The majority of cars and other vehicles contain in-vehicle audio systems containing relatively high quality audio components such as amplifiers and speakers. Such in-vehicle audio systems typically include radios, and cassette, CD and minidisk players, and the like. However, the range of audio content available to a listener of in-vehicle audio devices is limited.
A listener to a radio is limited temporally to the programming available at that time. If a listener misses a desired radio program at its normal broadcast time, he is unable to listen to that program later, at a time convenient for him, unless he recorded it during broadcast, A radio listener is also limited geographically to the programming broadcast from a within-range radio transmitter. It is currently not possible for a radio listener to travel abroad and still receive broadcasts from his home country's local radio stations on an in-vehicle radio. There is thus a need for a method for listening to a radio program via an in-vehicle radio system, while the radio program is not being currently transmitted on an in-range transmitter, without the listener having to pre-record the program.
A listener to in-vehicle audio devices, such as a cassette or CD player, is limited to the selection of prerecorded audio content, typically music, that he has available in the appropriate format.
A large amount of audio content, including both music and spoken content, is available over the Internet. The majority of in-vehicle audio systems are not Internet-enabled, however.
A large number of listeners to in-vehicle audio devices also possess cellular phones. New generations of cellular phones are Internet-enabled, allowing audio content to be downloaded from the Internet. The sound quality from cellular phones is typically poor as they are designed to minimize size and weight and are intended to be used by a single user, while being held close to the ear. Cellular phones are not designed for broadcasting music to a number of listeners. There is thus also a need for apparatus and a method for improving the sound quality of audio content downloaded from a network such as the Internet, through a cellular phone.