Kenwood Excelon XXV-01D Car CD / MP3 Player

Happy Anniversary! Kenwood's new 25th Anniversary CD/MP3 head unit is a marvel of sight and sound.

Cosmetics:

The first thing you'll notice when pulling this receiver out of the package is that it's one stunning piece of hardware. The front bezel glistens with a high gloss black, the buttons and knobs (of which there are a few small black buttons, a silver knob and hat switch) are classy and non-intrusive to the eyes. The large display adorns the front rather nicely. This is a heavy unit, whose build quality is evident. The dimensions are standard single DIN, so it won't present any unusual installation issues.

Rating: 4.5/5

Features:

While this is one hot looking unit, its features are where it really shines. Externally, the front face is motorized to allow access to the CD slot. I like this design because it allows for a larger display then is otherwise possible with a permanent CD slot. I also like the fact that the CD slot is protected from dust, etc. This unit does not have Kenwood's D-mask pluss that flips the face around completely as a security measure, and its a good thing, because Kenwood's D-mask mechanism tends to burn out fairly quickly. The face is removable and what's left behind offers a blinking red security light. The unit also comes with a Kenwood case to protect the face. Speaking of the face, Kenwood added a 4000 color organic EL display to this unit, and its a beauty. In demo mode, the head unit will strut its stuff with little videos and graphics that are astounding. Organic EL (OEL) display, what does that really mean and why should I care? OEL displays are an evolution of the standard LCD displays that equip most other cd players. OEL offers greater contrast, greater visability in direct sunlight, and larger viewing angles. The display is truly a sight to behold.

Flipping the unit around reveals all the essentials one would expect from a top quality head unit: the standard motorola antenna input, 3 sets of preouts (front, rear, subwoofer), Kenwood's proprietary input for CD changers, ipods, and satellite radio receivers, and a set of versatile RCA inputs. The preouts are all 5v, which will send a top quality signal to your external amplifier, should you use one.

Internally, is where things get really interesting. No expense was spared when the engineers are Kenwood designed this baby, and it shows: oxygen free copper wiring, audiophile grade capacitors, noise isolation barriers, gold plated preouts, and a world class digital signal processor setup. If you zoned out for that part, I don't blame you, but this is important: Kenwood used dual, independent, 24bit Burr Brown digital-to-analog converters (DACs) in this unit, that's a big deal. Burr Brown DACs are the audio industry standard for signal processing, and I'm talking about for top quality home audio! The DACs are the heart of this setup and Kenwood used two Burr Brown DACs, not just one, they have one DAC for each channel, to completely elminate crosstalk and noise. To give you a comparison, Alpine, a leader in the car audio world, uses a single 1bit DAC...

This unit features CD, MP3/WMA/AAC playback (on CDs CD-Rs or CD-RWs), XM or Sirius (native) support and is HD radio ready. The am/fm tuner works substantially better then you're OEM unit, so expect an increase there. The onboard amp supplies 22w RMS x 4, pretty standard stuff. For increased flexibility and sound quality, you can shut off the internal amp and go with an external setup. Kenwood's use of top quality components clearly reflects in this units vital stats. Frequency response is 10-20,000hz, which covers the entire human audible spectrum (and below for the bass), and CD signal-to-noise ratio is an impressive 110db (very clear signal compared to most other makers). The FM tuner has 9.3dBf sensitivity, which is better then most.

This unit has a plethora of configuration options to suit even the most demanding audiophile. Speaker size, position, and frequency adjustments abound, you have a parametric and 5 band preset EQ, SRS WoW sound imaging controls, standard balance/fade bias, two zone control, 2 save slots for audio presets, the list goes on and on. Oh, did I mention this head unit also tracks car performance? That's right, Kenwood built in a Graphic Motion Analyzer to judge (and record, if you wish) lateral G-force measurements, acceleration/deceleration, etc and it looks fantastic on the high quality display. You have stopwatch and laptime features built-in as well, no need for additional hardware or special installation requirements. I find this feature to be largely useless for those of us who simply listen to music, but I imagine the import/tuner crowd will enjoy this extra.

Rating: 5/5

Sound Quality - Subjective evaluation

My setup is a 1999 Chevy Camaro Z28 coupe running this head unit, and a full set of Polk MOMO MMC6500 6 1/2" components powered by a 4-channel PPI-4125 (125w RMS/channel) amp. All connectors, 16ga. speaker wire, and interconnects are JL Audio Premium. Also, the entire car has been covered with dynamat extreme, brown bread, and dynaliner. After getting everything installed and tuned, I hit the unit with my standard battery of acoustic tests. First disc is Crystal Method. Whether you like techno or not, there are few more demanding test discs out there then Vegas and Tweekend. The synthesizers were crisp, bass was tight and potent (without any noticable distortion), and the audio spectrum was fully represented. My reference speakers, the Polks, are some of the most natural sounding speakers I've ever dealt with, so they provide a good test for the head unit. I then moved to acoustic pieces, the Crimson Tide soundtrack (for bass) and Keb Mo' (for voice clarity and a nice steel guitar twang). Everything sounded great. For comparison purposes, I listen to my test CDs on my home system: Sennheiser HD600 headphones, Denon stereo amp, Rotel CD player. No car is going to be as accurate or spacious across the spectrum as my Sennheisers, but I didn't notice any audio anomalies with the head unit, everything functioned like a charm.

Rating: 5/5

Real-world Usability and Ergonomics

As you probably already know, the Kenwood head unit has a minimalist design interface. You have a menu button, a source button, attenuation button, a volume knob with pushbutton ability, and a 4 position hat switch for am/fm switching, radio tuning, and cd song switching. The problem with a clean interface is that everything needs to be buried in menus, some of which are accessible only when the unit is off, on standby, or when its playing. Additionally, there are no radio preset buttons on the face, so you have to enter a menu and then select, which is annoying. The other problem I had was that the volume knob is not very tall, its hard to grip. The hat switch is not very tall either, and has the same drawback. Basically, if you need to do anything other then change the volume or song/radio station while driving, good luck. I found that the included remote offers a nice fix for this problem. I do most of my adjustments and selections using the remote, so I don't have to mess around with the buttons on the face, and that makes things easier.

Rating: 2.5/5

Conclusion: For their 25th Anniversary, Kenwood has unleashed an uncompromising audio monster on the world of mobile audio. Build quality, fit and finish, audio adjustments, and sound quality are second to none, its that simple. With that being said, the ergonomics are not very good, the user's manual is poor, and all options are buried deep in menus. If you want ease of use, look elsewhere, because this audiophile requires a learning curve and isn't fun to use mess around with while driving. Some may find the Graphic Motion Analyzer to be neat and useful, I find it a bit silly. Also, you can't forget, Organic EL display, which is the high water mark for all head unit displays at this point (short of a true TFT DVD screen).