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BlownRiv Unregistered guest | i used to be more in touch with the car audio scene back in the day ('92-98), but sorta drifted away for a while, so now i've found out a few brands that used to be reputable have sold out to the mega-corps, and some companies that used to be known for good stuff are now making crap. here's what i (think i) know: i know rockford used to make good amps, but now i've heard they're not so great. i have a pair of punch 40iDSMs from around '94 - very nice amps. how are rockford amps nowadays? i've heard rockford purchased MB quart, and that JL now uses quart's old cone maker to build the evolutions. i used a pair of JL XRs for a while and was impressed, but does anyone know how the new MB quarts sound? way back when, harmon int'l owned a/d/s, harmon kardon, infinity, orion, JBL, etc. i know a/d/s is has been sold off, but what about all the other brands? if memory serves, soundsteam is now owned by power acoustik. are there other formerly good brands that were swept up by PA? and how are PPI, audio art, autotek, liner power, crunch, hifinocs, butler, and monolythic doing? are these guys still making any good product? thanks in advance to you industry gurus who keep up on this stuff. |
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Gold Member Username: GlasswolfNorthWest, Michigan USA Post Number: 4906 Registered: Dec-03 | this may help http://www.caraudiocentral.net/forums/showthread.php?t=32 I encountered the same thing you did a while back. was out of the scene for a while. came back. had to re-learn what was good. heh doesn't take long to catch up though. that's why I wrote that list. |
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BlownRiv Unregistered guest | hey, that's a pretty good list. a subjective list, but i agree with a lot of it. still, there are questionable things on that list, like soundstream. they are now owned by power acoustik, last i heard. how can they be "good"? and i think a/d/s has changed hands, so i don't know if they still shine like they used to (i own two older 6-channel powerplates, so i know what they used to be). maybe a "family tree" of car audio brands is in order, showing who owns who. i think i may research this as a side project. thanks for the link, glass. |
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Gold Member Username: GlasswolfNorthWest, Michigan USA Post Number: 4928 Registered: Dec-03 | soundstream's stuff still seems to be fairly reliable, and performs well enough, so it's not the crap that power acoustik's name brand stuff is. a/d/s is owned by Directed, just as Orion, PPI, Viper, and others are if I recall. older a/d/s is good. newer stuff.. typical Directed fare. most of that list notes old vs new or particular lines of products, but it's not perfect. |