Kenwood KDC-MP922 Car CD / MP3 Player
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Similar in In Dash Receivers
- MP3 / WMA Playback: MP3 Playback
- Player Type: CD
- Controlled Devices: CD Changer Mini Disk Player Sirius Ready
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One of last years greatest mp3 cd players
Pros
Very configurable screen layout, nice internal amp
Cons
low color/resolution screen/cannot add new screensavers to deck from PC
Recommended it?
Yes
The Bottom Line:
This is a great Deck from Kenwood, and has very quick menus
Interface:
I love the interface of this and similar kenwood decks. It sports the always-displayed menu at the bottom of the screen, and you simply push the button at the bottom of the screen that correlates to the screen. There is a 'next' button to go through more options, of course. This is VERY similar to TI Calculator menus, if that helps anyone. This menu system has to be one of the best, fastest-responding, and simple out of ANY deck I have used. I could jump through the menus and change my Non-Fading output(subwoofer) volume in less than one second. One thing about this deck that I like over my other decks is that when you are adjusting settings in various menus, and you decide to change the volume, it doesn't just quit the menu like other decks do (pioneer). That is a nice feature if you ask me. Also this deck sports both a pause button AND an ATT button, which I find to be a rare occurance these days (don't ask why).
Screen:
The screen has a dot-matrix 3-color scheme. Looks slightly worse than the new Pioneer screens, not too shabby. The unit comes with a few visualizations which are neat to watch for a while. This unit has more music-responsive visualizations than my other pioneer as well. One thing I like about this unit is you can really customize the display to the extreme. You can change the font colors for each of the 2 line display, as well as pick through a dozen display settings. A good example of this is you can set the unit to display the song title at the very bottom of the screen, EVEN while you are viewing a "movie" visualization.... The pioneers do not have this ability, and I miss it greatly. One thing that I wish this deck had was updatable pictures/movies, as there is no such option, you are stuck with some penguins and a few nice-looking spectrum-analysers.
Sound Quality:
This deck has a mosfet amp at 23watts RMS x 4. It puts out clean sound as long as you aren't powering some beastly 6x9's at high volumes. The kdc-mp922 has a limited EQ though, just bass/mid/high +/- 6 adjustments... it does have SRSWOW technology, which pretty much ruins the sound if you ask me, but some may find it helps their highs(if you're lucky.) One thing about the SRS setting, is you really can hear the "surroundness" of the audio... It's basically just a phase shift of some of the frequencies, so you can differenciate from the front and rear channels. This is fun to mess with but ends up hurting the SQ--as with many home theatre amplifiers with similar sound modifiers.
Features:
-This deck has 3pairs of 5volt gold plated RCA pre-outs. I always had strong signal going to my amps, and resulted in a very low gain setting on my autoteks.
-DUAL ZONE feature is really nice if you have a minivan or SUV, or just some specific reason to play separate sounds out the front channels, and another out the rear. You can play an internal source on one, and an external source out the back... e.g., Radio/CD--playing out the front channels, and a CD Changer/AUX playing out the rear... This could be handy if you hook up a cellphone speakerphone setup of some kind and want to hear it really loud...
-SELF HIDING faceplate... might be the best of it's kind. I hear people have problems with this mechanism going out, but in the year I owned this, I never encountered any problems. This allows you to leave the faceplate in the car and it folds itself over and it looks like you pulled it out. If you actually pull it out, there is a blinking LED to trick theives into thinking you have an alarm.
-Security code is nice too. You can input a 4 digit code (aka Birthdate or Address most likely), and you need this once power is removed--I hear you can get around this, but hey at least you annoyed the guy who stole your stuff, right?
I love the interface of this and similar kenwood decks. It sports the always-displayed menu at the bottom of the screen, and you simply push the button at the bottom of the screen that correlates to the screen. There is a 'next' button to go through more options, of course. This is VERY similar to TI Calculator menus, if that helps anyone. This menu system has to be one of the best, fastest-responding, and simple out of ANY deck I have used. I could jump through the menus and change my Non-Fading output(subwoofer) volume in less than one second. One thing about this deck that I like over my other decks is that when you are adjusting settings in various menus, and you decide to change the volume, it doesn't just quit the menu like other decks do (pioneer). That is a nice feature if you ask me. Also this deck sports both a pause button AND an ATT button, which I find to be a rare occurance these days (don't ask why).
Screen:
The screen has a dot-matrix 3-color scheme. Looks slightly worse than the new Pioneer screens, not too shabby. The unit comes with a few visualizations which are neat to watch for a while. This unit has more music-responsive visualizations than my other pioneer as well. One thing I like about this unit is you can really customize the display to the extreme. You can change the font colors for each of the 2 line display, as well as pick through a dozen display settings. A good example of this is you can set the unit to display the song title at the very bottom of the screen, EVEN while you are viewing a "movie" visualization.... The pioneers do not have this ability, and I miss it greatly. One thing that I wish this deck had was updatable pictures/movies, as there is no such option, you are stuck with some penguins and a few nice-looking spectrum-analysers.
Sound Quality:
This deck has a mosfet amp at 23watts RMS x 4. It puts out clean sound as long as you aren't powering some beastly 6x9's at high volumes. The kdc-mp922 has a limited EQ though, just bass/mid/high +/- 6 adjustments... it does have SRSWOW technology, which pretty much ruins the sound if you ask me, but some may find it helps their highs(if you're lucky.) One thing about the SRS setting, is you really can hear the "surroundness" of the audio... It's basically just a phase shift of some of the frequencies, so you can differenciate from the front and rear channels. This is fun to mess with but ends up hurting the SQ--as with many home theatre amplifiers with similar sound modifiers.
Features:
-This deck has 3pairs of 5volt gold plated RCA pre-outs. I always had strong signal going to my amps, and resulted in a very low gain setting on my autoteks.
-DUAL ZONE feature is really nice if you have a minivan or SUV, or just some specific reason to play separate sounds out the front channels, and another out the rear. You can play an internal source on one, and an external source out the back... e.g., Radio/CD--playing out the front channels, and a CD Changer/AUX playing out the rear... This could be handy if you hook up a cellphone speakerphone setup of some kind and want to hear it really loud...
-SELF HIDING faceplate... might be the best of it's kind. I hear people have problems with this mechanism going out, but in the year I owned this, I never encountered any problems. This allows you to leave the faceplate in the car and it folds itself over and it looks like you pulled it out. If you actually pull it out, there is a blinking LED to trick theives into thinking you have an alarm.
-Security code is nice too. You can input a 4 digit code (aka Birthdate or Address most likely), and you need this once power is removed--I hear you can get around this, but hey at least you annoyed the guy who stole your stuff, right?
