Tag: Audio Spotlight

The folks over at Kenwood continued their tradition of upgrading their line of head units this year. The new 2012 line-up of Kenwood Excelon receivers is finally here and better than ever. The DNX6990HD is one of the two flagship models from Kenwood. I have had some great hands on experience with it that I would love to share.

This year they packed more features than ever into a head unit which is also a few hundred dollars cheaper than its predecessor. The DNX6990HD continues to use the Bluetooth Powered by Parrot which is arguably the best quality Bluetooth interface available to date. The recent update to the Bluetooth added Bluetooth audio streaming capability from any iPhone, Android, or Blackberry device. This means that any music on your phone or audio playing from your phone can wirelessly stream through your car radio. In addition to being extremely convenient, it sounds great!

In the years since its inception, the pathway to integrating the factory radio with aftermarket components has been riddled with cheap methods, noisy adaptors and countless failures. The usual method if you wanted to add an amp to your car’s factory system involved the use of a high to low level adaptor, which worked “enough” at the time, although there was inherent noise and a huge lack of performance from this band-aid.

When we announced the return of the legendary Rockford Fosgate lineup to Ask the Advisors and Serious Autosport, we also brought in the newly designed Power Series of speaker systems. After hearing these additions, I can honestly say Fosgate has extended their reputation for quality and durability beyond just subwoofers.

The folks at Pioneer continued the tradition of the heralded AVIC car audio lineup with the AVIC-Z130BT, and this unit packs some real cool features, not to mention good solid performance!

The AVIC-Z130BT comes with standard features, including a 7 inch WVGA Touchscreen display, full on-board NAV, DVD player, iPod control and Bluetooth Wireless. In addition, new features include Pandora Internet Radio capability and HD Radio. On the Navigation side, the AVIC-Z130BT features lane guidance that can direct you to the right lane particularly when you will be heading towards busy intersections. It also has intelligent re-routing options which come in handy if you get lost during your travels. Navigation can be utilized in either 2-D or 3-D mode and displays major landmarks, making navigating smooth and easy.

If you are thinking about adding a new car radio to your vehicle, look no further than the Clarion NX501. This beautifully designed double-din radio will not only blow you out of the water in looks but also in the easy to use, user interface and incredible sound quality. The Clarion NX501 offers a wide variety of outstanding features.

We recently were proud to announce that we were offering the full line of car audio from the legendary Rockford Fosgate.

I’m also proud to introduce the new Marine lineup from Rockford Fosgate.

Since we just rolled out the full line of products from Clarion, I thought we ought to get right in and talk about their new high end marine unit, the CMD7.

This is a single DIN chassis with a large display face that can really take whatever the ocean can dish out. The CMD7 incorporates solid rubber gaskets for the best seals possible, stainless steel chassis designs, drip shields and rubberized controls to insure no moisture gets in anywhere. It is this attention to detail and the full IPX5 Salt/Fog testing that gets the CMD7 the highest water intrusion protection rating in it’s class. We’re talking as waterproof as you can get!

The KFCX-1730P Excelon series 6 inch components feature a new advanced speaker cone material and design that delivers the richest high, mid and low frequencies with minimal distortion. Kenwood has utilized a new hybrid fiber diaphragm material that combines glass fiber and a heat resistant material which allows the driver to provide a purer, cleaner sound across mid and low frequencies. A silk dome tweeter delivers a smooth, wide range of high frequencies. The KFCX-1730P also features a newly designed magnetic circuit that uses less steel, resulting in less distortion compared to a conventional circuit. The KFCX-1730P handles a hefty 330 Watts and allows for 3-point attenuation of the tweeter for better tuning.

Kenwood recently introduced 2 new control decks for the car that offer great features when having a CD transport is not necessary.