Head Units

audiobliss

I believe I'm finally going to get into the car audio scene. I researched it all quite a bit a year ago or so when I *thought* I was going to get into it, and I appreciate all the help I got then.

Now, it seems I'm persuing this road once again. When I did this before, I decided on the Alpine CDA-9831 as I'm more for SQ and really liked its features. However, after considering the price and the fact that it's not exactly very simple to access all its features, I've begun to think about a Kenwood or Pioneer HU. Could anyone tell me much about the 9831 and then about a comparable Kenwood or Pioneer HU? I'd really appreciate any info on the subject.

Thanks!

exalted512

www.electronicscity.com
go to the pioneer page--get the best one you can afford
-Cody

spwuinmk67

For less then the price of the Alpine, at least what its listed at on Crutchfield and at CC, you can get either the Pioneer DEH-860MP or the DEHP8MP . For the extra $20, I'd go with the 860, from what I saw, it has more options, it gives you the auto-eq and -ta, both are great features. Pioneers are also very easy to use and figure out.

audiobliss

Originally posted by exalted512
www.electronicscity.com
go to the pioneer page--get the best one you can afford
-Cody

I'll do that. Just curious, why are you so for Pioneer and against Alpine?

BTW, I can get the Alpine CDA-9831 for $380. Not sure what the prices are at Crutchfield.

Thanks!

audiobliss

Dual motion motorized flap face,
Built-in DSP with 13-band graphic EQ,
Auto EQ,
Burr-Brown DAC's

These are what sold me on the 860MP, especially the DACs. Now, I hafta see if any of the stores here sell it for that price. I hope they do, 'cause I think I can afford that.

How easy is it to read the song title/radio station, etc. on that screen with all that stuff in the background? Everyone agree it's good quality?

Thanks!

spwuinmk67

Pioneers in my opinion, are easier to use, easy to read, and look better. For $340, you can grab the DEH-860MP. I had the 960, which was an amazing hu, great features, and you can figure out a good 90-95% of them without the manual. The 860 is pretty much the same, just without the dual display. And as far as for Pioneer and against Alpine, you did ask for either Kenwood or Pioneer, and not Alpine.:) Crutchfield is too expensive, go to the site cody listed, or the links I gave, its the same place. Why not order online, rather then look for a shop? I don't think you will be able to find it that cheap at a store. It is

audiobliss

One last OEL display feature: you can actually read everything on the display in direct sunlight! Even off-axis passengers can read the artist, track, station ID, and other information while you drive. If the readability is this good in the daytime, just think how great it is at night!

This was said on Pioneer's website about the DEH-P8MP; does anybody know if you could say that about the DEH-P860MP?

Thanks!

spwuinmk67

Originally posted by audiobliss
This was said on Pioneer's website about the DEH-P8MP; does anybody know if you could say that about the DEH-P860MP?

Yes you can read it, sometimes, depending on how intense the light is, it makes it a little harder to see, but you still can. Unlike the one I have now, where I need to shade it with my free hand to see wtf it says.

audiobliss

Originally posted by spwuinmk67
Pioneers in my opinion, are easier to use, easy to read, and look better. For $340, you can grab the DEH-860MP. I had the 960, which was an amazing hu, great features, and you can figure out a good 90-95% of them without the manual. The 860 is pretty much the same, just without the dual display. And as far as for Pioneer and against Alpine, you did ask for either Kenwood or Pioneer, and not Alpine.:) Crutchfield is too expensive, go to the site cody listed, or the links I gave, its the same place. Why not order online, rather then look for a shop? I don't think you will be able to find it that cheap at a store. It is

It is......?

lol; guess I did ask for Pioneer/Kenwood, huh?

Well, thus far I have been restricted from ordering online. (parents) So, I may have to settle for the Alpin or a lesser Premier. We'll see.

Thanks for all the info!

spwuinmk67

Try searching around. Become friends with some shop owners, thats what I did.

exalted512

thats where i ordered my head unit from, its the deh-940MP but its not listed anymore, by far the cheapest place i could find that is an authorized dealer or pioneer
you should try to convince your parents otherwise, they are an authorized dealer of pioneer, so if they did something wrong pioneer would be all over their butt for it
plus, theyre going to be A LOT less than shops
i hardly ever had problems seeing my screen...there is a few times, yes, but not nearly enough for it to be annoying
-Cody

audiobliss

You mean electonicscity? So, they are an authorized dealer?! That could help things out considerably. (I hope.) They're not listed on Pioneer's site as being authorized, though.

In my searching for different prices and specs, I ran across the DEH-P860MP and the DEH-P8600MP. For a while this confused me 'cause they look identical!! (Well, usually. Some of the 8600s were silver.) After being confused for a while, I discovered on Pioneer's site that the 8600 has 4v pre-outs while the 860 6.5v pre-outs and some kind of PRO Mode. If you go to the site above for the 860 and hold your cursor over the Pro Mode listing under the specs, it'll give you a little paragragh explaining what it does. Does this mode mean that I could use the 860 to bi-amp the components I end-up goin' with? Again, I know that an amp would do a lot better, but I can't get it all at once. I would hafta use this HU for a temporary (maybe as long as a year) amp; would that work and would the PRO mode be any good?

Also, the 2-year warranty that is listed at electronicscity.com; is that a Pioneer warranty? So if I had any problems would I send it to Pioneer?

Anyhoo, I really hope I can convince my parents to let me get this 'cause I know I must've gone to Pioneer's site to gaze at the pic of it at least 15 times today! lol

Thanks!!!

MacLeod

Just my $.02 but Im an Alpine type of guy but I would have no problem buying a Pioneer, especially a Premier model. I think the Pioneer is every bit as good as the Alpine, I just happen to like the looks of the Alpine and thats pushes it over the top for me.

My point? If you cant get an Alpine, go with Pioneer.

AustinKP

Originally posted by MacLeod
Just my $.02 but Im an Alpine type of guy but I would have no problem buying a Pioneer, especially a Premier model. I think the Pioneer is every bit as good as the Alpine, I just happen to like the looks of the Alpine and thats pushes it over the top for me.

My point? If you cant get an Alpine, go with Pioneer.

Ditto. Only think that made me spend ~$100 more for an Alpine than a similarly-featured Pioneer was the very quick MP3 search function, and how fast you can change tracks with the Alpine.

audiobliss

Well, I'll hafta go to the store again with an MP3 CD and just play around with the different features and speed and etc. Thanks for all the replies!

MacLeod

Thats one thing Ive never been interested in, MP3's. I download a ton of music and burn a ton of CD's but Ive never wanted to use MP3's in my car. Mainly I guess becuase theyre such a crappy source. Ill take a clean sounding CD with 15 songs over a dirty MP3 with 500 songs.

audiobliss

Originally posted by MacLeod
Thats one thing Ive never been interested in, MP3's. I download a ton of music and burn a ton of CD's but Ive never wanted to use MP3's in my car. Mainly I guess becuase theyre such a crappy source. Ill take a clean sounding CD with 15 songs over a dirty MP3 with 500 songs.

Well, just what format do you download?! I can't imagine WMA is any better, and I'm sure WAV takes WAY too long. I don't see as that leaves anything else....

swerve

Mp3 is great if you rip your cd's at quality. I can usually only get about 110 mp3's on a cd...

MacLeod

Actually I dont know much about all that. I just download them off of whatever program Im using (Kazaa, Morpheus et al) and happens to be working at the time, and thats the extent of my knowledge.

Im not familiar with the different formats.

audiobliss

So, you listen to MP3s? lol

swerve

Mac all those are mp3's... the bitrate determines the quality obviously..... I usually rip at around 196 which sounds fine.... In fact I can't even tell the difference between 196 and cd.

-adam

AustinKP

Originally posted by MacLeod
Thats one thing Ive never been interested in, MP3's. I download a ton of music and burn a ton of CD's but Ive never wanted to use MP3's in my car. Mainly I guess becuase theyre such a crappy source. Ill take a clean sounding CD with 15 songs over a dirty MP3 with 500 songs.

You actually proved my point without meaning to. You're downloading MP3's. Then when you burn a CD, the program converts the MP3 back to Music CD format. Obviously, this doesn't recover the lost information, just decompresses the MP3 so any CD player can read it.

If you're not noticing any quality degradation this way, that's because the MP3's were of a high enough quality to make any degradation inaudible. At a 192Mbps bitrate, you're at or near CD quality and won't be able to hear a difference. This makes burning CD's in CD format useless if you're going for a higher quality than MP3's.

If you have an MP3 player, why not save having to change CD's and just leave the music in the MP3 format that you're downloading? If this makes no sense, sorry. I can explain better if you like.

-Austin

exalted512

yes, they are authorized dealers of everything they sell
http://www.electronicscity.com/warranty.php?osCsid=df1af81176ed94f597f67a553243baee
the 2yr warranty is through Pioneer
-Cody

audiobliss

Originally posted by AustinKP
If you're not noticing any quality degradation this way, that's because the MP3's were of a high enough quality to make any degradation inaudible. At a 192Mbps bitrate, you're at or near CD quality and won't be able to hear a difference. This makes burning CD's in CD format useless if you're going for a higher quality than MP3's.
-Austin

hahahaha 192MBps?!?! how 'bout kbps...lol just a typo, I'm sure

And NO MP3 bitrate is even CLOSE to a CD's quality, speaking in terms of data. Maybe you can't hear a difference, in which case there'd be no audible difference in quality, but a CD is recorded at 1,411kbps!!! That's just a bit more than 192; even 360 or w/e.

Just sayin' that there is a LOT of information you lose when you compress to MP3 format; however, I have a hard time actually noticing it in audible terms.

Joelsbass

WMP has an option to rip as 'windows media lossless' or something like that... takes up around 600-700 mb per cd, same space as is on the disk...


Hell i've never noticed any degredation with even 128kbps...

audiobliss

I currently have all of my CDs ripped as .wav files (identical as on the original CD) and most of them as MP3 files at 64kbps. I must be honest and say that I don't notice a difference, though I don't do any critical listening. However, I do notice a difference in disk space required!! I have ALMOST 26 gigs of music in .wav format!!

spwuinmk67

Originally posted by audiobliss
Does this mode mean that I could use the 860 to bi-amp the components I end-up goin' with? Again, I know that an amp would do a lot better, but I can't get it all at once. I would hafta use this HU for a temporary (maybe as long as a year) amp; would that work and would the PRO mode be any good?

You could bi-amp them either way, but with the pro mode, I believe that you lose the auto-ta feature, not sure though, I think I saw that somewhere in the manual for the 960. But what it does do, is it gives you more crossover options. It's also refered to as a 3-way network. It shows you the crossover point and slope for each signal; low, mid, and high, on the same screen, and adjust each accordingly, so it mixes better. Thats the best explination I can think of at the moment, and the manual isn't loading for me.

audiobliss

haha, ok; thanks for the explanation

Right now it's down to finding them and playing with them to see which I really like better. I may even end up considering the DEH-P8MP; we'll see.

I really appreciate all y'all's replies; extrememly helpful!!!

spwuinmk67

No problem. Today actually I saw the P8 in action for my first time. The display looks great, I almost like it better then the multi-color OEL on the 860 and 960, but thats almost. I didn't have much time to play around with it, but it is a great unit from what I saw. I wish I could've played around a bit more, figure out some more of the faetures.

AustinKP

Originally posted by audiobliss
hahahaha 192MBps?!?! how 'bout kbps...lol just a typo, I'm sure

And NO MP3 bitrate is even CLOSE to a CD's quality, speaking in terms of data. Maybe you can't hear a difference, in which case there'd be no audible difference in quality, but a CD is recorded at 1,411kbps!!! That's just a bit more than 192; even 360 or w/e.

Just sayin' that there is a LOT of information you lose when you compress to MP3 format; however, I have a hard time actually noticing it in audible terms.

Yes, 192Kbps, sorry. But yes, MP3 CAN be exactly as good as the original if you use a variable bitrate. Like Joel said, it's an option in WMP. It's mathematically lossless, meaning the soundwave is identical to the original. The size depends on the music you convert.

Yes, a CD is recorded at 1411Kbps, but a lot of that is silence. For example, if you're listening to a guitar solo, there is a lot of the sound spectrum from 10Hz to 20KHz that is not being used. MP3 removes these silences, thus shrinking the file size down to 200-400MB per CD instead of the original 700ish. The bitrate ends up being from 470 to 940 Kbps.

So there you have it: MP3 file that sounds identical to the original (even measured by machine), and a file 1/3 to 1/2 the size.

-Austin

audiobliss

ahh, now that's interesting; thanks