Automakers and their audio suppliers have already been toying with making different sounds come from different places and using active noise cancelling to quiet down the inside of a car, but Bose’s “SeatCentric” technology suite aims to take it a step further—and it’s almost ready for primetime.
If your car has parking sensors, you may have noticed the beeps coming from different corners of the car depending on where an obstacle is. It’s a subtle cue to get you looking in the right place. You may also know Bose uses the same noise-cancelling technology from its headphones to make the inside of your car quieter. Now, it wants to use both of those technologies to change who hears what inside the car.
Bose has been working on this a while, demonstrating earlier versions of the tech at CES a few years ago and installing a basic system in the Nissan Kicks. Now, the company says it’s close to having much more advanced tech in upcoming new cars.
Different Volume for Different People
The coolest version of this technology plays music at different levels depending on which seat you’re in. Bose calls it “SeatCentric Volume Control” and “Rear Seat Volume Attenuation,” but we call it the relationship-saver.
In the front seat, Bose uses ultra-nearfield speakers in the headrests in concert with speakers in the doors, dash, and roof to project sound directly into each person’s ears. Using the headrest speakers right behind your ears and modified noise cancelling software, the company can make the audio sound significantly louder or softer for one person than the other. The differential between the two seats is limited, so you can’t have one seat absolutely blasting and the other whisper quiet, but the difference is big enough one person could enjoy their favorite song cranked up while the other person listens to it at a reasonable volume.
For the user, the only part to figure out is the two volume knobs. Normally, volume is synced between the two front seats, but turn the passenger’s knob and you can untether them. An on-screen graphic shows you how much louder or softer you can make one side versus the other.
The second half of this localized sound technology lets you turn off the sound in the rear seats. Not just turn off the back speakers like you can today by adjusting the fader, but using noise-cancelling and signal processing software to keep the sound in the front seat sounding just as good while making the rear seat much, much quieter. Up front, the speakers recalibrate to keep the audio mix sounding right. In the rear, the speakers go into full noise cancelling mode to keep as much of the audio from reaching the rear as possible. It’s as good for letting the kids nap as it is for letting the in-laws have a pleasant conversation in the back while you listen to tunes up front.
Phone Calls Just for You
We’ve all been in a car with someone who gets a call and has their phone paired to the stereo, or at least puts the call on speaker. Music goes down or off and everyone else has to shut up and awkwardly listen in on the conversation. With all these fancy speakers, Bose has a solution for that.
With your phone paired to the car, the system can route the phone call to the driver’s speakers only and employs noise-cancelling technology to hide the audio coming from the rest of the car. This way, you hear your phone call just fine while everyone else keeps listening to the stereo at the same volume as before. Everybody wins. Admittedly, it’s a still a little awkward because even though other passengers can’t hear the call, they can still hear you talking, so they’re still getting half the conversation, but with the radio on it’s easier to ignore.
Less Noise From Outside
Bose is also working to enhance its noise-cancelling software to keep more road noise out. Current software works only on sounds from the engine, cancelling out unwanted noises and, if the manufacturer wants to, amplifying “good” engine sounds.
The next-generation software adds microphones and accelerometers to the car to measure noises coming up from the tires and suspension and through the body and windows, then generates the opposite sounds through the speakers to cancel out the noise. As with the current technology, the noise-cancelling sound waves are inaudible to passengers.
Because of the way sound waves work, the tech mostly works on low frequencies, so it can’t cancel all exterior noises. Even still, a demonstration in a Tesla Model 3 showed the system can mask a lot of tire noise, especially on bad pavement.
Better Audio From the Same Old Sources
Unless you’re playing high-definition audio off a personal device, most of what you’re getting on terrestrial and satellite radio is good old stereo (two channels, left and right). Bose and its competitors have been making software for years that emulates multi-channel surround sound audio using stereo sources, and the company wants to take it even further in cars.
Updated software, plus additional speakers on the ceiling, allow the company’s 3DX system to create a more immersive sound stage for front seat passengers. Rather than the sound seeming to come from the dash or some combination of front and rear, 3DX feels actually immersive, like standing in a concert venue.
Coming Soon
All of these technologies are just about ready for production and Bose says it’s in talks with several automakers to incorporate them in upcoming new vehicles. Each system requires some additional hardware compared to a typical car stereo, so we expect this technology to show up in one of two ways: either in luxury vehicles that can absorb the extra cost, or in expensive optional upgraded stereo packages.
Keyword: Bose SeatCentric Localized Sound Tech Is Almost Ready for Primetime