Just came across this in the BMW e-mail. So they are going to shove 30 speakers into the car, subwoofers to create tactile sound, etc.
I’m trying to figure out is this going to be good or a super gimmick? Is there anything on the market right now that works like this?
How the Bowers & Wilkins Car Speakers Power the BMW iX | BMW USA - YouTube
Interesting… 20->30 speakers & the in-seat speakers w/ bass boosters seem like the biggest change vs. the legacy $3400 option.
… and the increase from 1500 to 1615 watts, but at that point, who’s counting 
I’m most curious how much more they’re going to charge now! “Buuuut 10 more speakers and chip shortage.” 
The extra 115 watts will be used to pump engine noises into the cabin, even though there is no engine, because no BMW would be complete without fake engine noise. I’m trying to figure out if that’s why the sub-woofers are under the seat? to pretend like there is an ICE running?
More speakers is the car version of more cameras on iPhones! More is better than less right? Take my money!
Interesting. Gimmicky? Yes. But, it will work. B&W makes legendary speakers. They are just installing a fancy surround sound. Not sure why you would want decoded surround sound for 2 channel audio. Guess the kids in the back seat can enjoy 5.1 surround for their Dora the Explorer binges, lol. On the tactile bit. I have 4, 12 inch subs under my couch, floating on isolaters. The whole idea is tactile feel, and it works in spades. However, this is for movies, with special eq’d sound designed to pick up the 0-20hz range. It isn’t much good above 40hz. Most music, is going to peak at 35hz to 40hz.
Most music nowadays is so compressed (not talking about codecs, either) that it squashes quite a bit of the details.
Are they calling out optimizations for spatialized audio?
Sounds good in airpods etc, would be nice in the car too but not worth my $$$ =)
BMW’s B&W sound systems have been fantastic. I’m sure this will be amazing