The Audi sound system: tailor-made acoustics for every Audi model
What effect do sounds have on people? And how does Audi translate its customers’ subjective auditory sensations into the car as objectively as possible? With the help of sophisticated sound development, Audi is reaching its acoustic objectives.
Be it a violin concerto, an operatic aria, a radio drama, hip-hop, or a warning signal: Audi’s sound designers have set the highest goal for themselves: reproducing sound in the way that soloists, bands, speakers, or orchestras recorded it. The typical Audi sound should be natural and give passengers the feeling of being completely surrounded by the music or speech. The positive effect of mid-level frequencies on the human psyche serves as a benchmark. At the same time, low frequencies cannot function separately on the floor or high frequencies on the roof. On the contrary, a holistic frequency response is critical for a natural listening experience.
Wolfram Jähn, an audio developer at Audi since 1999, and his colleagues in sound design want to do justice to an extremely wide range of listening habits. To that end, the experts have a firm principle: whenever someone gets into an Audi with their favorite music, the sound has to have an immediate emotional impact. That person has to want to hear that piece of music in the Audi. The sound has to be clear, precise, and dynamic. “To give you an illustration, in the past, customers with the system integrated into an Audi have heard that the percussion sticks are made of wood,” says Jähn. “With the current advanced system, musicians can even hear what kind of wood it is.”