Put Some MP3 in Your Car Horn

The new Horntones FX-550 lets users trigger any MP3 audio they like in conjunction with their vehicle's horn. We're sure it's a great way to make friends.

If you’re one of those folks who has to tweak and modify everything about your "ride" to show off your, uh, "prowess" to anybody and everybody, then you might want to check out the new Horntones FX-550, an in-vehicle audio system which lets users associate a library of MP3 sound clips with their car horn.

Sometimes it’s best just to let the president of the company describe his own product:

"The brain-seed for this invention occurred at a coffee shop back in the summer of 2005, when a group of teenagers were heckling me about the Incredible Hulk that is airbrushed on the hood of my H1 Hummer," said Mike Kosco, Horntones’ President. "I thought to myself…I wish I had a button I could push that would make my car growl! Well, the Hummer now growls and makes hundreds of other sounds too, from simple voice clips to entire theme songs."

The FX-550 is a three-part system: an SR-100 loudspeaker, the AP-150 amp, and the FX-550 in-cab player. The FX-550 features 256 MB of memory for storing MP3 audio, and nine preset buttons and 2 negative-trigger inputs that enable users to select tones to a collection of user-definable "Themes." Users configure the FX-550 using a virtual player on the company’s Web site, then download the configuration to a USB thumb drive. Just pop the thumb drive into the FX-550, and you have your own custom Horntones configuration. Horntones offers some examples of how you might want to use the device, such as triggering the "Jaws" theme when you’re out on your boat, or playing Clint Eastwood’s immortal line "Go ahead punk, make my day" when, you know, teenagers give you lip about your ultra-cool airbrushed Hummer.

The Horntones FX-550 is available now for $250. Beep beep. You know you want one.