Radio/CD/MP3 player

[cerby]

I have owned Sony, Jvc and Alpine head units. I wouldn't buy another sony. I found that you paid a lot for what you were getting and that often the trend towards wanky looks made them less functional. Also oddly enough they seem to use lower quality reading systems, most of the ppl i know with sonys have a lot of trouble with them skipping and eventual read failure.
JVC was a good mid range performance. If your just after a functional easy system. ie not competition! they are very good. The mp3 browse controls on jvc head units is the best by far i have seen and it has been taken up in a lot of later model units by other brands. My old jvc unit is now in a competition 4X4 and apparently has no trouble coping with bumbs and flying mud!
The best i have used is the newer alpine units. I got a good level mp3 unit from autobarn for $400 and this has very good quality sound and is very easy to install. It has never skipped, even when playing old cds found in rubbish pile on floor
I find that it is important to consider how easy it is install since i installed the alpine head unit at a total cost of $450 while a mate had the same unit installed professionally at a cost of $800.
Any way thats my 2 cents worth. Hope it helps!
Cerby

[Smokey228]

cerby, did u pay 450 to have it installed? or is that including the headunit itself? cause its really not to hard to install urself... u can save heaps and get jus as neat doin it urself...

[o_man_ra23]

OK, firstly, the wattage rating given by manufacturers is peak, yes, but you dont take the RMS as .707 from the wattage given. RMS should be about 32 watt per channel for pioneer MOSFET, and about 25 for all others. The mosfets used by pioneer require less signal current to drive them, and have less gate voltage, meaning that they lose less power within the devices, and, therefore eminate less heat. after 6 years studying electronics... it seems that the actual power amplification used by pioneer is the best in the business, until you look at external amps. The pioneer DEH-P1Y which i just got for my GF actually can produce 60W per channel, or about 40rms. problem with this is the heat, but as only 2 speakers are being powered from the head, the rest from an amp, that is not a problem. The other factor to look for is the class of amp used. Class A amps tend to be about 50% or less efficient, meaning they produce lots of heat. Class B and AB are about 75-80% efficient, but class AB has lower distortion levels. Class C is about 60% efficient, and Class D is about 99% efficient, but is limited by the frequency of the signal amplified. These are only really used in subwoofer amps.

Number of pre-outs is irrelevant if you are not connecting amps.

Coffee, panasonic are crap, and always will be, they dont employ enough R&D engineers to produce a quality product, and skimp on materials, so they are no where near as robust. Ive never seen a Pioneer or Kenwood with a problem.

Sony is also crap, i sent mine back under warranty 3 times before it worked ok, and then when it was out of warranty it started eating CDs. My brother used to work at a HI FI place, who was 50% sponsored by sony for all advertising, and they dropped the entire sony range cause the after sales service was crap.

GF used to have a clarion, and it was about 8 yrs old when we sold the car it was in, never had a problem.

JVC is funtastic, great units.

Alpine is getting expensive, but you get what you pay for.

In all, I would go for a low end MP3 pioneer unit... reliable, powerful and good equalizer options.

Cheers, Owen