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TomK1 “tomk1″ (Brookeville, MD) –

  

I installed this in a car recently, and while its easy to be impressed with with what Pioneer has done in terms of interface, and look, the things they left out and what they want to charge extra for leave you scratching your head.

First of all, the screen is tremendous. It looks beautiful, it has nice touches, even to the point that when you turn your lights on, not only does the map turn dark, it puts stars in the sky of the map in 3-D view. As someone else previously mentioned, the iPod interface is superior. Just spectacular in terms of presentation, and ability to choose songs, artists, playlists, etc.

The functionality of the UI is rich and deep. The core of it was clearly designed by experts. But the details of this unit really let you down. Everything beyond base functionality is an option and a costly one at that. For example, HD Radio is an almost $100 dollar option. iPod? Yep, they deliberately crippled the unit so you need to pay $50 for a special cable (maddeningly, the iPod can be controlled with a generic ipod Cable, but no sound comes out unless you spring for the cable). Traffic information? Yep, you guessed it, another expensive option. This is not an inexpensive unit, most of this should be built in for the price.

The Bluetooth pairing process is the most unintuitive I’ve seen in any piece of electronics. But my biggest complaint is that for some reason, if you are moving, much of the options, including the ability to input a new destination disappear. I’ve heard of some older Ford and GM doing this, but every factory navigation unit made within the past 5 years doesn’t limit this functionality (and yes, I’ve heard there are bypasses, but why should you have to bypass to get to functionality that is available in the stock head unit?).

The navigation is well designed for these types of head units. It gives you a fair amount of options, lets you import & edit POI’s. It’s not feature rich, but what it does have is good, solid fundamentals, and its directions in general are no worse than a Garmin’s or other stand-along GPS.

The ECO system is gimmicky. If you like it, great, otherwise, you’ll never really use it. The anti-theft feature is that 3 buttons on the lower left come off. I don’t think it has any special circuitry and it appears likely the buttons can get lost. They do give you a screw to attach it more-or-less permanently.

My pro/con list:

PROS:
1) Beautiful screen
2) Well thought-out interface
3) Intuitive iPod controls
4) Bluetooth audio built-in
5) Good sound
6) Customizable

CONS:
1) Nav system that makes you pull over to add a new destination. Even if you have a passenger in the car.
2) Much of the options should be built in
3) I have to buy a special iPod cable?
4) Time zone must be set manually. This is so ridiculous that I called Pioneer to verify
5) The anti-theft feature seems silly. I don’t think it will prevent any thefts
6) Frustrating BT pairing process

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H. Krishnasubramani (San Jose, CA) –

  

I had this installed in my 2011 Subaru WRX a week ago and have great things to say about it. There are endless good things about this nav unit. However, here is how I break it down.

1.One of the best ones is the mat finish display that does not hinder with the sun’s glare.
2.The customizable home screen shortcuts is awesome and gives you a smartphone feel to you.
3.iPod interface and song/artist/album/album art display is brilliant. It is quite pleasing to the eye and readily readable.
4. Navigation has newest graphics and a host of information on the screen (also a borderline negative coz it is too many options on screen that can be turned off too).
5. POI search is not the most intuitive coming from an Acura owner, but one can get used to it.
6. Contacts syncing from your Bluetooth connected phone every time it is paired is a great feature, the contact list updated in the pioneer memory from any changes made on the phone.
7. A2DP profile for streaming Bluetooth music works well too, but with my BB it take a few steps, I have not tried with another phone.
8. I also tried to play music from the micro sd card which is a nice touch and plays well.
9. There are so many features in this car I have not tried after all this.

I have also not tried the Pandora or aha yet, sadly I am a Blackberry user and am hoping Pioneer will release updates to support this. I also have not tried to play Video from my iPod or DVD, which it supports.

Cons:
1. Way too customizable for an ordinary user, but one does not get this unit unless you want the level of customization and aftermarket creativity.
2. Does not support voice commands, I don’t know why they did away from that since the earlier model had it. This means you have to either dial from the phone directly or use the dial pad / contacts on the screen, but its not difficult to do either at all.
3. Pioneer does not allow you to use your iPod cable to play music through USB, you have to purchase the additional iPod cable (http://www.amazon.com/Pioneer-CD-IU50V-Interface-Cable-iPhone/dp/B001TINUF4/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1303164116&sr=8-1) that I paid $50 to buy from the installer. This is pretty lame, since the album art and song infor showed up, but no audio, they include a 3.5 mm pin for the audio alone.
4. Still not very pleased with the FM response compared to my Acura, but this is 1000 times better than my Subaru stock stereo’s FM.
5. The mute level can be customized so it can be reduced by 10db or 20db or full mute. Funny enough that I get to choose this for Tel only or both Navi Guidance and Tel but and not separately. I like it to be full muted for calls and some music can play with guidance since it takes a while for the guidance to complete (distance/lane/highway #/direction) and don’t want to have no music at that time. The other day I received a call and the caller could hear my music since it muted down only 10db. So I changed it to mute all, and both navi guidance and tel are muted down entirely. Finally I now have it to reduce by 20db for all, so now while on a call, I could have been listening to music at a reasonable volume and it muted down by 20db.

Overall, great unit, good value for the money you pay, and is firmware upgradable through micro-sd slot (should Pioneer release Blackberry compatibility ;-D)

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