The UPS guy stopped by my place the other day with a package from “Crutchfield”:4. Inside was the “Alpine CDA-9856″:3 iPod-ready car head unit (aka, car stereo) along with all the stuff needed for the install. Crutchfield really came through with complete instructions and lots of extras to make sure the install went smoothly.

Actually, my install was relatively simple. Since I had replaced the factory head unit a number of years back — so I could play MP3 CDs in my car — about the only thing that I needed to do was take out the old stereo, cut off the old stereo’s connector and solder in the Alpine connector to the harness.

If you’re thinking of doing something similar, don’t use electrical tape to insulate the solder joints. When the tape gets hot in the car, the adhesive basically melts off leaving a gooey mess that won’t insulate anything.

After the harness was finished, all I had to do was plug it into the back of the Alpine along with the “Alpine KCE-422i”:1 iPod adapter cable and slide it into the dash.

Overall the system works great. To get the iPod hooked up to the Alpine all you have to do is plug it into the Alpine iPod cable and switch the source input to _iPod_. And while the iPod is plugged in the Alpine will charge it for ya.

You can do pretty much everything you can do on the iPod (eg, search, fast forward, rewind, etc.) via the Alpine. However, the Alpine only has a one-line display, so it helps to have your music — if you have a lot of songs on you iPod — well organized in playlists.

If you interested in the Alpine solution, “here’s”:2 a link to the Alpine demo showing off the iPod interface.

*_Update: 2006-07-25_*
The Alpine works great!

The hardware interface is bomber. You can hot plug the iPod in and out of the Alpine no worries. The volume is controlled by a knob on the head unit, and the buttons are reasonably sized (they are still small, but are much larger than the buttons on my old Kenwood head unit).

The software (the iPod interface of the Alpine head unit) is solid too. The only limitation is the one-line display of the head unit which limits information display. You can get around this limitation if you have well-organized playlists… something I don’t really have yet.

Overall, I can highly recommend Alpine’s _Full Speed_ iPod interface.

[4(Crutchfield page for the CDA-9856)]http://www.crutchfield.com/S-mRu7cwhBstz/cgi-bin/ProdView.asp?search=CDA%2D9856&i=500CDA9856

[3(Alpine page for the CDA-9856)]http://www.alpine-usa.com/en/products/product.php?model=CDA-9856

[2(Flash-based Full Speed demo)]http://www.alpinefullspeed.com/go.html

[1(Alpine iPod adapter cable)]http://www.alpine-usa.com/en/products/product.php?model=KCE-422i