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Crutchfield debuts "digital drive-thru" for iPod owners
If you've wandered the aisles of your local consumer electronics megastore lately, you've probably seen racks of products promising to connect your iPod or other digital music player to your car's audio system... everything from cables to FM transmitters. But what's going to work best in your ride? Mail order car audio house Crutchfield thinks it has a better way. The company announced Thursday that it is launching its "digital drive-thru" service, a program that matches up your car, your audio system (OEM or aftermarket), and your iPod model, to recommend the best solution for making them all play together.
It appears to be a pretty easy process, and Crutchfield's database of more than 10,000 cars and car stereo systems means that they're more than likely to have a workable solution for every situation. An installation graphic shows would-be buyers how to do it (a VW Golf example is shown above), and Crutchfield's products also comes with an iPod installation guide for you manual-readers out there. (You know who you are.)
Virginia-based Crutchfield got its started out in the consumer electronics business with car audio systems, and it remains the company's core business. The digital drive-thru joins Crutchfield's "Find What Fits My Car" website tool in the company's customer support arsenal.
[Source: Crutchfield]
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Chris 2:15PM (3/31/2006)
Crutchfield is the ONLY place to buy mobile electroincs from. I purchased an S50 Sirus Satellite radio and it went dead in about two months. I e-mailed Sirius about 6 times and never heard back from them. I e-mailed Crutchfield about my problem and got a response in 12 hours. In week they had sent me a brand new receiver at no charge. They do a great job over there.
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TJ 2:54PM (3/31/2006)
first off, i'm not trying to plug circuit city in any way shape or form, i just want to give you the facts. Circuit city carries all the same brands as crutchfield(minus kenwood). all of the OEM aux input adapters, ipod adapters and fm modulators crutchfield has circuit city has. and if you get it installed at circuit city, you have a lifetime, yes LIFETIME warrenty on labor. so if there are any problems with the install, or the product, circuit city will check it out at no charge. that also includes professional removal of the installed product at no charge if you need to sell or trade in the car. (great for leased vehicles)
Nothing against crutchfield, i love their website, and have ordered things from there in the past. Circuit city's web site is pretty good, but for the more car model specific stuff, you'll need to stop by the store, they have alot more products available then their website seems to list.
best buy is a joke. none of the salespeople, or the installers ever seem to know anything about car audio. I have been to quite a few circuit city's in my time and have never met a salesperson or installer who didn't know what they were talking about.
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Matt 3:18PM (3/31/2006)
I've had something very similar to this for my GTI for about two years now and it works great. Though mine is a modified Belkin car charger, and cost about 1/2 as much.
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Bob Loblaw 12:16AM (4/01/2006)
If they offered a splitter that allowed you to select between the CD changer and iPod, I'd buy it in a second.
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charlesk 5:36PM (4/01/2006)
That was a bit rubbish. I've a 2nd gen iPod and a brand new car with a Clarion stereo.
The obvious solution would be to get a Clarion CE-Net aux adapter (EE-1155B-A, IIRC) to plug into the head unit's CE Net port. But what do they offer? An FM transmitter that attached directly to the aerial connection. OK, it's cheap, but also not very good.
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Logic 12:54PM (4/13/2006)
I'm still waiting for people to wake up and smell the coffee.. The iPod SUCKS. Too much DRM crap, UI is crap, sound is crap... Wouldn't it make SO much more sense to just ditch the whole thing and get a proper HDD-based MP3 player for your car? Oh, right -- THERE AREN'T ANY ANYMORE. Whatever happened to the Rio, Omnifi, etc.? I'll tell you what -- lazy users who can't be bothered with figuring out some fairly simple software to maintain their files and system. Yes, the Omnifi software was crap; so what? Get up off your lazy n00b ass and download the open-source Openfi and all your problems are solved. Better yet, if you have opposable thumbs and can use a screwdriver -- swap in a 120GB HDD into that sucka -- and you're set for life!
Fiddle with a teeny display and stupid "touch wheel" on a $350 30GB iPod? No thanks. I'd much rather use a nice DIN-sized controller to listen to my 100+ GB of music on my $120 Omnifi.
Have fun with your craPods!! :)
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