For the last few years I have used my trusty Alpine 9850Ri in my cars. The reason for this product is its ability to provide full speed and charge functions to my iPods.
I owned and used an original iPhone 2G model without problems for the last 12 months and before that several ipods. But since the lovely and shiny new iPhone 3GS was released and I upgraded I am as they say...."without music"!
Upon plugging my new shiny toy into my head unit I was left with dead phone, that would not even switch on and took me over 45 minutes to get into DFU mode to perform a system restore. Now I have been searching around the web for quite some time now looking for an answer which does not seem to exist. i.e. How the heck do I get this damn thing to play through my car head unit?
I have tried an iTrip, but frankly their quality is no where near as good as a direct connection. And I don't like the fact I have to keep changing stations when I travel up and down the country and on top of that all the new ones require plugging into the 12v socket. Which leaves me without power for my TomTom. I aren't saying that I am ruling it out but it has to be a last resort.
New Alpine units are coming out saying they still have full speed and control over iPods. Are they using new cables with the new pin outs on them? i have tried their webpage and it is not that good and they do not have any way of contacting their support people to ask the question, since the cable from head unit to iPod is only a cable plugged in the back and surely can be replaced with a new one that works.
I also have the armrest in my car which houses the 6 disc changer which of course does not work since I have replaced the head unit. Is there a way I can do something here and go back to the original head unit and use a iPod connection here. I notice there was a thread regarding replacing unit but it is actually going to work with the new phone?
I really am stuck on a way forward, does anybody have any ideas or stuck in a similar situation? Since you are generally all techno nuts as well.