When a piece of technology has outlived its usefulness, it usually finds either a place in the trash bin or gets somehow "magically" sent back to the stores under a different appearance, a face-lift if you will. This is also true in the automotive industry, where things like portable music players and game consoles with headrest monitors included have taken the "bling" away from the analog radio.

If you can't beat them, join them, that's the saying and in this case, that gets translated through the introduction of new broadcast services that provide digital radio and Digital Television (DTV), which could be a pretty good replacement or addition to your in-car multimedia system.

"The major problem for digital radio is the simple fact that good old analog FM radio ain't that bad, No one doubts when moving from AM to FM there is a steep change in quality, but when moving from FM to satellite there is no apparent improvement in quality-which is another problem for satellite manufacturers," said Richard Robinson, principal analyst for automotive electronics at the market-research firm iSuppli Corp.

New features that digital radio and television services include are telematics and datacast services such as traffic, weather, electronic program guides and location-based services. But still, when it comes to quality digital transmissions, there still is one problem, providing uninterrupted transmission of high definition videos into a moving vehicle, this has proven to be somewhat of a technical challenge.

In the United States, Hybrid Digital radio has begun replacing traditional analog radio, and a big number of users take advantage of this digital-terrestrial service. The Digital Television side hasn't seen the same success as the HD radio, actually being said to represent "about 10% of the story". All of these additions actually turn a car from its initial purpose, now you get a big enough four wheel drive vehicle and it can become a true "house on wheels", lacking the bathroom though.