Pioneer puts iPod on car radios

Stan Beer
Wednesday, 23 March 2005 00:30

IT Industry - Development

Pioneer iPod Adapter CD-IB100
$199
www.pioneeraus.com.au

In the 21st Century, it often seems as if buying the latest version is a better alternative – and even cheaper – than upgrading an older piece of technology. Thankfully, that's not always the case.

Ok, so we're talking about a specific brand and a specific type of technology here, but it doesn't matter – this particular adapter actually works. It's an iPod adapter for Pioneer car radio systems up to 10 years old. It does this by using Pioneer's 'IP Bus' system, originally designed to connect a CD stacker to car radio through a simple 'one cable solution'.

Now, the adapter isn't much to look at – but that's because it was never designed to be on display. The auto-electrician that installs it for you will undoubtedly hide it out of sight.

With an iPod akin to a giant CD stacker, it makes sense to let older car radios take advantage of newer technology in this way. Controlling the iPod is done through the CD controls on the car radio. Pioneer stereos will display up to eight characters of text including album, artist and song names, with the ability to scroll additional information. While an iPod is docked to the CD-IB100, the adapter will charge the internal battery of the player so the iPod as well.

The unit also works with Pioneer radios that feature a relatively large LCD screen for TV display or other information. Such screens have been on high-end models of car radios for over a decade, and if you're lucky enough to have such a radio, you'll see much more info on the LCD screen about artists, song names etc. If the screen is a touch screen (as most, if not all, are) then the iPod controls are all available through the radio's touch screen, which is easily controlled by the driver, letting you choose artists, albums, tracks etc safely… an important consideration when you're driving!

Another benefit to the system is that it is able to take full advantage of Pioneer's audio enhancement capabilities such as Easy Equalizer (EEQ) and Bit Media Expander (BMX). If your Pioneer car radio has the built-in BMX feature, it will automatically restore the harmonics lost during recording of compressed music, giving you much more of the same warmth and richness found in the original music.

So… this is definitely quite specific technology – you'll need an older Pioneer car radio and an iPod to take advantage of it. But if you've got both of these, we're sure you'll be pleased to discover there's a simple way to link them both together, without having to worry about FM transmitters or cassette tape adaptors, with access to music retained through the radio's existing CD controls.

ALEX ZAHAROV-REUTT