Hi-fi at 190

Bang & Olufsen finds space in the Aston Martin DB9 for 13 speakers and 1,000 watts.

Geoff finds happiness.

I'm sitting in the perfectly molded driver’s seat of a 2010 Aston Martin DB9. Despite the car's overall size, the interior cradles you in creamy burgundy leather. The massive center tunnel makes you feel like most of the car is above you, and the expansive dash does little to assuage that feeling.

The steering wheel seems tiny. There is no key, just a crystal key fob amusingly called the “Emotional Control Unit.” You slide this into a slot in the dash, and push it to start the car. In hindsight, the ECU is accurately named.

If you've never heard Aston's 5.9-liter V12 start up, you are missing out on one of the great pleasures of automotive life. They clearly spent a lot of effort in getting this right. Most cars give a "chug-a-lug-lug" sound as they struggle to come to life. Many GM models sound like metal scraping around in a tin cup. Or, if you have a car like my Ford, turning the key sounds like silence, followed by a lot of swearing coming from the driver.

Getting the Aston V12 to light off results in mechanical music that sounds like a tiny turbine spooling up, followed by an angry growl. I am not ashamed to say that I immediately turn off the car, just to do it again. Hi, I'm 10.
    
Sadly, this DB9 has the flappy paddle gearbox, so the next step is to press "D," and I'm off.

  

“Terrified” is the best way to describe these early moments with the DB9. Is it the 470 horsepower, the 190 miles-per-hour top speed or the price tag that is more than half my house? You decide. As I drive around town I get disappointingly few stares. This is L.A. after all, and when it comes to cars, we're a jaded bunch. I don't think the car needs to leave first gear to break the speed limit on these streets, so I head for the highway. Thankfully, it's early afternoon, so there's at least a 20 percent chance there isn't traffic on the 101.
    
There isn't. Most on-ramps in L.A. have stoplights at the top of the ramp to regulate traffic. I am pleased this one is red. It turns, and I lay a little into my right foot. At low RPMs, the V12 feels pretty normal, docile even. You can drive it around enjoying the sounds, never burning your tires or attracting attention. If you lay into it a little, the gentle V12 purr turns into an angry growl. You get pushed back into your seat and there is no way you're not smiling. Lay into it some more and the growl becomes a roar. Now you're just holding on, a 3,900-pound missile taking you just past light speed.
    
All this has taken about 6 seconds, and though I've only just past 70 mph, driving this car must make me a big old silver target for the CHP. Despite my extensive repertoire of Ponch and Jon jokes, I'm sure they'd love to give me a ticket. This is what we in the trade call “wussing out.”

    
Where was I? Ah yes, the stereo. There's a six-disc CD changer in the dash, but more interesting in this day and age, inside the center console is a cubby where you can plug your iPod. It's a digital connection, so artist and track info is displayed on a miniscule screen in the dash. Turning on the radio causes two disk-shaped objects to rise out of the dash, revealing B&O's Acoustic Lens tweeters.
    
Suddenly, you're not in a car anymore. The quietly burbling motor and any tire or wind noise (there isn't much) is almost completely replaced by music. From the tweeters in the dash, to the mid-ranges in the doors and by your feet, to the subwoofer buried somewhere behind you, the audio system envelopes with you with sound much as the seats and cockpit do to your body.
    
The Acoustic Lens drivers are a soft dome tweeter aiming up into a conical wave guide, with a cute aluminum hat. They look gimmicky, but they work. This stereo has some of the most detailed high end I've ever heard in a car. The treble is so clean and clear that you can actually hear the different levels of compression in MP3 tracks. That's easy to do in a home system, but in a car, especially a car in motion, it's amazing. B&O clearly knows their potential demographic, though, as I have to dial back the treble a notch in the EQ. I don't know the average buyer age for a DB9, but I'll bet real money they can't hear above 15k. For them, the extra treble probably sounds great. For me, it was a bit much. Dialed back one step it was excellent.

    
And then there's the bass. The 7.9-inch subwoofer is hidden behind the rear "seats," but it's ported right behind the driver so you feel the low end as much as hear it. Much like the 470hp engine, the 1,000 watts of the audio system is glorious overkill, and it certainly doesn't go to waste. The bass is ridiculously strong and accurate. Never a hint of distortion, only raw, brutal sound.
    
I've never heard a non-aftermarket car stereo go so loud, so cleanly. Even at highway speeds, you can overpower your ears with clean audio. While the treble and bass are the first thing you notice, it's the midrange that perhaps impresses the most, being punchy and holding its own with the show-stopping high and low end.
    
The soundstage is along the top of the dash, higher than in most cars I've reviewed. There's excellent imaging, yet another aspect that is more like a home audio than car audio. Different system settings let you fine tune the imaging and soundstage depending on who's in the car. "Driver" is rather self explanatory, with the center of the image more or less in front of the driver. "Front" pulls the sound more across the dash, with the center image along the center line of the car. In this mode you get a little better imaging, especially for a passenger. The "Auto" mode senses if there is a passenger, and switches between these two modes depending.  

    
There are also different surround settings you can play with, adding in more from the rear speakers. Thankfully, voices stay up front, with just more ambience coming from behind you.     

Sadly, amazingly, the system isn't perfect. The interface screen is tiny and only shows a few lines. Trying to find songs on your iPod is nearly impossible. The "Random" feature is practically hidden. It's not B&O's fault, but the sat-nav is embarrassing. You're better off with a sextant. When Ford and Microsoft (!) can create a near-perfect user interface in a $50,000 Lincoln, such archaic ergonomic foibles in a $190,000 Aston Martin are, well, “surprising.”
    
But at the end of the day, none of that matters. The $7,200 audio system price would be a bargain if this audio quality was in a home system, not to mention being available with the superlative car wrapped around it.
    
So with one of the greatest engines ever made at my beck and call, an incredible stereo system cranking tunes, I come down out of the Santa Monica hills onto the Pacific Coast Highway. The sun is setting over the Pacific, the traffic opens up and the bass line from "One of These Days" starts to pound. The motor starts its growl, the car surges forward and I smile.
    
PRICE: $7,200, plus DB9 ($183,070)

CONTACT: astonmartin.com / bang-olufsen.com

Photography by Paul Dimalanta