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Best HU for quality Bluetooth handsfree?

3K views 6 replies 4 participants last post by  skoobs 
#1 ·
Hey Everyone

It's been a long time since I've researched my car audio so I'm out of the loop with current standards and technology.

I'm looking to upgrade the wife's factory radio in her '08 Nissan Dualis. Originally, she wanted a Parrot bluetooth handsfree unit, but after some initial research, I figured it might be better value to upgrade the head unit to one that incorporates bluetooth handsfree while I'm at it.

Her primary requirement is a good quality bluetooth handsfree feature that, is fully iPhone 4 compatible, allows direct connection for charging, has full access to phonebook and most of all, has clear voice calling and noise/echo minimising technology. Getting an improved sound system as a bonus is secondary to that.

I know Alpine HU's incorporate Parrot technology and I haven't heard any bad things about that Parrot brand, so my primary question is, how do the other manufacturer's handsfree feature stack up against the Alpine range? Is that technology broadly similar across the board or is Parrot a standout at what they do?

So far, some of the models I've been comparing are;

Alpine's CDE-126BT
Eclipse's CD5030
Pioneer's DEH-7350BT
and
JVC's KD-R926BT

From a car audio POV, the Eclipse seems loaded with SQ features that you only get in higher priced Alpine decks like 7-band PEQ, time correction and 5V pre-outs and Eclipse's twin security setup is always a selling point with me so it appears it's a great bang for bucks unit. And if I was buying based on SQ then i'd be leaning towards this one. But the primary "want" here is the handsfree feature, and I can't find any source to confirm whether or not it's fully compatible with iPhone 4, or what the quality of the bluetooth is like (comparable to Parrot?).

The JVC also seems pretty feature-rich in it's specs, but I've only ever installed one JVC HU in my dad's car (his choice) and the SQ of the JVC was pretty average I found. Maybe this unit is better built or JVC have improved over the years? Anyone got an opinion on this unit?

So, does anyone have opinions on the quality of the bluetooth on non-Alpine brands?
And what's everyone's take on these units overall? Or are there better units for less than $400 out there?
 
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#2 ·
I didn't do a lot of calling from my jvc kd a925bt (I'm assuming these are very similar) so I don't know how well you can control the address book from the HU. I always just voice dialed from my iPhone 4.

As for call quality it wasnt as good ad my blue parrot professional head sets. The mic, like many cell phones and wireless headsets, pick up a lot of environmental noises. However none of my friends complained about my voice quality and when asked they said I got noisy or choppy every now and then.

One more issue I had that your wife may not, is the incoming sound goes to all channels, including the subs. Some fiends' phones put lots of low freq noise thru and it sounded aweful when it came in. Like my buddy's ring back tones. I didn't have any way to kill or turn down the sub channel easily except to go into the menu fairly deeply and shut off the sub channel.

Really wasn't that bad but there were the above issues. Gl on your search.

Edit: when I turned off the sub, the call quality was really good on my massive rk6s
 
#3 ·
For me, Kenwood KDC-x994 is more than acceptable. x995 is basically the same model, improved. I make phone calls all the time. The CD/mp3 sound quality is terrible with any of Kenwood's black-box sound-enhancing features turned on, such as Supreme+, highway sound, and boost boost. For example, an audio web site measured that channel separation drops down to 15dB with Supreme+ on. Turn them all off, and it's a decent unit for the money. I use its time alignment for time correction in a bi-amp front stage. It works ok, though I would have preferred if correction step size was smaller.
 
#6 ·
The 994 is a good unit. I've used one and it's a good unit for the money. The "sound enhancing options" do take away from the sound like said by ZAKOH. The highway sound feature is supposed to compensate for road noise, but ends up just causing the tweets to sound too loud.

Great crossover options for a non active head unit, and the BT works well. About as well as a non headset mic will do in a noisy car environment.
 
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