New Alpine h/u's and Best Buy

MacLeod · January 2006

Ran down to Best Buy yesterday to check out some Alpine head units. I was looking for one with TA and wanted to see what they looked like in person.

First off, when I walked in and the salesdude came up to me, I told him I was looking for a h/u with TA and you shouldve seen the look on his face! Kinda something like this --->

Well I explained to him what it was so he went to ask the installer which units had it. He came back and said ALL the Alpines did! HUH?!? So even this $150 unit does? "Yeah!" OK, so now I have that look on my face. After quizzing him further I discovered he still didnt have a clue what he was talking about. When I couldnt find TA anywhere in any of the menus he claimed they did it automatically. I told him it doesnt work that way and you have to set it for each channel and its different in.....oh never mind.

So after giving up on talking to the salesdude I continued to fidgit with the new Alpines and while I still like the look of them I do not like the stupid "glide touch". It doenst work right half the time and I can guarantee you it would be totally screwed up within 6 months. Why cant they just stick to good old fashioned buttons!?

I looked at some Kenwoods and Pioneers too and the Kenwoods look horrid now. They look cheaper than the Jensens!! WTF is going on at Kenwood HQ?

The Pioneers were ok but I dont like the one big knob that controls everything. Im sure it would be a lot of fun trying to work that stupid thing while bouncing down the road.

Well I guess Ill be looking into Eclipse now. They look the best, have the features I want and dont seem to have screwed everything up.

Why cant they just make an "audiophile" head unit. $500, no Ipod interface, no MP3, no XR Radio, no stupid navigation, no stupid DVD player with big **** LCD screen, just good EQ's, TA, excellent DAC, strong preamps and be done with it?!

beardog03 · January 2006

the 47, 53, and 55 Alpines are what I was looking at ..
I agree...the older models , I think were better..

I`ll probably get one of these models anyway, as Alpine still has a great sound..
The glide touch blows, so probably the 9847, or 9853 model

swerve · January 2006

new for 05... not 06

they are doing away with the glide touch for this year.

cam5860 · January 2006

Yeah I am also very dissappointed with alpine's new lineup for the coming year. There top of the line headunit this year is the cda-9857. You can see it on the alpine website.

The first thing that pissed me off about it is they only offer 2v preouts now not even 4v preouts anymore.

And this is supposed to be there top of the line headunit now and it only offers 2v preouts. Im sorry but if you ask me alpine headunits are getting sorrier every year.

brettw22 · January 2006

I like my Premier 860 with the remote. One of my friends said he didn't really like the remote thing but it's a godsend to have that thing because otherwise you do end up flipping through buttons unnecessarily.

Just like at home, once you learn the button locations you don't even have to look.

1996blackmax · January 2006

swerve wrote:

new for 05... not 06

they are doing away with the glide touch for this year.

Unless you are getting one of their DVD units, the regular units have also done away with the T.A. feature :mad: .

1996blackmax · January 2006

Hey MacLeod there is still time to get a really good deal on an 05 Eclipse unit

. Look to see what your local dealers have left

.

MacLeod · January 2006

I noticed none of the new '06 Alpines have TA so that really sucks.

The only problem with Eclipse is that the cheapest model with TA is $600!

Well there is the new CD5000 for $550.

cam5860 · January 2006

Alpine quit making good headunits after 04 if you ask me. The 9833 and 9835 were really nice headunits. But at the beginning of 05 they went to **** you might as well say.

MacLeod · January 2006

They dont appear to be the only ones. Since Ive been in the market for a new head unit Ive noticed there isnt many quality units out there. The market is bloated with stupid **** DVD, MP3 and Ipod centered units. There arent many SQ oriented units out there.

cam5860 · January 2006

Mac you hit the nail on the head. Alpine is so worried about making a seemless connection for the ipod. Until they have let sound quality fall to the waste side.

cam5860 · January 2006

Another thing i was looking at is sony's new headunit's for this year. All there models this year only have two sets of preout outputs. Now what there saying is on the rear set of preouts you can switch it over to sub out.

I really don't know what the hell there thinking either because if you do that you can't run a 4 channel amp without a spliter. No sound quality in a sony either for this year.

If your planning on running a 4 channel amp and a pair of subs. I think that sony is saying hey just run full range this year leave the subs alone.

MacLeod · January 2006

Sony's Xplod is strictly for marketing to the 17 year olds with money for the first time and want a cool looking system and couldnt care less about how good it sounds.

Kenwood is right behind them. Not only are their head units ugly but they look really cheap as well.

The Pioneer P9 is a benchmark and is an excellent SQ h/u but its also $1300!!!!

PoweredByDodge · January 2006

Kenferd's eXcelon stuff is quite nice, and the EZ500 and EZ700 are nice units as well.

Last GREAT alpine I had was the 7863, and that was a long time ago... although now its back in its original home... the 88 ram.

Everythign after that seemed cheesey alpine to me... I dunno...

exalted512 · January 2006

Never was a fan of alpine, this settles it. Pioneer has always made me happy. I love the new kenwood 25th anniversary hu though...thing is beautiful
-Cody

swerve · January 2006

sorry i wasn't talking about T.A. I was talking about the glide touch.

Mac, where are you getting the prices for the Eclipse stuff.

Hopefully I'll be getting a deal on the cd7000

One great thing about Sony is they are cheap and have the aux input in the front. Great solution for people who sell them like myself. This way when I can't talk the tight asses into the pioneer and the interface I can sell them a 100-120 dollar radio and a mini to mini cable.

Right now the majority wants iPod support and unfortunately that's what they are getting.

I use my iPod in my car nearly everyday.

swerve · January 2006

Oh... and Mac you are in best buy... of course they wouldn't know.
Circuit City would not know either.

My roadshop team at circuit city has went to ****... besides myself and 2 of the installers the others are barely hanging on.

I do not know how we do business when we are not around. It's so easy to pickup products now and learn them because of their simplicity yet these sales associates strive to **** up anyway they can. I mean if I see a Sony, JVC, or Jensen with a aux input in the front I'm not talking about any of the tweaking options... I'm striving to make you buy that and an iPod.

I don't know the past month I've been selling with the motto:
"It's better to play dumb than be dumb."

I haven't had a customer in so long that I can just have an intelligent conversation with about audio.

oh yeah - what's TA mean

(only playin')

MacLeod · January 2006

No, the '06 models do not have glide touch, but they do have 2 volt preamps. Ugh.

Here are the prices for the new Eclipse units.

Its looking like its gonna be a new CD5000 for me!

swerve · January 2006

I like the 5000's preouts... but if I can get a deal I might as well go all out.

cam5860 · January 2006

What do you all think about the new Alpine PDX amps. They say they are stackable to save more space. They look pretty good to me and have decent specs.

1996blackmax · January 2006

I bought my CD8455 for $519 out the door, intallation (did this for the 3 year warranty) and tax included. I thought about the CD8445 (the same thing minus the i-Pod control as the CD5000), but I wanted more control, TA, x-over, and EQ wise. That said, out of the box the CD5000 will be a great SQ unit. I have played with mine with the pro-mode off (makes it the same as the CD8445 and CD5000 control wise) and I can still get very nice sound from it.

On a side note. I found out a couple of days ago that they have been using Burr Brown DAC's in their top HU's. The cool thing is that they are the true 24bit DAC's. Just goes to show you that they do pay attention to detail. They could have used the cheaper alternative, but chose to go with what is considered a better DAC.

SportsFan · January 2006

MacLeod wrote:

Ran down to Best Buy yesterday to check out some Alpine head units. I was looking for one with TA and wanted to see what they looked like in person.

First off, when I walked in and the salesdude came up to me, I told him I was looking for a h/u with TA and you shouldve seen the look on his face! Kinda something like this --->

Well I explained to him what it was so he went to ask the installer which units had it. He came back and said ALL the Alpines did! HUH?!? So even this $150 unit does? "Yeah!" OK, so now I have that look on my face. After quizzing him further I discovered he still didnt have a clue what he was talking about. When I couldnt find TA anywhere in any of the menus he claimed they did it automatically. I told him it doesnt work that way and you have to set it for each channel and its different in.....oh never mind.

Why cant they just make an "audiophile" head unit. $500, no Ipod interface, no MP3, no XR Radio, no stupid navigation, no stupid DVD player with big **** LCD screen, just good EQ's, TA, excellent DAC, strong preamps and be done with it?!

Whew!!! Glad to know that even the salesman didn't even know what "TA" is! Sorry, but my mind is elswhere other than stereo equipment when I see the letters T and A being used together

So what exactly is "TA"? (only thing that comes to mind would be "treble adjustment"???) Also, what does "DAC" stand for

P.S. - by the way.....I've long thought that car stereos have been going the wrong way as far as looks, ease of use, etc., for a long time now. It seems that as technology increases, manufacturing and incorporating new technology into these product seems to decrease. Just my opinion....

1996blackmax · January 2006

T.A. = time alignment (can help out with getting more natural sound in the car by delaying the signal of speakers closest to you, as well as matching them to each other in the case of your mid and tweeter being quite a bit apart)

DAC = digital to analog converter (what converts the digital information into anlog information, or music we hear)

SportsFan · January 2006

OK, thanks for that clarification, blackmax. I'm familiar with and know exactly what you're referring to....I've just never heard them referrenced by those particular initials before.

1996blackmax · January 2006

We get lazy around here and just us parts of words

.

rodney · January 2006

MacLeod wrote:

Why cant they just make an "audiophile" head unit. $500, no Ipod interface, no MP3, no XR Radio, no stupid navigation, no stupid DVD player with big **** LCD screen, just good EQ's, TA, excellent DAC, strong preamps and be done with it?!

the Kenwood xxv-01d does a pretty good job, and looks nice too... but also has some of the extras

neomagus00 · January 2006

MacLeod wrote:

Why cant they just make an "audiophile" head unit. $500, no Ipod interface, no MP3, no XR Radio, no stupid navigation, no stupid DVD player with big **** LCD screen, just good EQ's, TA, excellent DAC, strong preamps and be done with it?!

hear, hear!

btw, DAC stands for Digital-to-Analog Converter, it's the bit that reads the CD and converts it to a signal to be amplified... naturally, it's rather more complicated than that, but that's the gist of it...

and while we're on TA, does anyone know of an external TA unit that can independantly do at least 4 channels, preferably six? all i need is time alignment, nothing else, cause the TA feature on pioneers is crappy, and i'd like to try it...

1996blackmax · January 2006

Eclipse units use true 24bit Burr Browns

.

exalted512 · January 2006

the rockford fosgate 360 does time alignment...but its a little expensive if thats the only thing youll use it for
-Cody

1996blackmax · January 2006

How much is it going for ?

neomagus00 · January 2006

yeah, how much?

and if i can get 6-channel eq out of it, that'd be nice, too...

New Alpine h/u's and Best Buy

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