A good friend of mine (Brad, you know who you are) were having our normal morning debate while trying to get the coffee flowing. I happened to ask him, "If you were shopping for an indash NAV unit, what would you be looking for"? Now keep in mind, i'm no stranger to high end car audio, i've just been out of the loop for a few years. Well, after a lot of research on the web and a lot of lurking on AVIC411.com, it only took 4 days to make decision. I just placed on order for my AVIC-F90BT from 6AVE.com for $598 (found the coupon). Order the rear camera, Scosche dash kit, harness and PAC SW1-PS from Amazon. Should have it all next Thursday. Thanks to everyones posts. It made the decision that much easier.

Agreed. Most of us would've paid $5k for a system that did all this crap five years ago. Prices are out of hand right now

Congrats on the purchase.

In 2003 and I paid $2500 for an Alpine 900. It was a flip out, in dash DVD player. No navigation, no ipod control, no bluetooth...

WOW, thinking back... that unit really sucked!

Back in 1989, a buddy of mine had a $1400 Nakamichi cassette deck. State of the art...

I know what you mean. When I bought my Maxima a few years ago, I thought there was NO way I'd ever replace the craptacular Bose HU. It ended up breaking so I had no choice. I went to Maxima.org expecting to hear that I was screwed and had to have it installed by pros that would charge $500 etc. 2 weeks later I'd installed a new Pioneer HU myself.

Flash forward another year and here I am installing a Pioneer nav unit! I never thought I'd have an in dash nav HU, much less one for $375.00! It's forums like this that save the average Joe like me a Hell of a lot of money. Plus, and it might just be me, but I tend to appreciate something a lot more if I did it myself. I tell my friend's I installed my own HU and they think I'm crazy.

I got a f90bt for $429 after ebay coupon and live cashback

got a backup camera from china for $20

got a 500 watt alpine amp and 2 alpine subs for $80

got sir-pnr2 for $30

got the pac-swips for $40

install by a friend who owns a shop got all harnesses and wires and built the box Free

Grand total is $599. This would have cost $5000 five years ago

Grand total is $599. This would have cost $5000 five years ago

It probably would've been more. Technology's a great thing, it always leaves you wondering what'll be the next big thing...probably internet access to check your mail and such, and a playlist that uploads from your home computer and the option to download music right to your unit via iTunes or something. That'd be awesome.

Grand total is $599. This would have cost $5000 five years ago

 

It probably would've been more. Technology's a great thing, it always leaves you wondering what'll be the next big thing...probably internet access to check your mail and such, and a playlist that uploads from your home computer and the option to download music right to your unit via iTunes or something. That'd be awesome.

You can have all that already. I know I did with my CarPC. You can get pretty crazy with that stuff.

It's possible with Avic as it is a little PC too

Yeah but getting it right now requires building a carputer or hacking the F. I'm talking about it coming stock. I mean what else can you cram into a radio? They already have GPS nav, multimedia from multiple sources, gas prices, movie info, forcast, traffic info, bluetooth, SAT ready, voice commands, Hard drives, besides internet access and downloading straight to the radio I can't imagine any other breakthrough ideas. Maybe blu-ray player but that's not a huge leap in technological advances as far as aftermarket radios go.

That was so hilarious, I had to keep from chocking on my gum. Oh wait, nothing funny happened to you monday, why am I laughing?

Pretty crazy how fast things advance. Check out the future of car audio.

Pretty crazy how fast things advance. Check out the future of car audio.

Internet connected is a great first step for next gen nav systems. But I don't think mercede's has a holy grail on their hands yet. You need internet connection for this to run, and considering that cell coverage doesn't exactly work everywhere due to terrain, cell tower locations, and coverage you could be left with out music, and navigation easily if you happened to be traveling through a tunnel, through the mountians, or other notoriously bad coverage areas.

They also need to work on the user interface, until I can quickly select "Korean Food" while waiting at a stop light and direct myself to the closest korean food location we are still not at an optimal user interface design. And in my opinion that's simply what both OEM & after market nav system developers seem to miss. They are so busy making sure you've got your parking break on in order to use the nav system that they haven't bothered to make it easy and quick to use even if the break is off.

I'm not really seeing the funny part.

Grand total is $599. This would have cost $5000 five years ago

 

It probably would've been more. Technology's a great thing, it always leaves you wondering what'll be the next big thing...probably internet access to check your mail and such, and a playlist that uploads from your home computer and the option to download music right to your unit via iTunes or something. That'd be awesome.

Use an iPhone - headphone jack into audio in - use Symplify Media app to access your home computer's playlists - get your email - use Pandora.

Yeah not quite what you're talking about but not the bother of a carPC either...

I'm not really seeing the funny part.

Keep looking, you'll find it

Use an iPhone - headphone jack into audio in - use Symplify Media app to access your home computer's playlists - get your email - use Pandora.

 

Yeah not quite what you're talking about but not the bother of a carPC either...

I guess that would work, and the ability to use Pandora is pretty cool, but I can see that becoming dangerous, looking down at your phone trying to navigate while driving. The whole point of this hands-free/internet iea is to not have to touch your phone.

You guys talk about indash car audio computers well i acutally have one that Clarion Made back in the day its called the Clarion Joyride System google it and check it out. I paid almost 2500 for this system in 1800 and that was cost back then since i worked at a car audio shop it was a neat unit but not practial ya know..