head unit recomendation

A

andyr354

NAXJA Forum User
Location
North Central KS
Just picked up a 91 for daily driving.

Want a head unit that will drive the speakers on its own and have a built in subwoofer contol and an input for an MP3 player. Was looking at a pioneer 4800, whatelse should I look at. The better the tuner the beter as well, live in a rural area.

Have some older JBL GTO series 5.25s to put in the front doors and nothing yet for the rear.
Have an older polk 12 in a sealed box I was possibly gonna throw in the back.

Don't want to spend a pile of cash on it either.

Thanks.
 
Look into the Alpine 9856. It has the great quality of alpine and tons of features but none of that faggy dolphin shit. They are priced around $200.
 
my sony crapped out after a year or two, and i've had a panasonic touchscreen for a few years and it finally quit working yesterday, the touch screen that is, still works fine otherwise just gotta dig out the remote now.
 
i second and strongly recommend the Alpine CDA-9856...ridiculous deck and adaptor for under $250 you get the deck and an IPod cord(optional) the cord goes from the back of the deck into ur glove box and ur ipod attaches there...alpine used to use a KCA unit which was an ipod interface and it was $100 and sucked,the new decks(anything with 6 buttons is new,6 for 06, )use a cord and the interface is in the deck, its a lot faster and only like 20 bucks if u shop around...the deck has the full ipod search interface, CD, xm, blue tooth phone technologies, remote, bass engine (a very good design), and some other stuff...its very easy to use and if u purchase it at bestbuy they will install it for free...

Andrew

link to it if ur interested....
http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?skuId=7652382&type=product&productCategoryId=cat03066&id=1134701297638

and link to ipod cord if ur further interested...
http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?skuId=7675401&type=product&productCategoryId=pcmcat59100050009&id=1134702497966
 
I highly suggest the Alpine 9856 I have had it for about 3 months and it has worked for me jsut fine. I have the ipod adapter adn I also have to kicker L7's hooked up and the subwoofer controls work great!

GOOD LUCK
 
kenwood, kenwood and kenwood. been using kenwood stuff for more than 15 years and i love it, kicker and kenwood make bomb proof stuff
 
ebjones7 said:
I highly suggest the Alpine 9856 I have had it for about 3 months and it has worked for me jsut fine. I have the ipod adapter adn I also have to kicker L7's hooked up and the subwoofer controls work great!

GOOD LUCK
Click to expand...
also have a Kicker L7 15" running off that deck and like ebjones says great, simple control over ur speaker bass and ur sub bass...ive owned many decks and alpine by far is the best...pioneer is also a close second they put massive amounts of tuning features in even some of their most basic decks....through experience kenwoods, sonys, duals, and jensens suck...my buddy and i have installed and swapped many decks with people and my favorite to have been the Alpine "ghost face" aand the 9856
good luck bud
Andrew

EDIT: saying that those 4 companies sucked was wrong of me....I just have seen friends, family, and "customers" of my buddy and I's little business be very unhappy with their decks...they dont necessarily break they just dont perform as well as i think they should fr the money
 
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I have been impressed with my Pioneer P7700MP. It has front, rear, and sub RCA outputs. It will control an I-POD, XM, Sirus (with the external controller) CD, DVD changers, and can use just a line level input. It will play CD's, CD-R's/CD-RW's MP-3's (WMA & ACC formats). It will play just about full blast with out any distortion. It has a built in parametric 3 Band EQ, adjustable high/low pass crossover from the mids/sub with sub phase and level controll. According to the manual you can even use the rear channels to power up to a(IIRC) 50wRMS sub. I payed around $250/300 for it at Wal-Mart.

I've had a JVC, (decent unit) Kenwood, (was developing some problems) Blaupunk, (used it twice before I sold the truck it was in). My best friend loves his Alpine, and have some friends with Panasonics that seem to work great.
 
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I could care less about apple junk, I just need a line in to use my Sandisk Sansa.

Thanks, but $200 is to much for a deck, not that into car audio anymore. The only Alpine I owned 12 years ago was a piece of junk and skipped all the time, maybe just a bad unit. Just need a good functioning deck. Heck I listen to AM news and talk half the time anymore.
Maybe I will pull the 10 year old pioneer premier deck out of my towrig and put a cheaper deck in there since it is just driving the stock speakers and no sub. I can't remember the model # right now, it was the same year they came out with EEQ. Still really like that deck.

So far the ones I have found that fit my budget and feature reqirements are

Panasonic CQ-C3333U
Panasonic CQ-C5303U
Pioneer DEH-P4800MP

I have used alot of pioneer stuff in the past but the new radios look kinda goofy IMHO. Though it does have the same menu system and EEQ than I am used to. Oh and no fancy animated display with dolphins lol.
 
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I'm happy with my Pioneer.

For the original poster, ensure you check that the unit you are buying has line-in capability if its advertised as "iPod ready". Reason being, some decks are iPod compatible, but won't accept a regular line in. Usually iPod ready refers to being able to control the iPod from the radio itself. Line-in is necessary to run any other unit...

Just to add a couple of more cents.

Stereos I've owned that I was unhappy with:
Sony, Kenwood, Panasonic and Alpine.
Sony are quite featureless unless you shell out the bucks.
Kenwood was unreliable for me. A bit of coffee on the exterior and the lighting all died. CD's skipped. Poor warranty service.
Panasonic was functionally retarded. It was not user-friendly enough while driving and distorted at med to high volumes.
Alpine was way overpriced for what you get.
Caveat: all of these stereos were either 1980's or 1990's models.

Stereos I've owned that I was happy with:
Pioneer, Clarion, Infinity and Blaupunkt.

Your mileage may vary...
 
I have the alpine 9856. AWSOME DECK!!! 3 outputs (Front, REAR, SUB) 2 inputs, tons of features like HD radio, SAT radio, MP3,WMA, SUB control and they are simple to use. I paid $220 for mine and I LOVE IT!!!!
 
I have an Eclipse head unit and its absolutly the best sounding i could find.. they dont make face off's though! so that usually takes them out if the running for most people and the price is always an issue.. the unit has a security code you set and when the power is cut ie: stolen or working on electrical system it will no longer function without the correct key input.
I have modded up a way to "cover " it and it works like a charm..

has full sound field harmonics and adjustment.. key point for me was the 8V preouts to my Amps...

Now if i could just afford those Focal speakers to go with it!! LOL

Links

http://www.eclipse-web.com/cd-index.html
Now dont get me wrong.. most people end up going with Pioneer or Alpine vers eclipse.

BUT ask the audio guys and they will tell you that Eclipse is the "audiophiles choice"..


Aaron
 
x2 on the Eclipse. I've had mine for more than 5 years now. XJ is the second vehicle it's lived in. Only had one issue when I inserted a CD with some grime on it and I had to open it up and clean off the aperture, aside from that it's performed flawlessly, has an aux input, and line level outputs including a dedicated sub output.
 
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