Summary: 2008-01-04 11:01:16 I've been wanting to upgrade my stock system to that of a all-in-one, loaded system and after xmas this unit's price fell to somewhat reasonable. I got mine for $750 with warranty & 1 yr labor, so.. ok. I was so excited after I installed this as it looks nifty on my panel (black! shiny! blue lights!), but my joy quickly turned to horror as I learn this is one heck of an un-user-friendly unit. Let's see where to begin...initial setup was a nightmare, as it's asking installation angle (must not be more than 30 degrees vertical, 5 horizontal...which translates to Lv. 1 thru 5 when you type it in the unit - huh? don't worry, they give you an origami measuring device - take off the faceplate and manually measure the angles, please) and reverse polarization orientation (that really means forward or reverse in your gear orientation, yeah the system wants you to input that, but you don't type in FWD or RVS, naturally. You type in GND or Battery, silly). And so after the initial setting is up, it's time to calibrate the GPS. The system made me go back and forth between the main manual and the installation manual, because, read above, i need to put in the installation angle. Oh yeah, the main manual is missing that step about the angle-thingy so hopefully you realize it sooner or later. Then it's asking me to drive around for 10 mins, with a specific speed that it didn't specify (just drive around till the system says ok! speed's good enough!), while continuously engaging the parking brake on and off. Ok. So I got through that. But then I tried presetting my favorite radio station and even that wasn't a simple process! You know most units has simple "memory" and "enter" button that you use to preset your fave station? Not this one! It's asking me to tune in to my fave station, then display the "Preset List" by pressing up-button or down-button, but when you press either button, you lose that station because the Preset List displays other stations that you of course have not set up! Upon closer examination it turns out that I have to hold the arrow DOWN button in order to get it into "memory" mode. Makes sense.
So anyways, to make long story short, this unit is, 1.) NOT PRACTICAL, 2.) NOT FUNCTIONAL. However it is loaded and it's an all-in-one system, so if you're looking for value and don't mind spending some time memorizing the hundreds of commands, go for it. To be fair, I'm happy with the navigation as it performs better than Pioneer's, for example, but inputting the destination is NOT efficient as you have to type it in (not touch screen) on alphabet letters. Finding POI is also not easy as I fumbled finding landmarks such as LA Convention Center (have to guess "categories" if you're finding it that way). The predictive text is also somewhat annoying as it limits my search to addresses I don't want.
HDD function is USELESS as it doesn't record and display any info about the artist, song name, etc so you just have to listen to the songs and figure out who it is.
Oh, one more caution, this unit comes with a remote but it's practically useless at night, cuz it's not illuminated and you have to feel your way thru the plethora of buttons. I often find it easier to just reach out to the glowing button on the plate and risk my driving than fumbling with the remote, which defeats the purpose of having a remote. MANY OF THE COMMANDS FOR THE PLATE AND THE REMOTE ARE DIFFERENT FROM EACH OTHER, meaning that the buttons/steps that you have to press on the plate and the buttons/steps that you have to press on the remote is different, so you have to memorize two sets of commands/steps to get to the same function.
The remote itself is not intuitive, as the buttons do not relate to the button positions on the plate. For example, the volume button on the plate is located on the right-hand side, and it's a circular button that you have to press-up and -down to adjust volume. On the remote, it's located in the middle section, on a linear button up and down, but often I instictively jamb on the large circular button on the center of the remote, because it's the same shape. Same thing goes for for the AV source and navigation button, the buttons are on the circular button on the plate but it's located on the top right and top left corner on the remote.
Precisely because this unit is so compact, it crams multiple commands on many of the same buttons, but with different steps. Memorization is key, and I drive around with the manual. I actually got this unit partly to impress the girls that I'm dating with, but with operations as convoluted as this, I can forget asking their help to input destinations on the nav, ipod, hdd, etc. Not even my buddies are able to figure this out. DON'T get this for your wife or gf.
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