mvague
06-21-2004, 10:34 AM
I went through a LOT of research on these sort of things after purchasing my ipod, when I had my Miata.
1. I wasn't going to ever bother with a tape adapter, or FM transmitter, as I bought the ipod for sound quality, and neither of those things can even be considered to have that going for them.
2. I finally settled on buying an in-dash unit with an aux in and getting the belkin auto kit, and that was fine, if expensive overall and a hassle to boot.
THEN I sold my car. ... *sigh*
OK, so when I bought my 2002 Jetta, there was NO WAY I was going to do away with the monsoon single din stock stereo, because it all looks sooo good in that car at night (all those blue and red lights...). So, the research began all over again.
long story short, I ended up at enfig.com and spoke to Christian there... the kits they put together were cool, modified belkin kits and easy plug ins for stock head units make for a 10 minute installation.
*the only negative was that I got an early version of the ipod charger and it has problems with shorts, and they didn't want to do a swap without me buying another one and them crediting my account when they get the original one back... (which I am doing now)
(to be fair, Christian did offer to have me send my original back, and THEN they would send me another, but I just COULDN'T wait for well over a week without an ipod in my car, not that it sounds SO good. so...)
it really is cool, there's a bit of distortion now and then, but I think it's possibly the original adapter I have, and that the replacement will get rid of it, OR, it's that line-out issue I've read about where you have to reduce the volume of the aac files, and then boost the volume on the HU. Either way, it's still a much better solution than most I've read about.
1. I wasn't going to ever bother with a tape adapter, or FM transmitter, as I bought the ipod for sound quality, and neither of those things can even be considered to have that going for them.
2. I finally settled on buying an in-dash unit with an aux in and getting the belkin auto kit, and that was fine, if expensive overall and a hassle to boot.
THEN I sold my car. ... *sigh*
OK, so when I bought my 2002 Jetta, there was NO WAY I was going to do away with the monsoon single din stock stereo, because it all looks sooo good in that car at night (all those blue and red lights...). So, the research began all over again.
long story short, I ended up at enfig.com and spoke to Christian there... the kits they put together were cool, modified belkin kits and easy plug ins for stock head units make for a 10 minute installation.
*the only negative was that I got an early version of the ipod charger and it has problems with shorts, and they didn't want to do a swap without me buying another one and them crediting my account when they get the original one back... (which I am doing now)
(to be fair, Christian did offer to have me send my original back, and THEN they would send me another, but I just COULDN'T wait for well over a week without an ipod in my car, not that it sounds SO good. so...)
it really is cool, there's a bit of distortion now and then, but I think it's possibly the original adapter I have, and that the replacement will get rid of it, OR, it's that line-out issue I've read about where you have to reduce the volume of the aac files, and then boost the volume on the HU. Either way, it's still a much better solution than most I've read about.