Dolby atmos is the next big thing for cars. Currently lucid has a 21 speaker Dolby atmos setup in their latest models. I bet it’s insane. I guess sennheiser and Bose and few others are also making similar Dolby atmos offerings for other car manufacturers, but I don’t see much that we can buy after market.

Mind you, atmos just got started in 2022 with lucid and now it’s in 2024 models of a handful of major car makers like GM and Hyundai. So it will probably be another year or two til we get after market receivers. That said, you could always use a computer or maybe a tablet as the receiver connected via toslink.

 

Dolby atmos is the next big thing for cars. Currently lucid has a 21 speaker Dolby atmos setup in their latest models. I bet it’s insane. I guess sennheiser and Bose and few others are also making similar Dolby atmos offerings for other car manufacturers, but I don’t see much that we can buy after market.

Mind you, atmos just got started in 2022 with lucid and now it’s in 2024 models of a handful of major car makers like GM and Hyundai. So it will probably be another year or two til we get after market receivers. That said, you could always use a computer or maybe a tablet as the receiver connected via toslink.

Yeah, I know how it could be done with something other than a head unit, but built into a head unit is what I wish for. Dolby Atmos seems like a waste for a car, there's not much room for height cues, but I guess maybe they could make the roof "disappear" sonically. I'm not a fan of the latest and greatest surround sound in factory systems; they are always hamstrung by lawyers looking to avoid lawsuits for hearing damage. I want that stuff available in custom car audio, aside from the one time Alpine tried it. It appears that all of the 5.1 Dolby and DTS patents expired in 2017 and 2018 respectively, there is no licensing barrier to anyone wishing to implement these in a head unit or DSP.

 

It won't happen in aftermarket for the same reason that it was sparsely offered before...licensing.
Noone wants to or is willing to pay for Dolby licensing

Alpine processors offered it in mid2000s..
The feature was rarely used .
JBL has logic 7 in the MS-8 when Andy was there. It was essentially an unlocked Land Rover amp with an consumer gui.
Add on that most shops can't even properly tune a car, adding another feature for installers and sales people to understand isn't going to drive sales.

Bottom line...there is no money in Dolby for aftermarket car audio.

 

It won't happen in aftermarket for the same reason that it was sparsely offered before...licensing.
Noone wants to or is willing to pay for Dolby licensing

Alpine processors offered it in mid2000s..
The feature was rarely used .
JBL has logic 7 in the MS-8 when Andy was there. It was essentially an unlocked Land Rover amp with an consumer gui.
Add on that most shops can't even properly tune a car, adding another feature for installers and sales people to understand isn't going to drive sales.

Bottom line...there is no money in Dolby for aftermarket car audio.

5.1 Dolby and 5.1 DTS patents expired in 2017 and 2018 respectively, there are no more licensing fees for them, only for the newer stuff, which seems pointless in something as small as a car. The 5.1 format is perfect for a car, front left and right, front center, rear left and right, subwoofer. Many of us have tried to implement proper center channel mixing and proper rear fill mixing, with mixed results (forgive the unintended pun). Both Dolby and DTS 5.1 upmixing have those issues sorted out. I think it's past time for this.

 

Watch this if you haven't. I know that streaming services give artist a bonus for tracks recorded in Atmos. So, there is an incentive. I was never a huge fan of 5.1 and DTS for music but Atmos is a different animal, at least for me.

Dolby Atmos in cars precisely tuned by DSP Concepts

 

The issue for Atmos is Digital Transport Copyright Protection (DTCP) and its associated costs. See comments from a Bose engineer on MOST and Ethernet AVB from this thread: https://www.diymobileaudio.com/posts/6315534/
If a company like Bose has a hard time, I doubt any aftermarket will exist.

 

You get an idea of when car manufacturers have to pay royalties for its various software or audio formats.

Just look at all the licensing involved either a BMW idrive unit from 2018. It it has CarPlay licensing as well.

 

A lot of companies offer you the service once you pay the licensing fees. I see headphone companies are doing that with Atmos. So, the expense goes directly to the consumer if it is a feature they desire.

 

There's a useless cost, Atmos on headphones.

 

Atmos is a completely different way to achieve special positioning. Audio is not encoded per channel like it is in older technologies. Atmos is encoded by spacial position, and the decoding device determines how to play that sound with the available speakers to achieve the position.

It‘s a completely different way to produce surround than anything previous. It’s also why you can decode the same data stream with two speaker headphones or a 34 speaker theater