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Head unit upgrade


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Hello all,

new to this page and have little knowledge about in car headunits.

Do they all connect in the same way? don't won't to buy one that won't fit.

Can anyone link me to a forum post or post a answer ?

Cheers Luke.

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A single DIN upgrade is pretty simple. The radio should slide straight in to the existing slot. The standard VW harness will fit virtualy all aftermarket radios, you just have to switch the red and yellow bullet connectors around, like the instructions on the radio tell you to. You might need an adapter for the aerial plug.

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By that Skezza do you just mean buy or make the adaptors for switching the red and yellow over?

Well I'd buy one personally, but yes essentially, but the adapter also has the important blue wire, which, when connected to a signal separation filter, lets you obtain AM radio, RDS data and TA data.

Aftermarket looms cost £3 or something off eBay. You can chop them up and bodge them however you want, safe in the knowledge your OEM wiring is still nice and healthy. Seems to be common sense to me.

Edited by Skezza
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Yeah I bought mine as well but I see no reason why you couldn't if you felt like it make one. Just checking we were on about the same thing.

You can, I just don't recommend it.

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Im looking at a double din head unit. will i need to buy new surrounding for the unit or will it just fit. Also if you know about aerial upgrades I'm looking a a shark fine aerial on ebay anyone know about fitment or quality of this product ?(http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/BLACK-SHARK-FIN-AERIAL-ANTENNA-VW-POLO-LUPO-GOLF-BEETLE-/120497522461?pt=UK_CarsParts_Vehicles_CarParts_SM&hash=item1c0e36471d)

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Im looking at a double din head unit. will i need to buy new surrounding for the unit or will it just fit. Also if you know about aerial upgrades I'm looking a a shark fine aerial on ebay anyone know about fitment or quality of this product ?(http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/BLACK-SHARK-FIN-AERIAL-ANTENNA-VW-POLO-LUPO-GOLF-BEETLE-/120497522461?pt=UK_CarsParts_Vehicles_CarParts_SM&hash=item1c0e36471d)

If you buy a double DIN then it will most likely come with a cage, however the cages are sometimes a bit hit and miss, so I always recommend the FP-17-00 which guarantees a nice, clean, OEM-style fit, for any* double DIN radio.

*Excluding those without a indent, for those you'll need to modify it for them to fit. Easy job with a file.

Regarding the aerial, I can't tell you how easy it'll be to fit, or the quality. Straight away, I'd say you need to remove the base of the OEM aerial, which is a bit of a pain, but not impossible. What I can tell you is despite what the ad says, it's not an upgrade. It's quite stylish and a bit more modern-looking, but you will definitely suffer a reduced quality in your FM and AM signal quality. If you're happy with that go ahead and buy it. I would like to see it fitted to a Lupo, but like I said, don't expect quality reception.

Edit:

As far as I can tell, the only benefit of this aerial, is that it has a 12v booster, which I assume acts a signal separation filter (which is something most people add to their stock antenna when fitting an aftermarket head unit). It may be a proper antenna amplifier, which is fine, apart from the fact it means any interference will also be amplified quite excessively. I'd keep well away to be honest.

Edited by Skezza
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I have a kenwood 4023BT, it's a really good double din headunit for the the money, has bluetooth, ipod connection etc and displays all the info on it, including cover art! you can go through playlists etc too, it came with everything i needed to fit it and works great, sits flush with the dash too so looks nice would recommend one, don't go for a cheap ebay job from a random make, though functional the sound quality and user interface is never as good, after installing the kenwood i don't even feel i need to upgrade the speakers as it makes them sound a lot better.

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I have a kenwood 4023BT, it's a really good double din headunit for the the money, has bluetooth, ipod connection etc and displays all the info on it, including cover art! you can go through playlists etc too, it came with everything i needed to fit it and works great, sits flush with the dash too so looks nice would recommend one, don't go for a cheap ebay job from a random make, though functional the sound quality and user interface is never as good, after installing the kenwood i don't even feel i need to upgrade the speakers as it makes them sound a lot better.

I don't think the eBay units are bad, but you should be grounded and do a bit of research when buying one. Don't expect Kenwood quality audio (although they're better than OEM), or a beautifully crafted Pioneer-style interface like you said. However if you buy the correct model you should expect some of the best sat nav performance from a head unit, even better than the top brands, and because it's an open WinCE ROM, you can customize it however you want. So really, it all depends what you want and require from your head unit. If extended functionality is more important than sound quality, then definitely consider one of the eBay units (although I wouldn't buy them from eBay, there's better places)

The GPS lock times are insane on most of them (like less than 2-3 seconds) because most of them use the SirfStar IV chipset which is the best GPS-only chipset in the world. If the unit you're looking at uses the SirfStarIII or a Samsung GPS chipset, I would be wary. I have no knowledge on the Samsung chipsets, but the SirfStarIII was quite a slow chipset, to put it into a context, a SirfStarIV cold-start can beat a SirfStarIII hot-start!

I also wouldn't recommend any unit with a motorized screen. While the motorized screens are built using the same spec as the Kenwoods and Alpines, your warranty will probably not cover them (unlike with the major brands). Really, if you do want a 'China 2DIN' (as they're known), go for a 6.2 inch model with no moving parts other than the CD/DVD player and buy it from a UK warehouse, then you have piece of mind.

Edited by Skezza
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IMG_4807_zps900552f5.jpg

not the best picture in the world but you can get a good idea, the 4021BT is very similar and is slightly cheaper as well if you're on a budget

This is one of two units im looking at how much did you pay for yours mate ? and where from ?

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I've just fitted a Pioneer AVH-3500dab in mine, best upgrade I've done for ages, and the first brand new head unit I've ever bought! Ipod, DVD, DIVX, Bluetooth and dab! £309 inc the dab aerial, bargain!!!

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Get the pioneer appradio sph da-100

Best headunit for the money

Just picked mine up off ebay for £100

I'd absolutely agree if they had a CD/DVD player.

The non-AppRadio Pioneer's are impressive too, but a lot of them don't have Sat Nav.

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When I bought this radio, I was told to keep away from the app radio as they are 'troublesome'! I was going to buy a Sony double-din, as I had a 10-disc changer and the ipod kit from my old radio, but was also told that Sony's double dins were' crap'! I would have liked sat nav as well, but for the extra £200 they seem to be over the media receivers, I'll stick with my stand-alone one. You can buy a sat nav add-on for the Pioneers though...

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