ipod and Alpine

Tom,

Don't know if you are still around, but I just had my iPod die after plugging it into my Alpine. I have the CDA-9855 head unit. I have had it for about a month with no problems, then all of a sudden I had a problem today. When I used the M.I.X. setting to shuffle my music, the first song would play and then it would stop. I tried everything, but the problem continued. I was able to go to my playlists and M.I.X. those songs. I was out of my car for about an hour or so and when I got back and started it, the head unit said 'searching'. I disconnected the iPod to reset it, when I realized there was no power on the iPod itself, I thought that the battery somehow drained in the car. I plugged it in at home and went online.

After reading your discussion, I guess I will wait to see if the battery drains and the unit resets itself. How long do I wait? I have the 60GB photo. Is there a way of resetting the unit without having to wait for the battery to die? Let me know what your final outcome was. Also, if you don't mind, what are your thoughts on your Alpine unit?

My gripes with the Alpine:

1) I like to shuffle or M.I.X. my music. Every time I shut off the motor and restart my car, I have to reset the M.I.X. feature. Very annoying.
2) I have over 700 artists on my iPod. The unit will only show 511. This I didn't find out until today. So in my search for artist, it will only go from A-O. I can't scroll from P-Z. That's almost half the alphabet.
3) Same type of thing applies to playlists. I have playlists with over 400 songs, yet the Alpine will only show a max of 255.
4) I have the scroll bar on my unit. It's supposed to be faster than turning a knob, but it really isn't very fast (Apple did it right with the progressive speed search on the click-wheel). You can't drive and scroll. Also, the bar is very sensitive and I find myself making a selection by accidently pressing too hard, when I want to continue scrolling. Also very annoying.
5) The display is very hard to read during daylight hours.

There is more, but I do love the sound of my music much better than the OTA method, or even using the head phone jack directly plugged into the head unit. Thanks for any feed back.

Phil

Tom,

I just checked my battery a few minutes ago (3pm). It is finally in need of a charge (I last checked yesterday around 5pm). Won't know if everything is fine until it is fully charged. Let you know later.

Phil

Alpine issues:

1) I too have unplugged my iPod and scrolled for an artist, then plugged it back in. But what is the point of that?!
2) Not so much an issue, but the salesman at Goodguys has an older remote with the face plate tilt buttons on it (my unit face will tilt). The tilting helps with reading the display, but you have to go through a couple of steps to get it done (much easier if it is done with remote). Also, if you change direction in your car, the face needs to be tilted back (something I deal with, maybe not a concern for many).
3) ....and I guess my iPod locking up. If there is no problems with the iPod itself it isn't such a big deal, but a bit of an inconvenience.

To All,

I bought an Alpine CDA-9853 head unit for my car a few months ago and used it with the KCA-420i. My iPod worked fine for a couple weeks then it froze, still displaying the Alpine logo after disconnecting. The Apple Store just gave me a new iPod since they couldn't fix the problem. Before using the new iPod, exchanged the head unit for an Alpine CDA-9851. The iPod worked well at first, again, and then one day the head unit only displayed "Searching" when I plugged in my iPod. The iPod screen displayed "Ok to disconnect" with a large checkmark. This is what happens whenever the iPod is connected in my car. That is two different problems I've had with two different head units. I really wish I could figure this out...

P.S. I believe solution to finding the song you want more efficiently would be to make a playlist for every letter of the alphabet(song names or artists), just a suggestion...

hi,
i'm with phil on this. same type of problems re lack of searching and inability to cope with the capacity of the 60gb. unfortunately its a work vehicle that this alpine is fitted in and the others who use it with mini ipods have no trouble.
i have had mine freeze and pause at the start of each track selection and somehow info such as titles within artist folders disappeared until i was able to reboot at my desktop. it cannot search within songs randomly and gets very scared when mix all is selected. all i can do is select an individual artist (up to letter P). very uninspiring.
did either of you guys get to the bottom of this? are we just dealing with a machine/software unable to cope with a serios ipod?

I just installed the CDA-9856 with the KCE-422i Full Speed Connection Cable for iPod. I must say the sound quality is outstanding. I have a 20004 Toyota Tacoma with stock speakers and the sound is hugely improved over the stock stereo with cassette adaptor.

As far as ease of use, it's definitely not where it should and could be (if Alpine would only offer ROM upgrades like every other high-end electronics manufacture, ie Digital cameras) but is a vast improvement over the KCA-420i with the 2005 head units. For one it lacks a Podcast selection but this can easily be remedied with a smart playlist for all Podcasts.

The biggest downside I see is that when you have finished sifting through your library list (be it Songs, Artists, Albums, Playlists) and have already chosen a song to play the unit does not allow for a user to continue from where they left off in their search. It actually goes back to the very begining the next time your return to searching unlike the iPod. This is disappointing as it does not allow for a user to continue searching through the current song's Artist, Album, Song or Playlist directory.

To Alpine's credit they have improved on what I consider to be a simple fix that Apple refuses to fix on the iPod. You can actually continue scrolling past the letter Z and back to the begining of any directory. Fantastic!

Overall, I give it a grade of an B- for interface design and an A for sound and an A for the cheap price of around $200. There are some other more expensive models with added interface design elements but may not really be worth the added price.

http://www.alpine-usa.com/en/products/product.php?model=CDA-9856

Has anyone else tried the CDA-9856 with the KCE-422i yet? I've been using it a for a couple of weeks now with only one issue. Sometimes I will receive an error message and the iPod becomes inaccessible to the CDA-9856 headunit and has to be reset before they can communicate again. Not sure what causes this...

Has anyone found the solution to the frozen ipod? My ipod worked fine with my Alpine headunit & interface for about a year. Now, when I connect it, the display either says "searching" or just shows "00.00". When I disconnect, the Alpine logo stays on the ipod screen and it's completely locked up -- until it drains -- then I have to recharge it and it's fine. I've done this twice. I have an appt. with the shop that installed my Alpine units, but wondered if anyone else had resolved this, since the installers hadn't heard of this problem before.

Linda

I have the Alpine CDA-9856 with the KCE-422i cable connected to my 20GB iPod. I frequently (at least 4 times in 1 hour) get the "Error-1" message requiring that I unplug my iPod, wait 45 seconds, and then reconnect. Fortunately it continues playing where it left off.

I have tried another iPod to see if these error messages continue to happen so frequently, and they do. Has anyone else had this problem? If so I will return the Alpine.

It is very easy to buy any brand of auto stereo with a line-in connection (i.e. cd changer, auxilary input) that will allow me to wire an iPod cable line-out wires to it. Controlling the iPod from the iPod is a more user friendly interface than Alpine provides!

Any ideas on a fix for the Error-1 issue? I have a feeling it has to do with the Alpine firmware.

NA Other OS

Did you try resetting the iPod? That worked for me. I've only received that error three times. It hasn't happened in over two months.

I agree that the Alpine interface is not too iPod friendly but it does allow you to focus on Artist while using the MIX feature (click it to turn off) and it will stay in the current artist's folder of the library. Apple needs to provide this on the iPod itself.

I just had the Alpine CDA 9857 installed with the KCE422i high speed cable for my 30GB Ipod Video.

When I connect the IPod, the screen on the Alpine unit only says "searching...." and nothing else. I understand that the Alpine logo should pop up ony my Ipod screen.....

I've reset the Ipod, I've reformatted the Ipod, updated I tunes and the Ipod, rolled back I Tunes and the drivers....all to no avail...

Has anyone else had similar problems.....any help would be appreciated....Alpine's support was nil. Should I send the Ipod in for repairs?

I have a CDA-9856 and the problem I am experiencing is the inability to play some tracks. Most play but some do not. This problem only started recently and prior to this all songs would play. When I try to play certain songs or artists, the head unit just scrolls through the tracks but never reads them. Anyone else have this problem?

Are you sharing songs from someone else's library? I had a similar problem before with songs I was sharing from my brother-in-law's library. If I connected my ipod to any computer other than my main machine at home (which is authorized to play his library) just to charge or to extract songs from my iPod to my machine at work (which was not authorized to play his library] and then tried to play anything from my his library it would do the same thing you've described. However, I haven't noticed it ocurring recently. Perhaps the last iPod software update solved it. What version are you using?

I don't share with any other library, and I am happy to say that after a reboot of the ipod, it seems to work fine once again. I am running the latest update (03/06) on a click wheel ipod. The only thing I can think of is that the song files may get corrupted or disorganized some how when primarily using my Alpine to control the ipod. I was also a bit concerned with leaving the ipod in my truck's console while at work as I live in south Texas and it can get rather hot in a closed vehicle to say the least. All in all, the problem seems to have been resolved with a reboot. Thanks for your interest and suggestions!

Hello,

After reading your post, I just called Crutchfield since I was having the same problem with my 3rd GEN 40GB iPod. Anyway, Crutchfield didn't have anything in their knowledge base insofar as the problem we're seeing. However, he did recommend performing a reset on both the iPod and stereo when the problem happens again (the stereo has a reset button behind the display).

I'll try that on mine and post my results. The Crutchfield guy did say if the problem is with the headunit they'll either upgrade me to the 9857 or do whatever I want done. He was also going to open an issue with Alpine to see if they had anything similar logged on their side.

Cheers,

Chris

I have the Alpine CDA-9856 with the KCE-422i cable
connected to my 20GB iPod. I frequently (at least 4
times in 1 hour) get the "Error-1" message requiring
that I unplug my iPod, wait 45 seconds, and then
reconnect. Fortunately it continues playing where it
left off.

I have tried another iPod to see if these error
messages continue to happen so frequently, and they
do. Has anyone else had this problem? If so I will
return the Alpine.

It is very easy to buy any brand of auto stereo with
a line-in connection (i.e. cd changer, auxilary
input) that will allow me to wire an iPod cable
line-out wires to it. Controlling the iPod from the
iPod is a more user friendly interface than Alpine
provides!

Any ideas on a fix for the Error-1 issue? I have a
feeling it has to do with the Alpine
firmware.

NA
Other OS

I am having similar problems with the Alpine CDA-9856 that I had installed with the KCE422i cable for my 60GB iPod Video. It worked flawlessly the first few days but now I constantly get the Error 01 code or it continuously says "searching". I tried updating my iPod firmware, resetting my pod and the head unit but had no luck. I am going back to the stereo store tomorrow to get it looked at and probably get a new head unit and cable.