Some were surprised to hear that the 2014 Cadillac CTS and 2015 CTS utilized a system that pumps the vehicle’s engine and exhaust sounds into the vehicle using its sound system. And as it so happens, the 2015 ATS Coupe uses a similar technology.
Called Engine Sound Enhancement (ESE), the system amplifies the vehicle’s engine and exhaust sounds through the audio system. To note, the sounds are not pre-recorded, but rather further enhance the sounds the car is making.
According to Cadillac, the goal of ESE is to make the sweetest sounds even sweeter by working in conjunction with Active Noise Cancellation technology, which helps eliminate unwanted sounds. But compared to the third-gen CTS Sedan, the ATS Coupe executes ESE differently in these three ways:
- ESE is only on ATS Coupe models equipped with the Bose surround sound system
- ESE leverages the upgraded amplifier and speakers of the surround sound system
- ESE does not change with drive modes, meaning that it’s the same regardless of the selection of Tour, Sport, or Snow/Ice drive mode
If you’ve experienced Engine Sound Enhancement, do you like it? What do you think of the concept of amplifying engine/exhaust sounds using the car’s audio system? Talk to us in the comments.
Comments
Fake engine noise! No likey!
Not really fake but they are introducing the engine noise into the interior with the sound system to give you a choice of having it or not.
With out this the car is very quiet and not sporting sounding but not everyone wants noise.
Also in cases of 4 cylinders like the new Mustang there is no way to make the 4 sound anywhere as good as a 8 or even most v6 models so in this case fake will help the car better than a fart can muffler.
Get used to it as this is where they are all going on the smaller engines.
As long as the sound is not pre-recorded, I don’t have a problem with it. In my opinion, using the speakers to amplify the real sound from the engine should not offend anyone. My only gripe is I should have the option to turn it off when I want a quiet drive
You can shut it off in the Cadillac but my understanding in the Eco Mustang you can not.
have not driven the car . have not heard the amplified in cockpit exhaust/engine sounds.
I have heard about it…. and don’t care for it.
I think the M5 has it.
some things come to my thinking.
we have come so far in excluding automobile noise from the drive that now we have microphone devices that pick up this noise and play it over the sound system in the car……. jeeezzz.
I would never have a bose system in my home. but if I want to hear my car in this otherwise well built car……bose it is. bose sound is so contrived. its not really high end engine/exhaust note sound reproduction, is it ?
it seems so contrived. the sport/luxury thing here is really just plain tacky to me.
Tacky, cheap, pathetic? Take your pick. It’s something I’d expect a kid with a ricer to do.
If you want noise, just put a big lumpy “Duntov” type cam, exhaust headers, and scavenger pipes with turbo mufflers and you will have all the noise you could dream of! 🙂
Just wait till you have a couple hundred thousand or more miles on the vehicle, it develops a knock or tick. Who would want that amplified? lol
All in all, I hope it’s a feature that can be turned off. I like a quiet cabin, I don’t want to hear power train or much road noise.
Not my cup of tea but it does match with our smoke and mirrors, fake, artificial, superficial society we live in….
Cadillac exhaust notes for the hearing impaired.
The XTS VSport has it too! It is very subtle and hardly noticeable unless your really into the loud pedal. It has a nice stacato sound similar to a playing card in the bicycle spokes.