What headunit music/DVD

[mtnkid85]

Hello gang,

What is everyone running for music and entertainment in there rigs?
I have always just used what ever was in the truck or was cheap, but my radio just quit on me and Im needing to replace it with something. My intial reaction is to pickup a ~$150 multimedia player with out a CD function like in my other vehicles. However then I started wondering if its worth while to run something with a screen that could play DVDs for longer road trips. I would want to keep it a single DIN unit, so that would mean a pop out screen.

The other avenue is a mount for a tablet and use that for in cab movies.

Im really not a huge music/entertainment guy, but do a fair bit of long boring travel and thought I should explore my options here.

Opinions?

 

[TechMOGogy]

Tablet and/or any smartphone to play music via a bluetooth speaker - but you may have speakers already in your vehicle!
I am looking at installing a wired bluetooth speaker system - currently using a battery powered unit (iLoud)

 

[mtnkid85]

Im not sure I want to build an entire system around a tablet/smart phone. I am one of the few people left who doesn't have a smart phone and I don't really want to have the tablet in the cab all the time either. Probably 80% of the time I just listen to FM/AM radio.

And yes there are already speakers in the truck, I think what Ill do is put a JVC Bluetooth reciver in. Then I can look at mounts and tablets down the road if I still feel the need.

 

[mchambers]

I see that you don't have a smart phone but I am going to chime in. I bought a Jensen unit with Bluetooth for my suburban and love it! I play a lot of music and audio books from my phone and it is nice to just get in and everything starts up where you left off when you got out. Also I can answer and hang up calls with one button on the radio. I call it my caveman radio because I can do almost everything with one group of four buttons. Very simple and intuitive. It came with state lite radio but I haven't started the service yet.

 

[mtnkid85]

mchambers, yea I think I will go for a Bluetooth unit. My wife uses her phone in similar fashion and Im sure when this phone dies Ill end up with a Iphone of some kind so I would like to be able to accommodate that in the future.

Really I was just looking to see if anyone in the offroad world was running a popout screen single DIN radio. Seems like reliability could be an issue.

 

[Reboot11133]

If I was going to go with a pop out screen type of unit, I would definitely be looking for one that has good GPS functions. Preferably one that you can load topo map sets on with a usb. I haven't been shopping for these yet but that would be on my wish list.

 

[BuckBlue90]

I would also appreciate any recent feedback on the Kenwood double din receiver/GPS's
Eric.

 

[rayra]

I was researching new stereos for my '02 Suburban which has a singe DIN dash and discovered some references and youtube vids showing how very easy it was to swap in a double-din cage from a 2004-2006 series GM truck /suv, shifting the climate control unit down about 3/8" and swapping the dashboard bezel. Havne't done it yet but that's the plan. I'm looking at a variety of in dash entertainment units with DVD playback. And researching aux output for the video/audio so I can put a larger display in the back for camping.
Systems include USB, bluetooth, iPhone/iPad connectivity, etc. Very interesting stuff. I was also quite surprised how inexpensive such car audio stuff has become.

 

[mtnkid85]

I was researching new stereos for my '02 Suburban which has a singe DIN dash and discovered some references and youtube vids showing how very easy it was to swap in a double-din cage from a 2004-2006 series GM truck /suv, shifting the climate control unit down about 3/8" and swapping the dashboard bezel. Havne't done it yet but that's the plan. I'm looking at a variety of in dash entertainment units with DVD playback. And researching aux output for the video/audio so I can put a larger display in the back for camping.
Systems include USB, bluetooth, iPhone/iPad connectivity, etc. Very interesting stuff. I was also quite surprised how inexpensive such car audio stuff has become.

Rayra, yes I too was surprised by some of the prices as well. That's what spurred me looking at all these other choices!
Another question Ive come up with is if there are any units that will play a DVD but without a large display and only a video out. So you could then play DVDs through a tablet without a disk drive... Make sense?

 

[rayra]

yeah, an aux out would be good, particularly if that allowed porting the signal to a screen in back. But if you've got the tablet already you could rip your preferred films ahead of time and load them on the tablet directly. Last year I undertook the huge project of ripping all our DVDs and most of the Blue ray movies we had and now have a very large digital library. I'm able to push it via iTunes and an Apple TV device and play everything thru our TV over wireless. But I can also load a movie or three into our iPad or iPhones. Average is about 750Mb/film. So a 1-2Gb USB thumb drive would make it easy to port a movie to the vehicle.

My vehicle came with a Rosen entertainment system, a fold-down ceiling screen in the back seats, equipment for broadcast TV that became obsolete not long after the system came out, along with pushing the audio thru the vehicle's stereo. This was seemingly DOA when I got the vehicle and I wanted to go the dash way anyway. And the DVD deck was under the back seat, not real handy and a lot of the cabling was exposed when the seat was folded up, a real problem with our two big dogs, so I took just about everything out. Had to leave the screen itself in place because of the big hole its install created in the headliner. I might fiddle with that and see about hooking any new system to that screen for backseat viewing. (shrug). Don't want to throw a lot of money at it, I know there are all sorts of fancy options, but I'm not spending real money on that stuff.

There's some really neat systems out there in the $250-300 range, hook just about anything up, navigation options cost a bit more, several have rear view camera options, all the name-brand companies have similar offerings. It's been 20yrs since a I shopped for a car stereo system, I'm really blown away by what's available these days and the comparatively low prices.

 

[climber-420]

Kenwood DDX371.

 

[TechMOGogy]

I have the older Jensen MSR2107 marine unit (new in box - if anyone is interested)
My buddy had one and it was great and waterproof - worked with his speakers and his mobile
I got it for my Mog but never installed it