital), and a pair of Jensen triaxials, and later had a shop install a set of AFS Kricket 5.25's in the doors. The HU would overheat, so I upgraded to a Sanyo (I think it had presets, still manual tuning - probably had Dolby and CrO2 tape heads - big deals back then).
Next car was a 1979 Mustang Cobra. I'm not sure when I upgraded to the sound system (events run together at my age), but it eventually had my nicest sound system - one of the first JVC cassette decks that had no internal amplifier (pre-outs only), two Jensen 18Wx2 RMS amps under the passenger seat, Pioneer 6x9's in boxes, and Pioneer 3.5's in the dash (that kept blowing even with bass blockers). Cool thing was you could open the hatch, throw the boxes on top and here the stereo from a ways away - Good times!!!
After that I mostly had stock stereo's until 1997 (although there was a Sony and a Pioneer cassette HU - great FM on the latter in between) when I finally went digital with a Kenwood KDC-2006 CD deck in a 1994 Tempo. Then last year, I upgraded the stock stereo in my 2002 Focus to my current Sony.
I'd bought stuff here and there from CF over the years, was getting ready to replace the stereo in the Focus and had some questions and discovered the CF forums. One of the threads was about removing the stereo from a 2004 Focus, and I had just seen how to do that on another forum so I replied, and then found out that there was a lot to learn and also a lot to share with others. 6600 some posts later and counting, and here we are!!!
Music Tastes: Mostly old classic rock - Rush, Van Halen, Boston, Chicago, Dire Straights - occasionally old progressive jazz: Maynard Ferguson, Bill Chase, occasionally contemporary Christian or country. Not much from the last decade or so that I listen to.
Biggest oddity: I've never owned a subwoofer system or a really powerful car system, and I'm usually the guy telling people how to hook up multiple subs to an amp.
2nd Biggest oddity: I used to think Bowling for Soup's song 1985 fit me pretty well. One of the main lines in the song is "And who’s the other guy that's singing in Van Halen ..." now it's 2008, VH is back on tour, and the "other guy" (Sammy Hagar) is not in the band anymore and Diamond Dave is back.
BTW, here's a picture of me, and a pic of my ride:
2002 Ford Focus Sony CDX-GT410u Sony XT-100HD HD Tuner Stock speakers, no amp, no subs
Alright, grandpa. Time to take your pills....
Just playin'. I'm not that far behind you. I had cassette players (I remember the very first tape I bought ...Men At Work - Down Under) I remember the Challenger blowing up. I evan kinda remember Elvis' death. I remember when the Rubiks Cube first came out.....I feel older than dirt but still crave excessively loud music.
A boom a day, keeps the doctor away!
2005 Dodge Ram Quad Cab DC Sound Labs Soundstream Blow-through See it here http://www.stevemeadedesigns.com/board/index.php?showtopic=34090
namosh:Alright, grandpa. Time to take your pills....
I already did .... I think ... Didn't I ...
Oh well!!!
You know tiger at some point we are going to have to get that car set up with 4 subs and a couple of extra alt's so it will compete with namosh's dodge....
Welcome back, Spruce!!!!!
Compete - with the smaller interior volume it should dominate it - of course, I'll be living in it since I'll be kicked out of house and home!!!!