Effects of the Background Noise of the Perceived Quality of Car Audio Systems

The paper describes the recording/reproduction technique and the subjective listening experiment aimed to the assessment of the effect of the background nose on the perceived quality of the sound being reproduced inside a car. The noise inside 4 different cars was recorded at various speeds both with a binaural microphone and with a Soundfield microphone. These background noise recordings are reproduced inside a special listening room, by means of a very sophisticated reproduction chain, designed so that at the ears of the listeners the same sound pressure is presented as inside the original car. A computer-based system is finally employed for collecting subjective responses to sound stimula, constituted by the reproduction of music or speech on an automotive sound system in presence of the background noise.