Alpine iPod Interface Reviewed

I don't think so- pretty sure you need to have the alpine head unit- reason enough for me to wait for the bmw/mini adapter. Maybe less functionality, but more elegant and integrated. In my opinion.

Yeah, why is this showing up on Motoringfile if it isn't really MINI related necessarily?

Thanks Gabe: The Alpine touch screen is the best I have used with the new 420i. I wouldn't have considered it without this review.

Or, you could just do to your MINI what Alpine did to theirs: http://ecominet2.alpine-usa.com/html/adc/2004mini/2004mini.htm

I thought the 420i head unit was ugly (garish is not a strong enough term) until that link Aaron… someone needs to give Alpine a taste transplant! I have ended up using the aux input and the iPod remote velcroed to the wiper stalk since I use the iPod for http://www.audible.com books when in the car this is working ok for me as I get my music from XMDirect in the MINI… but if I did not have the sat radio I would go with the MINI/BMW unit with all its faults it is the most intergrated for now… but I bet the 06 or 07 MINI radio will have an elegant integrated solution with a nice built in iPod dock… any wagers

Sweet review… I still think I'll be going with the Apple interface though :-D

I completely agree with Patrick, I just bought this and the sound is great but scrolling is unworkable for me. It would be much better if it allowed the iPod controls to still function instead of “taking over.” I'm going to revert to my Neo Car Jukebox instead.

I bought the Alpine iPod Interface, KCA-420i along with an Alpine head unit several months ago. I was looking forward to getting it since I have owned two different FM-transmitters and was not happy with either the quality of the audio in my car (friends have them and audio is fine for some reason) or the ease of use. However, having had this setup for a while, I would not recommend it. First, navigating to play specific bands, playlists or songs takes forever. When you scroll, it pauses on each selection for a second no matter how hard you turn the dial. So if you have 100 artists, scrolling to the one you want may take 1-2 minutes, and you have to pay attention as you scroll because of how they are displayed. Second, it displays the title, artists, albums, song time and time of day, but only one of those at a time, and the button to change is small and in an akward postition above the dial (maybe not a problem with other head units). I thought about buying a clock for my car now since it is akward to keep switching to time, then back to the display I usually use. This is strange since they have plenty of room on the display to show things like the this. Also, I leave the display on artist usually since I play my songs randomly and like this when a song comes up that I don’t recognize immediately. The problem with this is it takes 6 seconds to show this info. When a new song first starts playing it shows the song time for this period then switches back to what you have it set to display. If you change the volume or other settings during this period it adds to this time for some reason, so it usally takes around 8-10 seconds to show the song info I want. Also confusing to me is that as I switch between different sources, it remembers my display setting, but for CD and Tuner only shows “No Title” or “No Text”, which makes it look like there is problem as I listen to radio. Another odd feature is that it scrolls the display no matter how long the text in it is. For example, “UB40″ gets scrolled across just like “Message In A Box: The Complete Recordings (Disc 2)”. This looks strange because it starts at the left and scrolls to the left, so short text is quickly scrolled off the display leaving it blank for a bit. Again, not a big deal, but it just makes it look goofy. Another annoying thing is that it does not remember random settings. I almost always listen to my iPod in random mode (especially given the hard navigation), so evertyime I get in car, I have to hit the random button twice to get it in “random all” mode. Another problem for me is that it does not charge or recognize the iPod when its battery is low. I only listen to my iPod in my car, since I commute quite a bit each day. The iPod can generally handle being left in the car, except that the battery sometimes runs down over night just enough to not be recognized by the Alpine. I have to get it out of the glove box and turn it on manually for the unit to then recognize it. If the battery ran down enough to not come on manually I have to charge it at my computer, then put it back in the car. This probably is not a problem for most people that use their iPod regularly outside their car, but it seems seems that this unit is meant for my setup — The connector takes two hands, is somewhat fragile and is in my glove box. The glove box seems natural since they do not provide a way to hang it up like they show on the Alpine website and even if it is out, the iPod only displays “Alpine” and you cannot interact with it while connected, it does not look like it meant to be connected and disconnected easily every time you get in and out of your car. The one positive is that I get crystal clear audio now… now if it was just the song I wanted to hear, it would be perfect.

I totally agree with Drew on every bit of his message.

The audio is perfect, but searching a band or a song takes forever and is clearly dangerous while driving (and lets be realistic on this one: how many times would you pull over and stop driving, just to scroll to the song you want?)

BoerFons