Ok, first I will apologize if this has been addressed before. How does one change radio presets via the steering wheel controls? Mine will only apparently move up and down via frequency. Is there a setting in the system that I missed to change that? I have only had a few mins hands on with this new nav but I have read the manual cover to cover. My first impressions, this thing kicks the shit out of the Kenwood 814 I had! The iPod interface is a thing of beauty for sure. I mean I can actually move between songs with no delays! The voice activation I have so far had hit or miss luck. Usually the misses have been the way the machine pronounces some names I think. I had one contact (affectionately called Mamasita) that the nav finally found and called it exactly as one would sound it out. As we all know that is not the case with that name. lol It also had problems with Lady Gaga and it was the same story here. The sound quality is great although I need it to be adjusted as it is still setup for my old Kenwood I think and they frankly have different sounds. I was expecting the sound to be bass rich but actually it is the opposite. A very tiny tweek of the bass booster or the eq definitely fixed that but the Bit One really needs to be adjusted. That will happen next week. I am very interested in playing around with the nav end of it as I have zero experience with navs period. I want to give Avic feeds a go round soon too when I get some time. Whenever that might be... One more question that I have because my installer mentioned he did it on his kenwood. Does this nav allow proximity alerts? He said he loaded in all the red light cameras in the area into his. I would really like to do that with mine if it is possible. Thanks for any help. A big thanks to VBlue too for all his help over ths past year or so too. Much appreciated.

Oh, and it is true. The Pioneer PAC unit kicks the living crap out of the Kenwood equivalent! I hated that thing on the last setup. I absolutely love it now. It actually works like it should and how it did with my factory deck setup.

Ok, first I will apologize if this has been addressed before. How does one change radio presets via the steering wheel controls? Mine will only apparently move up and down via frequency.

Unfortunately you cant do preset up/down and track skip up/down with the same control. Track up/down corresponds to frequency up/down. If you change the programing of the PAC module to give you preset up/down, you will loose track skip all together. This is a Pioneer software issue and for whatever reason has only become the case sense the F series and up. One option you might want to consider is the PAC WIR-P wireless option with one of Pioneers wireless remotes. That will remove the limitation with the wired remote option. Search WIR-P in the general Z110BT forum for more details. Everything is stickied so it will be at the top of the forum.

Does this nav allow proximity alerts?

Unfortunately here is no POI alert feature on any Pioneer navi. You can use AVIC FEEDS to convert Traffic Camera POI but all it will allow you to do is display them on the map.

Thanks once again VBlue. I can live with having to go to the faceplate to change radio stations the few times that I actually use the radio anymore. The lack of proximity alert is a real bummer however. Oh well. That is definitely not enough to make me want to even think about Kenwood for even a second. It will be interesting to see if this year's Kenwood's are any better than last year. My guess is yes but only slightly. IMO, JVC might just have passed them actually. That new NT3 has me slightly intrigued.

Funny enough I just picked up the 9960 today. So far it appears to be as bad or worse then the 9140 as far as the interface is concerned. I will be installing it tomorrow and putting it through its paces.

Why do you put yourself through such torture?... One Kenwood was enough to turn me off that brand for a time. If I ever consider them again in the future it will only be with a helluva discount and some serious research (of the hands-on variety). What happened to the X910 anyway?

I got a blow out deal on the unit so I went for it. I will still be keeping my X910 until I know for sure that I am going to keep the 9960 or not. I will know by the next thirty days so I will be able to sell the 9960 and certainly get back what I put into it. Look at it this way, I am Guinea Pigging myself so the rest of you will know. I will certainly be doing a series of demo vids to highlight the ups and downs of the unit. I wont be at a lose on this unit.

If I were to have gotten such a deal I might have considered it too - just for kicks. On paper, it sounds like a sweet unit but upon your first writing on kenwoodforums.com I see I would really not like that unit. I am going to be taking a look at those vids when they go up tho just for curiousity sake. Plan on grabbing a JVC NT3 anytime soon? lol

LOL! No.

Ok, now after having this thing in my dash for a little more time to play with it, I have a few more things to say. First, I don't know what everyone is talking about this thing having major outdated maps. I plugged the address of the house I am having built in an area that didn't even have streets in the area 2 years ago. It found the exact road it is on even if it didn't ask for my house number (I might have done something wrong here tho). I was shocked at how accurate the maps seem actually. Maybe they have spent alot of their attention to detail on Canada. That is most welcome change to the norm. Now if only some company out there would actually start providing traffic updates in Calgary. I have yet to find a single provider for that here. It would be nice if whoever does that makes it work with this unit down the road after MSN Direct is done soon enough. I would love HD Radio up here someday too as I think that could be the best solution for this down the road. That service is already available for Vancouver, Montreal, Ottawa and Toronto - all of those are alot closer to the US border however too. Damned CRTC - I hate them. We'd have Pandora up here legally without them too. Ok, back on track after that vent. The iPod control on this thing is unbelievable. It actually works like it should. I can zip through 15 songs in like 15 seconds. Voice activation has been spot on for pretty much every order I have made of it so far. Actually, the vc has been spot on for all except my phone contacts. Sadly, I have had as much luck with this as everyone else really. I am still playing with it and I only have like 2 contacts right now - lol. I am still kind fo learning how to use it for navi entry but the one time I tried it - it was accurate. For sound quality, it is good if a little undecided so far. You see, I don't think the bit one was fully reset with this install. It has a pretty noticeable hiss between songs and the music is decisively high ended. Tells me the tweeters are getting too much juice possibly. I sure can make it have bass tho with all the very welcome controls for bass control (loudness, eq, bass boost) which the Kenwood had none of. I am going to go back next week for it to be tuned (my installer suggested that when I picked up the car). This thing looks sweet in my dash too. Very happy so far. I can't wait for the update too. I am hoping it fixes the having to hit the agree sign for the vr to start (I ran into this already - kind of annoying). Just thought this might be of interest to some.