Music from my iPod sounds tinny - how to fix?
 

I load my albums that are converted from flac to mp3 onto my ipod.

they are converted in dbpoweramp to mp3 256 CBR with a lame encoder, (which I hear is a good encoder).

I then connect my ipod through it's dock connector with dock connector adapter with a tape player adapter plugged into the dock connector, then with a tape player adapter playing in the car stereo, ( it has a cassette tape deck).

to help those reading understand what I am using:

I use this adapter to the ipod dock: http://www.amazon.com/Micro-Adapter-...pter+connector

then into the micro adapter connector I plug this in: http://www.amazon.com/GTMax-Cassette...ssette+adapter

I use these together to play the ipod music in the car stereo cassette deck.

what I noticed is when I turned up the volume load, (the car stereo volume knob, the ipod volume does not work with the connector in the ipod dock), the music sounded a bit tinny, muffled or distorted.

I have also noticed sometimes when playing my music through this stereo that I would get a grinding squeaking noise, like static interference, like old fashioned radios in the 50's or something like this, it is hard to explain in words.

I would try & pop the tape adapter out & then back in, sometimes this helped sometimes not, I even tried cleaning the heads on the tape adapter, but this did not work very well.

I am not quite sure where these problems lay, there are a few elements going on I know, the car stereo cassette deck is from the 80's or 90's am not sure.

I have played my ipod in a car rental, in a modern (21st century vehicle) with my little dock connector out, with an axillary cable plugged into the these stereos, & it sounded ok.

Cleaning won't do anything.

This is an issue with the quality of DAC (digital to analog converter), or of the speakers, or wiring. You'd have to replace each item with known-excellent quality items to see where the fault is. That will get time-consuming and expensive for sure, unless you have friends/family that you can borrow something from in order to test.

For example, try the cassette adapter with a walkman or discman of some kind. See if it sounds tinny, too. If not, then the issue lies elsewhere.

The rental car shows the iPod itself is okay.

The old tape deck may just be crummy. Is this a GM? Chevy tape decks were awful back then. Ford had much better stock tape decks than GM did.

No, this is a ford dodge van, but the original deck I believe had been replaced with what is in it now; a Sony tape deck player. I know the player is from the late 80's or 90's era. I do notice sometimes that there is crackling sounds from the speakers & no sound comes out or out of just one, & I readjust by popping my tape adapter out & back in & that brings things back to normal.

It sounds like the tape adapter is inferior. You may want to replace it with a higher-grade Sony branded tape adapter.
Amazon has them for about $15: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00...SIN=B00005T39Y

Sony has always made the best tape adapters.