Anyway, after owning my car for a few months now I'm far from an expert or anything, but I did want to address two common complaints. One is the stock stereo and the other are the stock tires. Frankly, I don't understand complaints about either.
Maybe it's me, or maybe I'm not a true audiophile but I think the stock stereo in my Accord is excellent! I love it. The sound quality is crisp, never muddy, it seems to play all genre's of music well, with jazz and classical being extremely well reproduced. Even with only six speakers sound seems to be evenly and cleanly reproduced throughout the cabin. There is no equalizer but the highs, lows, and mids seem well balanced. The volume is more then enough for me, whether the windows are up or down, or the moonroof open or closed. Even at the point where it starts to become painful to my ears the volume doesn't distort the speakers. I know the 2008 is getting a 270 Watt system with a separate sub, but 180 Watts for me and no sub is more than enough. It's not always about ear splitting volumes, but more about how well sound is reproduced and for me the stock Accord stereo is perfect. Am I a little pissed there is no AUX port or a cd player that plays MP3's as stock equipment, yes, I am. But for a little extra money both of those gripes can at least be fixed.
The stock tires, I don't know what to say other then unless you are doing high performance street driving on some closed off section of town, there is no reason to hate on these tires. Normal aggressive driving is not an issue. If you're taking turns so hard the tires are breaking loose on public streets then maybe you should slow down and drive more responsibly. But I think the stock Pilot HX MXM4's are quiet, well made, extremely stable at high speeds, and confidence inspiring in wet weather. And from what I have read getting 40K or even 50K out of them with normal tire rotations and maintaining proper inflation is not a problem. They are not a high performance tire and they were never billed as a high performance tire, so I'm not sure what all the criticism is about these tires. I think they exceed at the type of driving they were made for, which is all season driving with a moderate to moderately aggressive driving style. If you go around driving like you're Mario Andretti then the tires probably aren't for you, but you probably also shouldn't be driving like that on public roads in the first place.
Okay, that's it. It's late, I'm bored (my new girlfriend works weekends so she's asleep now) and I wanted to voice my opinion about these two common complaints. I look forward to hearing your opinions.
