The In-Dash CD player? An anachronism?

[thefrese]

Honestly though most of the time I am listening to AM radio (traffic, weather, news) and that is abysmal quality to even an MP3. LOL!

I'm an AM radio listener too. If you have a smartphone you can check out RadioPup and see if your local stations have an internet stream. Sounds MUCH better.

[retro_rocket]

I still keep a couple of CDs in the car, and one in the stereo all the time. I prefer to listen to them on short trips when I don't feel like hooking up my phone or iPod. Once I have a car with proper Bluetooth integration, though (so I don't have to plug my phone in each time I enter the car) I can't imagine I will use CDs much at all.

[zhenya00]

A while ago I downloaded Fragile by Yes on HDtracks.com. It is a 24/96 flac. My wife and I wanted to listen to it in the car. I put it on CD and made a high bitrate mp3 as well. The MP3 sounds flat and the highs sound like crap compared to the CD... and this is in the Kia stock factory stereo. The soundstage, keyboards, and hi hats just don't translate well from a 24/96 flac to an MP3. Yes you can hear the difference. You just have to know what to listen for.

The only reasonable explanation for that is that it was an extremely poor conversion, or, more likely, that there was no difference. Beyond 256k, very very few people can reliably tell the difference between the compressed sound and the uncompressed original. At 320k, it's virtually nobody, and those who can hear the difference repeatedly can ONLY do so because they know EXACTLY which (extremely subtle) artifacts to listen for. A properly encoded file does not change things like 'how the highs sound,' or make it sound 'flat'. People who try to identify compressed files based on these attributes consistently fail the tests because that's not where the differences are!

FWIW, an iPhone or iPod CAN play uncompressed ALAC formats, but it's a waste of space. Keep your originals at home in FLAC or ALAC, but only for the flexibility in changing formats, not because the sound is markedly changed.

[nickthaskater]

Which uncompressed formats play in cars? I don't think there are any at this time.

My Kenwood headunit plays ALAC (Apple lossless) just fine via the USB interface and sounds indistinguishable between a CD.

[kingrukus]

yep, I can't stand the hiss of a cassette.
I've never heard one that didn't have some amount of hiss. Drives me nuts.
I'll be using a tape converter until I can find a good radio
I'm leaning towards the Kenwood KIV-BT901
The Alpine one is too ostentatious

I hate the central dial

I am running an older generation Alpine (ida-x001) with no cd-player and it has suited me well. I hate the radio function though, requring me to press a number of buttons before allowing me to change from one pre-set to another. I hope to switch to a double din touch screen next summer - thinking the pioneer app 2 radio with android capability.

[Robski92]

I like to have the capability to play all media formats in my car so I gotta have all formats in my car. Also what if I find a classic cd in a thrift store? I'm not gonna wait an hour before I can listen to it.

[VadGTI]

The only problem with all of these in the E36 is that they look like crap. There's literally not one aftermarket unit that looks as good as the CD43.




vs.

[SimplyBao]

I think they are going the way of the dodo. We've had our CTS for almost 5 years now and we've used the CD player once in those 5 years. And that was because we were playing with the audio system and it's ability to rip the songs to the hard drive.

I've never played a CD in my MINI.

After our remodel, I'm not even going to hook up the CD player to the home system. Yes, CD's sound better than the compressed junk we get, but you know what? I don't care. I hardly ever just sit around and listen to great sound anymore.

[Silly_me]

My MP3 is only taken into the car on long road trips, otherwise I'm fine with the CD changer (MP3 serves primary duties on the motorbike).

I'm not an audiophile, in case that wasn't obvious

BTW, does lexus still offer a tape deck in their cars ?

[Omnilith]

I've switched two of my cars over to media decks so far and am not looking back.

I hate CDs. I hated them in 1989, and I hate them now. It is a terrible execution of the format due to cost. They should have come in a self-contained cartridge. From an end-user form factor standpoint the cassette tape had it right, just without the benefits of digital.

...and if you can hear the difference between a CD and an MP3, you're encoding them wrong. VBR or high bit rates are mandatory if you have sensitive ears. That's one reason I can't get into Sirius or XM... the compression is nasty.

[Chapel]

The only problem with all of these in the E36 is that they look like crap. There's literally not one aftermarket unit that looks as good as the CD43.




vs.

Still not worth it. $430 for an oem stereo and an adapter to end up just using my iPhone anyway? Pass.

[Benjamin.]

I had this same brainwave when shopping for a head unit for our Escape. Ended up with this:


http://www.crutchfield.com/S-VDOC6Ic...Audio_Playback

Under $100 on Amazon shipped (to my US PO box), best money I ever spent on a car. The iPod integration was flawless. I've since moved to Android and suffered a little bit in slickness, but it's still very functional. I love that I have the option to connect via USB (ran the cable from the rear and into the centre console) if I need to charge, 3.5mm in a pinch, and of course the bluetooth streaming option is very handy and most often used. This model also comes with a mic which I mounted at the top of the A pillar and the hands free quality is superb.

EDIT: The button and screen zones are also infinitely colour adjustable so it does blend surprisingly well with the interior for being a modern aftermarket offering.

This is probably exactly what I would get in your situation, Chapel. I've been very, very impressed with my budget JVC head units in the cars I've had them in - the internal amps are pretty robust for a head unit, and at <$100 with built in bluetooth, how can you go wrong?

[Jrod511]

I bought one of these to throw in a car; liked it so much I bought 3 more. Insane @ $30 a piece shipped! No CD Player, but has aux, usb (charging), and sd card. Basically as long as I have my phone (always), and a $2 aux cord I have accessibility to anything I want to listen to, or hands free calling.

Edit: Matches BMW's (reverse coloring though)

[Jrod511]

I needed a cheapo headunit to fill a hole in a dash of a Dodge that had previously had a single din headunit. Here are some real life pics. Quality overall is fair, sound quality is quite good actually believe it or not.

Seriously; I paid $29.99 shipped, so for $120 I have 4 of these things. One is going in my 325is. Totally worth it for functionality and OEM-ish look if you don't give a crap about brand names. Go on ebay and search for SC-4646

[Chapel]

for me, hands free bluetooth is very important.

[grounded87]

Pretty sure the CD player in my S2000 (Alpine) has been broken for 2-3 years, and the six-disc in the dash of my TSX has never been used. MP3/Pandora from the Droid hardwired to the Alpine in the S, XM and Droid over Bluetooth in the TSX.

LOL. Yep. The CD player (Alpine) in my Golf took a crap well over a year ago, and I really haven't missed it. I used to use it out of laziness and having made up many discs over the years, but after it broke it pushed me into primarily streaming from my Droid. I just ordered an IPhone5 as well. I heard many of the Alpine's have problem with the new integration cable for the iPhone5 and ios6, but so far I've been content with just streaming via the 1/8" jack.

I was a bit of an audiophile and have been moving backwards with time. I do have a very nice Alpine four channel, two channel, and subs wired up properly, EQ, etc. but my car is noisy enough on the highway it hardly makes much difference in the dynamic audio quality losses of .mp3 vs. CD.

I may upgrade head units if there's a killer Pandora/IPhone5/etc. integrated unit out there, but a physical CD unit on board will not be a priority.

[mhjett]

Hey, what's up Nick!

Yeah, for me the advantage of not having to lug around and swap CDs in the car has always trumped the slight quality degredation of compressed audio on my iPhone/iPod. The Dynaudio amp in my Jetta is pretty top-notch, but the audible difference between a CD and a high bit-rate compressed audio file is pretty slight and the convenience of some 2000 hours of music in my phone is pretty awesome. I can tell a difference on my home system, but in the car the difference is slight at best.

[redshift]

I hardly ever listen to music in the car anymore, anyway. When I was younger I used to define my entire life by music (didn't every teen/early-20?) but now I hardly care while I'm driving. I'm re-buying a lot of my old albums that have been lost/stolen/destroyed/etc. in FLAC, but I rarely bother burning them to CD to bring with me. My wife is pissed that her Miata has the single-disc and mine has the 6-disc changer, but I hardly ever listen to it while she can't be in the car 5 seconds without music playing.

I'll show you an anachronism though: the 2002 WRX we just picked up has a 6-disc changer with a cassette deck! Before that, I can't even remember the last time I was in a car with a cassette deck...

[Sledge]

My newly acquired Miata has a cassette player. I can't even remember the last time I used a cassette.

[nickthaskater]

My brother in law's '06 Charger R/T has a factory cassette deck

[caj1]

People are insane if they think they can notice a difference between a decently coded mp3 and a CD while driving.. If you listen to music while parked in your garage, sure.

[rockhog]

i havent used a CD since 2003 and that was CD-RW burned with albums of mp3s

compressed digital files is the way to go , get with the times

[warren_s]

A while ago I downloaded Fragile by Yes on HDtracks.com. It is a 24/96 flac. My wife and I wanted to listen to it in the car. I put it on CD and made a high bitrate mp3 as well. The MP3 sounds flat and the highs sound like crap compared to the CD... and this is in the Kia stock factory stereo. The soundstage, keyboards, and hi hats just don't translate well from a 24/96 flac to an MP3. Yes you can hear the difference. You just have to know what to listen for.

The problem isn't "MP3".... There are dozens of ways to encode an MP3, some of them produce very good results, some of them produce exactly what you described.

I ripped my old 1990s Yes CDs back around 2000 or so when I first started using MP3s. Five or six years later I redid them all with a better encoder, and higher bit rate settings, and the sound was significiantly better. Of course, then Yes released the remasters and they got encoded as MP4 using an even better encoder, and now I can't really tell the difference from the source CD.

[WhistlerYOW]

Some new Darts with the big LCD screen have the CD player in the centre console storage bin...

Which actually makes a lot of sense... because even people that do use CDs don't change them enough to need it right in the dashboard.

Its a neat idea. I looked all over but can't find a pic online.

[Chapel]

I was looking at headunits and I found this really nice one:
http://www.sonicelectronix.com/item_...KIV-BT901.html

So, I bought this...
then I realized it doesn't work with my iPhone5... needs another $65 in adapters and still no video.

Anyone want it? Just paid $280 for it...

Works great with iPhone4 and 4S, but I'm not going back.

ARGH!

[20aeman]

Anachronisms are the best.

[danny_16v]

So, I bought this...
then I realized it doesn't work with my iPhone5... needs another $65 in adapters and still no video.

Anyone want it? Just paid $280 for it...

Works great with iPhone4 and 4S, but I'm not going back.

ARGH!

what? the blue tooth doesn't work or what?

that sucks! I was going to get that one too-