Soarer Central: Archive through June 21, 2010

Soarer Central ICE - In Car Entertainment ICE Chat So i bought a cheap chinese head unit.. Archive through June 21, 2010

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Aiden Cheese
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Soarer jzz30

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Wednesday, June 02, 2010 - 07:56 pm, by: Aiden Cheese (Chillpen)

The brand name is Eonon and some of the english is pretty hard to decipher..

But pics:

It took a while to install. I wanted it so that the switch that i have for the illumination for the two gauges is also the screen switch.

How the gauges worked was i just had power switched. Sadly the head unit works by a "handbrake earth" or when its earthed it turns off. So instead i changed the switch (a fair bit of resoldering stuff) and put it all together. Plus everything else it did take a while. I already had the iso adapter in the car ready to just click it in but there was a few mistakes like i lost the remote cable so the amps didn't turn on and other things..

Overall though now it's done it seems to work okay. The sound quality is no lower than the pioneer that was in it already but it also handles my iPhone (but doesn't charge it though will charge ipods).

It's a 7" folding out screen. If it doesn't come out, it also has a little 1.5" lcd display for song titles or radio station etc on the front.

Anyhow a friend of mine had a different eonon branded thing in his car with a 7" screen and it lasted about 3 years, if i get even a year out of this i'd be pretty pleased for the price.

I bought this off ebay new for $137.50 delivered.

The movie is shrek. I'll take a couple more pics tomorrow just for the sake of pics, and just to show how it looks during the day.

I had some problems that with it flush, the climate control was crushing the top of the head unit down onto the moving screen.. so i had to cut off the two little "bumps" which lock into the stock head unit and even then i had to even pull the actual eonon unit further out (about 3.5mm to the next screw hole).

The mass of wires was pretty damn retarded.

edit: also with the movie i removed the black bars top and bottom by telling the 'dvd software' that my screen was 16:9 and not 4:3

Warren Moore
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Wednesday, June 02, 2010 - 08:09 pm, by: Warren Moore (Warreng)

Better said late than never. This is what I posted in a previous thread.

"DO NOT buy cheap chinese model headunits as they are terrible. I mean if you just want to use the stock soarer speakers and have a "fancy" headunit, then by all means get one. If you however want to install an amp and aftermarket speakers, do not go anywhere near these chinese brands as they will just •••• dacks once higher end components are put into the picture. You will get terrible sound quality, interference, and static. You pay for what you get quality wise with headunits."

My mate had one of these Eonon e837 headunits like yours and he took it to sound street and vision wanting it installed into his bmw, they laughed at him. He then asked me to do it, I also laughed at him.

Ben Kelly
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Wednesday, June 02, 2010 - 09:02 pm, by: Ben Kelly (Ace)

good job aiden. i am just about to do the same thing. except im going to attempt to fit the single din fold out in the tape deck slot of an emv soarer. I know full well that the unit might die, but the one im looking at is 400 with inbuilt australian gps, as well as ipod etc etc. The closest i can find is units that cost around 1600 and an extra 200 for a seperate gps unit. thinking i will take my chances. btw leaving in stock speakers, but putting in audison amp. any thoughts or tips appreciated.

Aiden Cheese
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Wednesday, June 02, 2010 - 09:26 pm, by: Aiden Cheese (Chillpen)

Ben Kelly wrote on Wednesday, June 02, 2010 - 09:02 pm:
btw leaving in stock speakers, but putting in audison amp

Yeah sure if you want it so it can easily be reverted just leave all the regular wires alone (most of which you can't use anyway).

I installed a Iso connector by tapping off a power accessory and ran a new earth. Once that was in i didn't need to change anything else up front. If i wanted to throw in the old head unit it is a matter of unclicking the iso cable and clicking in the stock head unit again.

I ran new wires for the rear speakers, leaving the old ones there hanging but hidden by the trim and disconnected the stock amps. Ran power and earths for the two amplifiers, ran 3 rca cables and a remote wire) to the front where the head unit would be (probably the hardest bit because of the effort of pulling up trim).

The front speakers pull out the grommit which runs between the door and the chassis and feed through the speaker wire that way, crimp (and maybe solder) then shrink wrap some small spade female bits so you can unclip the stock front speaker clip and clip in the wires at the front. This will drive the speaker and the tweeter.

Run on the other side of the car the power wire. I only had the speaker wire cross the power wire at one point for the passenger door, rca's and speaker wire was all on driver side and power on the passenger.

The sound quality will be pretty good. In fact that sound was better than the sound i got from a pioneer head unit powering 4 channel amp for a set of pioneer 6x9's rear and a set of pioneer 6"s at the front with another amp powering a pioneer 10" sub. Which i thought was pretty good, played a lot of music quite well with its good and bad.

It should be loud enough to cause hearing damage if you have good hearing and leave it up too loud for far too long but you might hear some bass kick distortion from the rear speakers if you do go too loud (i notice it specifically with my rear passenger speaker will distort before any other speaker in the car).

Warren Moore wrote on Wednesday, June 02, 2010 - 08:09 pm:
DO NOT buy cheap chinese model headunits as they are terrible. I mean if you just want to use the stock soarer speakers and have a "fancy" headunit, then by all means get one. If you however want to install an amp and aftermarket speakers, do not go anywhere near these chinese brands as they will just •••• dacks once higher end components are put into the picture. You will get terrible sound quality, interference, and static. You pay for what you get quality wise with headunits

Hi warren, if you check my last ICE posting it was of a pioneer head unit powering two low powered amps to power the stock sub and stock speakers. This had a small amount of whine if you had the volume set at 1 (enough so amps were still powered).

This head unit has the exact same noise. It also has almost identical sound quality. Now instead of it only able to play mp3 cd's can play dvd's vcd's and pretty much anything except MKV's (though i haven't tested it, just wrappers confuse most players). It also plays my iphone music fine and doesn't yet have any strange noises except for static between radio stations on search.

I'm not into "ICE" loud music or even really ricing my car. The ability to have bluetooth phone calls and play music straight from my iphone without me having to manhandle the phone itself was the reason i got this. It solved this problem. Like i said it cost $137.50, if it lasts longer than a year than its doing better than two (more expensive) pioneer units before it.

edit: I just wanted to put up a theory of why the soarer sounds better on stock speakers than the old car did with the full sound system. Sound deadening. Honestly - its probably just the enclosures and the sound deadening that really makes the soarer sound good.

Miles Baker
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Wednesday, June 02, 2010 - 10:07 pm, by: Miles Baker (Milesb)

In my experience, claims that these units have poor sound quality are just sour grapes. Every one I've listened to has sounded great. They should, too. Audio electronics are a commodity design now.

I intend on putting one in my '55. Shocking but true.

Austen Menze
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Wednesday, June 02, 2010 - 11:19 pm, by: Austen Menze (Mercyfulfate)

Hey if you like it and it does the job, then who cares what others think

With regards to the whine, ensure you have signal and power cables running on opposite sides of the car.

Aiden Cheese
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Thursday, June 03, 2010 - 03:13 pm, by: Aiden Cheese (Chillpen)

Austen Menze wrote on Wednesday, June 02, 2010 - 11:19 pm:

With regards to the whine, ensure you have signal and power cables running on opposite sides of the car.

Aiden Cheese wrote on Wednesday, June 02, 2010 - 09:26 pm:

Run on the other side of the car the power wire. I only had the 1* speaker wire cross the power wire at one point for the passenger door, rca's and speaker wire was all on driver side and power on the passenger.

Added in that 1 for clarity.

I'd guess that the problem more has to do with earthing maybe than anything else of the amps. Maybe. Who knows.

I really want to go for a drive in the car - but considering I literally have no cash and the soarer only has 5L I won't till i have the money to get to the nearest BP. I usually try to avoid getting my fuel so low as that i'd be stuck with running off the dregs of fuel especially in a 20yo fuel tank..

But my preliminary review:
It really sounds perhaps better than my pioneer head unit that was in it before. It's louder without clipping, but i think thats because it has a larger range of bass heading towards the subwoofer. I'd love to demonstrate Pendulum's - SLAM on the system to a few people who are curious to hear the quality.

There are drawbacks: the UI is terrible. Awful. This is a old unit from eonon the new stuff uses a 3d interface. But this unit is old. The radio is probably the best UI? Because you actually press the screen in the places where your radio is pre-set to control it. Maybe the bluetooth phone calling is better, for the same reason. But everything else is controlled by pressing the middle of the screen and waiting for a On Screen Display overlay which controls the UI. yes, its a UI to control the UI. lol.

There is one more drawback. iPhone playback has been a bit sub par. The software seems to be horrible and sounds like ••••• Simply it clips as soon as a song gets into its stride (when the song starts to sound busy). This is a drawback considering that was one of the reasons i was getting a new head unit at all. To get one which i could charge/use my iphone music on. However the blutooth between the phone and the unit means i don't even have to take my phone out of my pocket to make a call or to pick one up. I can also send music via blutooth but it sounds a little worse than radio and you can kind of hear the *noise* it makes.. its semi static-y like one of those old radio transmitters you can buy that plugs into your cigarette lighter.

I hope that newer revisions have fixed this considering..

However DVD mp3 works, and SD sticks are accepted. I'm getting an 8Gig stick from MSY for 8 dollars soon and i'll throw my music onto that leaving the dvd free for movies.

I haven't tried the USB port yet.

I haven't tried it while the car has been moving either.

Honestly my biggest concern is the longevity. This sound quality is more than enough for me (in fullness and in loudness) but now I'd like to make sure it doesn't die before i finish my final year of uni and have a better paying job at the end. (better than nothing is pretty easy)

Anyway a new day has passed and i've got a couple of pictures:

Edit: you can see that i re-soldered my LCD in the second to last pic and it all looks not-bled :-)

Mike Beck
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Thursday, June 03, 2010 - 03:51 pm, by: Mike Beck (Gold_40gt)

Nice concept but I would put low cost electrical gear in any car of mine, why does it stick out so far? Bit of a design flaw really, a console should have all the units flush and looking uniform.

But that's just me.

I recently got a Nakamichi head deck to go in my car at some stage, top Japanese electronic Audio gear, made to last, and made in Japan. You do pay for it though but quality is everything.

Aiden Cheese
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Soarer jzz30

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Thursday, June 03, 2010 - 04:11 pm, by: Aiden Cheese (Chillpen)

Aiden Cheese wrote on Wednesday, June 02, 2010 - 07:56 pm:

I had some problems that with it flush, the climate control was crushing the top of the head unit down onto the moving screen.. so i had to cut off the two little "bumps" which lock into the stock head unit and even then i had to even pull the actual eonon unit further out (about 3.5cm to the next screw hole).

Well to elaborate it crushes down onto the head unit and you can see from the picture there is a gap between the sliding bit and the cover of about 0.75mm or less than a mm anyway but by the middle there is no gap. If i push it further back the climate control digs in more.

This probably is a problem with where i drilled the holes for the screws into the bracket more than a problem with the unit: if i had dropped it another mm or 2mm it would be clearing cleanly with out any kind of gap, the unit could sit flush and so on. But considering the holes around the hole i made, im worried that if i drill again i'll cause the whole metal bracket to break because there's a hole next to it and a hole below it.

So the long story short is if i pull the whole thing out (again) i might be able to change it but while the screen is up i just don't care. It looks pretty good anyway.

If you're worried about quality of audio i can prove how nice it sounds and i'd think you'll be shocked really. Same with the screen in a movie.

But again you just can't get even a regular headunit for 135 dollars delivered which supports proper blutooth let alone dvd's external inputs and so on. You might get a better sound out of your ipod cable though.

Michael O'Driscoll
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Thursday, June 03, 2010 - 04:39 pm, by: Michael O'Driscoll (Remickz)

We put in the single DIN 5inch touchscreen into my partners mini, and we are both very happy with it. Has all the features of yours, but with the newer interface. We are running it through an MTX amp, and it sounds perfectly fine, obviously doesn't huge amount of audio features like a graphical equiliser, but with the basics such as bass and treble, you can make it sound good. Even for the Mini haha.

Aiden Cheese
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Thursday, June 03, 2010 - 07:53 pm, by: Aiden Cheese (Chillpen)

Haha wow. That mini sure is something! Fleckled red paint and leopard skin plush.. if you drive it i think you're more of a man than i am! I bet your partner would love it though. I know a few girls who'd be totally jealous of that!

Yours should have a graphics equaliser hidden somewhere, i know mine does according to the booklet i just haven't played with it because at flat it sounds pretty good. I left loud and other options off too.

Im still sure the key to making it sound good is good insulation. Sound deadening and removing outside noise (highway noise etc) would be paramount to really hearing the good sound. Plus after hearing my little charade again now i'm sure it sounds more tinny but it could be just because its basically tin and plastic haha and it could be psychological!

Good work with the mini, does it drive right now? There looks to be wires on the other side of the front window?

Michael O'Driscoll
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Friday, June 04, 2010 - 02:20 am, by: Michael O'Driscoll (Remickz)

Yeah it drives, well it did, its running very rich. Needs a good tune and timing, but we are not going to worry about it, we dont plan on registering it, just keep it under covers for now.

Aiden Cheese
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Friday, June 04, 2010 - 12:11 pm, by: Aiden Cheese (Chillpen)

Haha fantastic ride!

Shane Sartori
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Sunday, June 06, 2010 - 12:49 pm, by: Shane Sartori (Kingmoron)

what seller did you get it from for $137

Ben Kelly
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Monday, June 07, 2010 - 08:34 pm, by: Ben Kelly (Ace)

mike the single din units are longer than factory cos there is about another 2inches for the ejection mechanism. Im hoping ill be able to shove mine back nonetheless.

Michael. nice mini. swap you for an old soarer and fat chick.

Calan Fitzmaurice
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Monday, June 07, 2010 - 11:05 pm, by: Calan Fitzmaurice (Fixed_term)

Hi guys

I brought one of these cheap Chinese double din units. It's one of the newer ones from a the brand Erising with a higher res screen (800x480), DVB-T, gps, etc..

I wanted it to look as stock as possible so I settled on a 6.5" screen as most of the 7" units had motorized faces that stuck out. As a result they looked like they were not going to sit flush. Plus I figured our cars were designed for a in dash screen and should sit at the right angle.

I also purchased a Metra mounting kit from the States so it would fill the stock 2.5din hole. I ended up having to modify the kit quite heavily as the face of headunit was too wide and the ashtray lid fouled and wouldn't open.

I've also relocated my boost controller from the old 0.5 din 'gap' to inside the ashtray....close the lid and it looks stock as a rock

Overall I'm very happy with the end result.

Warren Moore
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Monday, June 07, 2010 - 11:17 pm, by: Warren Moore (Warreng)

that looks clean calan

Matt Petersen
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Tuesday, June 08, 2010 - 11:53 am, by: Matt Petersen (Mattmannz)

That's a very nice clean stock looking install.

Evan Kaio
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Tuesday, June 08, 2010 - 04:01 pm, by: Evan Kaio (Knave)

I think this site has been posted before, http://www.chinavasion.com/
Check it out and see what you think.

Aiden Cheese
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Tuesday, June 08, 2010 - 04:22 pm, by: Aiden Cheese (Chillpen)

Ben Kelly wrote on Monday, June 07, 2010 - 08:34 pm:
mike the single din units are longer than factory cos there is about another 2inches for the ejection mechanism. Im hoping ill be able to shove mine back nonetheless.

Hey Ben and further to mike's point:

The image below shows how much extra is sticking out. The Red line is how far back it should be sitting more than it is, and the green line is what does stick out if it was "flush". My pioneer only also came flush up to a point and the faceplate that was removeable stuck out too.

Shane Sartori wrote on Sunday, June 06, 2010 - 12:49 pm:
what seller did you get it from for $137

It was just a find on ebay, from some guy in wooloongong claiming he was selling it for a friend who's closed his store on vacation.. It was a bit dodgy sounding but, the price was right. I couldn't even honestly recommend this unit to anyone knowing that the new units from eonon are 800x480 res and the UI is 100 or more times better plus they come with the GPS unit http://www.eonon.com/UserFiles/image/1025a-04.jpg lol also the english is maybe a little better.. maybe.

Calan Fitzmaurice wrote on Monday, June 07, 2010 - 11:05 pm:
I brought one of these cheap Chinese double din units. It's one of the newer ones from a the brand Erising with a higher res screen (800x480), DVB-T, gps, etc..

And the install looks brilliant! I'm not sure what your sound quality is like or what you've done with your speakers (if anything) but I'd love to show off how good mine sounds.

It sounds better than the pioneer, but largely because the subwoofer now has more range and the low pass filtering is done at the amp instead of the head unit. (even when you turn off filtering on the head unit the sub stops pretty much at 150hz~ which is pretty ••••••

Anyway it really helps the fluid move between bass and midrange with the 10" sub doing more range. Still impressed. Though my battery is going to die soon if i don't charge it.. A long drive on friday is pretty likely.

Calan Fitzmaurice
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Tuesday, June 08, 2010 - 10:23 pm, by: Calan Fitzmaurice (Fixed_term)

Cheers for the complements guys! It's not perfect, but it's close enough.

Aiden Cheese wrote on Tuesday, June 08, 2010 - 04:22 pm:
And the install looks brilliant! I'm not sure what your sound quality is like or what you've done with your speakers (if anything) but I'd love to show off how good mine sounds.

Aiden. The rest of the system is stock. It does sound a lot better than the old install which was a 'supersound' unit, installed buy the previous owner. While the old unit did have a sub output it seems the new one uses it's sub output a lot more (as you say it most likely has a higher crossover point). You are however very limited buy the adjustments you can make to the sound ie. bass, treble and loudness. That's it. I would have really liked to see some kind of sub level control and maybe even crossover points, although I guess that those kind of feature are really only seen on mid to high end units. I'm sure they figured anyone who used the pre-outs would be running them to aftermarket amps where you could make those kinds of adjustments anyway.

Even though mine is one of the newer units I feel the UI is still a little lacking, based on some of the things mentions above. However you have to stay objective and remember that at this price point, roughly $350, there is nothing that can come close to it. For the features it packs and the value for money it provides.

Cal

Aiden Cheese
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Tuesday, June 08, 2010 - 11:08 pm, by: Aiden Cheese (Chillpen)

Calan Fitzmaurice wrote on Tuesday, June 08, 2010 - 10:23 pm:
However you have to stay objective and remember that at this price point, roughly $350, there is nothing that can come close to it. For the features it packs and the value for money it provides.

That's exactly right. The UI is pretty awful at times considering what we've been accustomed to with iphones/pads/touches and when people don't like something they ususally modify the software like they have on http://www.modaco.com/forum.html and http://forum.xda-developers.com/ for phones.

What would be really sweet if the drivers were there and available would be to flash a real OS and run http://www.centrafuse.com/ on the display.

But I'm not complaining - I knew exactly what i was buying before i got it. It was a trade off of either buying a cheap-cheap head unit for the charade or paying about the same and getting something that could play DVD's give me blutooth and take aux-in properly for the soarer and move the pioneer to the charade.

Chris Lock
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Monday, June 21, 2010 - 07:27 pm, by: Chris Lock (Sledge)

http://www.pcworld.idg.com.au/review/gps_car_entertainment/pioneer/avic-f900bt/252328/images?image=3
$750..
tempting..

Austen Menze
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Monday, June 21, 2010 - 10:17 pm, by: Austen Menze (Mercyfulfate)

Chris the maps for those things are around 180bucks!

Aiden Cheese
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Monday, June 21, 2010 - 11:42 pm, by: Aiden Cheese (Chillpen)

Sure, but at 750 dollars its worth more than 10% of the car... which is better than 2000 dollars which is worth nearly 2/3rds. (I bought my car for $7000).

At 750 I'd be building a htpc like rig and a 130 dollar touch monitor. That way e-manage can be modified on the fly and wifi enabled for internet browsing when not on the road, phone plugged in would give internet tethering.. etc etc. It probably wouldn't be 750 or less, i'd probably guesstimate including the soundcard to run the amps and gps receiver, tv tuner and hardware on top that'd come to about..

Monitor: $130+ delivery (online store)
Mobo: $230 with onboard nvidia ion gfx, intel atom processor, spdif audio out, wireless card
HDD: $56 WD 500gb drive
Garmin USB GPS: $65
SPDIF to RCA converter (digitial to analogue converter): $25 from jaycar (had to search but found
this

And that's about it really. Oh an inverter, thats expensive.. but it would mean using other 240v things in the car...
$80 for a 300w (1000w peak) inverter

Total cost: $586.

Hrm. Guess it's not that expensive.

Edit: also I'd case it in fiberglass. Mostly because there's heaps spare and I could shape it to my glovebox that way.

edit: forgot the powersupply, a thermaltake 430w silent one will cost only 43 dollars. That takes the new total to

$626

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