Team-BHP - ICE for my RS

Hi guys,

I picked up a yellow RS last week and am absolutely loving every bit of it. Only thing is I would love to connect my ipod to the alpine in my RS which came stock with it. Is this possible. Somebody told me the RS comes with a ipod connectivity cable.Is that true? Or should a cable be purchased for this purpose? I would like to change tracks on the ipod rather than the system. What should be done to satisfy the above requirements? How much would this cost me? The alpine in the RS is it vcd/dvd compatible as well?

I am also looking at a touchscreen option. What would be my best bet? I have seen a lot of touchscreens on the U.S. ebay which are pretty cheap. Are they good? Jensons seem to have a sale but are the products good? With the touchscreens what are the features which come with them? What are the prices like?

Would appreciate your inputs.
Cheers

Alpine has a unit that connects the HU to an ipod. However the HU on the RS is too fiddly for my liking. I procured an apline specific cable from amazon and used this with a Harmon Kardon Drive play

Does the RS still come with the Alpine 9830? If yes, you can use the iPod adaptor KCA 420i

The 9830 does not play any video formats. You could hook up an external DVD changer or so for that.

Congrats for the vRs first of all.
You need KCA 420i for it . Should cost you around 6-8k.
In that AFAIK you'll can change the tracks both with the ipod as well as the Headunit.

Quote:

Originally Posted by abhinav.gupta88 (Post 961207)

Congrats for the vRs first of all.
You need KCA 420i for it . Should cost you around 6-8k.
In that AFAIK you'll can change the tracks both with the ipod as well as the Headunit.

6-8K for a Cable???:Shockked: U can get an Ipod compatible HU for that price!!

Quote:

Originally Posted by JayD (Post 961326)

6-8K for a Cable???:Shockked: U can get an Ipod compatible HU for that price!!

It costs only around Rs.2000.

Ignore the post: The price I have posted is for the cable.

Quote:

Originally Posted by abhinav.gupta88 (Post 961207)

You need KCA 420i for it . Should cost you around 6-8k.
In that AFAIK you'll can change the tracks both with the ipod as well as the Headunit.

1. the 420i costs about 4K now. The 422i sells for about 3K (grey)
2. with the 420i you can only use the HU to change tracks.

both cables are fine if you have play lists or play entire albums (like I do). If however you like to search and seek (like my wife) they are little better than useless unles you have a rather small collection (ours is about 9000+ songs , from 300+ artists and 600+ albums).

If you seek and search and want full ipod functionality the Drive Play is a better option (you do have todeal with the Drive Play's display unit).

Alpine 420i is the ipod connectivity cable and interface for the older HUs like 9830/31/35 etc.. It costs around 4k.
If this is used, then changing tracks is only possible on the HU and not on the ipod.

Alpine 422i is the ipod cable for newer HUs (from 2006 onwards). The interface is inbuilt on the HU. Again, all the controls are on the HU and it's very fast too.

If you want to control playback on ipod and want the sound played thru the HU alone, then I would suggest you to get an aux in cable for 9830. Connect the ipod to the HU as Aux, switch on Aux in from the HU. And go boom boom boom!

I might upgrade to a touchscreen in the near future. So do you guys think it makes more sense now to get the aux in cable and plug in to my ipod and play the tracks from the pod?

If you have an HU with AUX-IN, you could go in for a normal audio cable that costs Rs. 20/- .. You will not be able to change tracks from the HU and will have to use iPod for that. All other functionality of HU i.e. equalizer etc. will be applicable.

I am using this cable with my Pioneer 6950. One end goes into the Aux-In behind the HU and the other in the Headphone socket of the iPod.

Quote:

Originally Posted by redsfx (Post 980997)

I might upgrade to a touchscreen in the near future. So do you guys think it makes more sense now to get the aux in cable and plug in to my ipod and play the tracks from the pod?

1. if you are going to upgrade the HU why invest in a Alpine specific cable?

2. Touchscreen are notoriously diffcult to use while driving. In bright sunlight the screen can be all but unreadable.

Quote:

Originally Posted by manveet (Post 981243)

Or you could use the FM transmitter that connects to your iPod.. costs about 300 bucks.

You select FM on your HU and play it at the frequency of your choice.