The ICE Age

Martin Handley turns on and tunes in to in-car entertainment through the decades

- Martin Handley

Fancy a bit of entertainment while on the move? Speak your instruction and your in-car Android multimedia device will play you whatever reached No 42 in the Hungarian pop chart of October 1958, while your passenger watches May 1961’s Bonanza episodes – if they’re what you want.

It wasn’t always thus. In September 1970, the Philips N2602 became the first compact cassette player to be offered as standard equipment in a British car. It was a Dutch product but had been developed here in the UK.

Before this, the first experiments with recording on magnetic tape were conducted in Germany during World War Two. Reel-to-reel became the accepted format, but the bulky equipment required to play it was clearly unsuitable for use in motor vehicles.

In 1965, Ford introduced an eight-track cartridge audio system. It was also fitted to some Rolls-Royce and Bentley models. By 1968, Slot Stereo had augmented this by developing stereo reproduction projected through the car’s radio speakers. A year later, Motorola offered a similar player for £39 18s 6d, though in this case the five-inch speakers were mounted on the rear parcel shelf. Maximum playing time was 40 minutes. Despite the eight-track still being inconveniently sized for in-car use, this system apparently continued to be offered by Ford until 1983.