i recently bought a alpine cd player, and it is now the most annoying stereo i have ever used, to turn it off you have to hold a button for about 5 seconds!! utter crap, its very hard to use IMO, little buttons, the buttons on there are wearing alway from about 10 mins of use :bang: so how do you people rate the alpines?

Crap!

Never rated alpine especially on the lower end or mid range, top end is not bad though.

Too many buttons and for reasosn like youve just mentioned beau, why i rate sony over them on everything

I have an Alpine 9812cda

It's a nice piece of kit.

Not complicated at all, until you get into the 3 different ways to adjust the Bass!!!

I like mine!

:slayer: Kenwood head is better. Got kdc w7031head unit. SUPERB gravity sensor on it also. loads to muck about with.

The alpine i have is ok, the sound quality is top notch. and for the price i can't argue.

As mentioned on the other thread, it seems to dislike cold weather. But its easy enough to use, and it plugs into my ipod nicely...

but there comes the problem.
I wish they'd left it so you could control the head unit from the ipod. The ipod is p.ss easy to use, but the head unit is built for a max 150 tunes, not bordering 7000, and navigating a full library is way too keen. if you have a pod and wanna fit it to the head unit get a charger and an AUX cable. or wait til the new models come out next year.

never seen so many threads about one HU

sony high end units basically suck aparet form the odd couple which are no longer in production mid range units there fairly good for the money but dont come close to sound quality of an alpine set up properly. Remember tht most alpine units now also need a direct battery feed to power the amp on them to give decent quality.

kenwood units are ok but again sound quality isnt as good if you only after flash looking then buy a sony. If your wanting quality and adjustment but dont mind the UI then buy an alpine.

You dont buy a high end headunit and then expect lots of easy bass functions to mess with it. The people buying them want as much fine tuning as possible. Considering alpine units are used in the majortity of SQ competitions must say something about them

But all depends on the unit a cheap alpine unit is exactly that its cheap it does what it says it does and thats it a hig end one does what it says and is very upgradable which is the whole point behind them.

I just think sony and kenwood units arent up to much. I would only look at pioneer or alpine units in that range if we get more expensie then start looking at units which have no flash graphics or anything they just play music with amazing sound quality. Which is what i want i dont care if it has a 16million colour tft screen if it sounds naff i will buy a cheaper better sounding unit.

TBH, if I was in the market for a new HU, I don't think any of the head units / brands mentioned above would be my no.1 choice.

As time goes by, companies have to build things for a price, not a spec. My Alpine head unit cost £699 back in 1998, no onboard amp, MP3 or CDR compatability. What it does have is top quality components used throughout and was probably the last of Alpines great competition head units.

they now have th F1 statues which consist of handpicked parts probably every bit as gooda s the one your using now. But retail is in excess of £1000

So thats the downside. They do have a new unit coming out though. No internal am etc standard type headunit no F1 status and its still gonna be retailing for around £600-£1000.