Hard Drive, Easy Trip
Take a look at the latest and greatest hard drive car stereo head units.
By Doug Newcomb
://www.techtv.com/callforhelp/products/story/0,24330,3421184,00.html
Car stereos with hard drives
When you hit the road, you gotta bring your music along. As you'll see on today's show, the latest generation of car radios that incorporate hard drives let you leave those bulky CDs at home.
Alpine HDA-5460
The Alpine HDA-5460 features a 16GB hard drive for storing more then 3,000 MP3, WMA, or WAV music files. The removable hard drive sports a USB port, and you get Alpine's Mobile Multimedia Driver software to manage your file library. The HDA-5460 links to any Alpine radio that uses the company's Ai Net connection scheme, or it can be jacked into any other radio via an RCA connection. No price has been set for the HAD-5460, which will be available this summer.
Pioneer DEH-P90HDD
The Pioneer DEH-P90HDD CD receiver will rip music from a CD or live radio broadcast straight to a 10GB hard drive. The built-in Gracenote Music Recognition Service tags files with artist name, song title, and CD title. You can also update and share songs via a memory stick slot, which adds its own digital music options. The DEH-P90HDD is XM Satellite Radio-ready, and comes with a steering-wheel remote.
Suggested retail price: $2,100
Sony MEX-HD1
This CD receiver lets you record music from a CD onto a hard drive at 8X speed while you listen to it at the same time. Once downloaded from a CD to the MEX-HD-1's hard drive, songs can be labeled and categorized with the custom file memory and folder options. You can also download some of the MEX-HD1's 165 hours of music to a memory stick via the built-in slot for playback on compatible portable devices.
Suggested retail price: $1,500
ALPINE ANNOUNCES NEW HDA-5460 IN-DASH HARD DISK DRIVE PLAYER FOR NON-STOP ACCESS TO MP3/WMA MUSIC FILES
IN THE CAR
TORRANCE, Calif., January 9, 2003 -- Alpine Electronics of America, Inc., the industry-leading manufacturer of high performance mobile electronics, today unveiled a new in-dash 16GB hard disk drive system capable of storing more than 3,000 MP3, WMA or .WAV digital music files for playback in the car. The HDA-5460 features Alpine's new Quick Search™ functionality, allowing users to easily find the track they are looking for, and comes complete with the powerful Mobile Multimedia Driver desktop software for acquiring, organizing and managing their music collection. The system can be easily integrated with any Alpine Ai-Net head unit or can function as a stand-alone playback system using an RCA output.
"With roughly 61 million Americans regularly downloading music from the Internet, there is an emerging market for systems that let them easily enjoy those libraries in the vehicle," said Steve Witt, Alpine's vice president of Brand Marketing. "Alpine's HDA-5460 is a premium in-dash playback solution that defines itself with industry-leading features that address the particular challenges online music enthusiasts face, including the need to more intuitively navigate through large libraries to easily find the music they're looking for."
The HDA-5460 is designed for an in-dash installation, putting all the system controls in front of the user. The HDA-5460 features a three-line text display and Quick Search functionality for genre, artist, album, song or playlist search using a simple "paddle switch" on the front panel. The system's faceplate, which pulls off for security and accessing the removable hard disk drive, features Alpine's Biolite™ technology delivering brighter visuals to help punch through sun glare, as well as wider horizontal and vertical viewing angles for easier operation. The player also features a unique selectable DJ function that personalizes 10 genre selections with different DJ voices and sound effects and Alpine's Music Visualizer™, which provides accompanying graphics on the display.
The HDA-5460's removable hard disk drive features a USB port for easy connection to PCs for fast transfer of music files. The system comes complete with Alpine's Mobile Multimedia Driver software, providing powerful desktop tools for managing large libraries of MP3, WMA or .WAV files. The software allows people to easily create customized playlists for playback on the HDA-5460. An "auto-synch" function allows people to quickly update their hard disk drive with the latest music they've downloaded to their desktop.
The HDA-5460 is expected to be available through Alpine authorized dealers this summer.
