Plays MP3s, good power, easy to use controls, looks good.

Moving Volume control causes blue lights to flash.

Regardless what others say, this unit does not skip a lot. I've had my unit for over a week and drive on some fairly rough roads in a Mitsu 3000GT with a fairly stiff suspension and have not had any skipping problems at all. I've even tried to make it skip by hitting bumps at a higher than normal speed, but it didn't. The controls are no worse than any other car stereo I've ever used. If you read the manual, you won't have any problems. Push this button while holding that one down is common among most manufacturers today.

As far as the "eating CDs" complaint - be careful to keep your CD-Rs and especially CD-RWs out of direct sunlight or high heat. The CDs are written by a laser that uses heat to mark the data on the CD. The CD is stupid - if it gets the right amount of heat, it thinks it's being written to. If that heat isn't controlled by a laser, it will wipe out the CD. Try it by putting a good CD-R or CD-RW on your dashboard or front seat in the sun on a warm day. It will be useless.

For more even reviews of this product, goto www.cdc-mp3.com. It's not my site and I'm not affiliated in any way. I was looking around the web for reviews on the CDC-MP3 before purchasing. After hitting this site (carreview.com), I thought it was a bad product. After reading thru the cdc-mp3.com site, I became convinced that the people complaining so strongly about this product didn't take the time to install it properly and didn't read the instruction manual.

The blinking blue lights when turning the volume control knob is kinda flakey, but overall this is a good product. It has many more features than the much higher priced Kenwood. Those that are waiting for Sony to come out with a unit, guess what? Sony owns Aiwa!

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Factory stereos

What do I like about it? Well, since that's a small list, here it goes:
It reads MP3 files, and it can read CDRW's.

OOOOOH Where to begin! I have to refrain from using every obscenity in the book.

(1) NO SHOCK PROTECTION!!! OK imagine this... hit a bump... ANY bump... SKIPPIDY DOO DAA! This unit will skip on anything. I closed my glove compartment... what happened? SKIP! Their memory buffer (if it even has one) is terrible. Once you start skipping on the highway, it's almost impossible to get it to stop. I wonder if this is normal for a low end cd player for cars? AIWA, if you're paying any attention, cars hit things called bumps. Shock protection... what a concept!

(2) Any of you ever had an old car that when you changed to AM you heard a whirring noise from the speakers as you revved the engine? Well, this unit does just that off and on while the CD plays. I can only imagine that it doesn't supply a strong enough signal to the amps. Never had that problem with any other unit. To get any good bass from my subwoofer, I had to turn the gain and boost levels to MAX, then turn the bass on the unit to level 7 (max) and then turn HBASS to max. a sad system...

(3) The sound quality is average at best. It's controls for Bass and Trebble don't offer much difference in range. What does "source level" really do? Boost the output sound? If so, it sucks royally.

(4) Function controls suck. OK, while the unit is off, press this for 2 seconds... to change this, while the unit is on, hold down these two for 2 seconds, to change that hold those, hang upside down from a ceiling fan, and extend your left pinkie. What moron thought of such an unstructured method of changing settings?! Oh, and to turn it off, hold power for what? 2 SECONDS!

(5) No subwoofer control channel. Seriously AIWA!

Save your cash and run for the hills! Why AIWA would overlook so much for a land breaking model release is beyond me. In any event, I'll steer very far from anything AIWA makes. YOU BLEW IT AIWA!

I hear Kenwood makes an MP3 deck, but at $900 I'll just stay away. It's a shame that Kenwood didn't decide to make a lower end model - I mean, who needs DVD controls anyways?! All I want to do is play MP3 files with great sound... nothing more.

I wish Sony had a mobile ES that plays MP3 files.

Oh well... what a damn shame.

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I've used a Sony ES system in my car ever since the car was new. Those systems have great audio controls and shock protection! I think I'll put my old Sony back in again.

MP3 playback enables 100-song CD's and Napster enables "sampling" of just about any music you want

Sometimes skips, but may be do to not having a backstrap installed - I am redoing my install this weekend, will post a followup review

I will recommend this as long as you weren't one of the people who bought the Kenwood one for ~$700! Also, I think that when Sony perfects the car/cdr MP3 player, I'll go out and give it a whirl and put this thing up on Ebay for half what I paid. Aiwa beat everyone to market, but it's still an Aiwa......Don't get me wrong though I love it, and the fact that something like this is FINALLY available and affordable.

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Sony CDX-5680 - not as convenient as far as ability to control easily. DEFINITELY leaves somethings to be desired in the controls and ease of use.

ID3 tags are awesome, pretty good looking display, plays mp3's (sometimes), blinking fake security led, ok controls.

where to begin? skips like crazy, "eats" cd's, doesnt play certain tracks, remote control sucks, blinks when adjusting the volume, so-so sound quality, hard-to-attatch faceplate, SKIPS!

This is a horrible deck. I wouldn't buy another one if it was offered to me at half price. Aiwa needs to focus on improving the quality of their products instead of marketing them. This deck "ate" every mp3 cd i played in it. It would play them for about 4 hours then give me an error. Then when i'd try to access the mp3's on my computer, the computer couldn't even read the cd! People told me not to buy it but all the hype got to me and I bought one anyway. I should have listened to them, and you should listen to me, DO NOT BUY THIS DECK! I sent mine back in 2 weeks.

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Plays MP3's.

Skips when I hit a bug. I have seen many other reviews reffering the skip problem as well, it doesnt seem to be isolated to just my unit. Also the remote is pointless, It would only work for me if I were driving straight.
When I saw it at best buy there Display model had already broken.

I wouldnt recommend this product for ONE the Quality seems alot left to be desired, and TWO the Skiping.

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Alpine CDA-7863. Cant play MP3s but it sounds much better then the Aiwa. Also the quality is much higher.

Finally! Affordable integrated MP3 for the auto. Plays audio CDs, mp3 CDR/W's, am/fm, etc... Modern, somewhat flashy look.

The remote could perhaps be helped some. I generally wind up reaching for the reciever when I wish to adjust something instead of the remote.

I couldn't justify spending twice what I did for the Aiwa on the Kenwood MP3 player. The Aiwa is a great player, has quite a fancy front panel with wooshing lights and all the rest of it (if you're into that sorta thing). Good feature set, does everything I need it to. I'm happy I bought it, and when the time comes, I'll buy a second for the other car!

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Regular CD reciever (Pioneer). The Aiwa, in this case, is more powerful, and has more features (not including MP3 playback).

Massive amounts of audio on .mp3 encoded cd-r's...impatient people (like myself) don't have to change cd's every few miles....most discs, depending on compression rates, will hold 100 songs or better. Two sets of RCA's on the back should appease most audiophiles.

Steering wheel remote leaves something to be desired. As for function, when pushing a hefty amount of bass, the .mp3's sometime skip pretty badly... .mp3's tend to skip a little more than usual when it's extremely cold. Also, an early press release on this product said it was cd-text capable. Unh-uh. Don't believe what you read.

This is a great unit. I, so far, have been very pleased. Would recommend it to anyone who loves music, and ALOT of it, without having to change the stupid cd every fifteen or twenty minutes... It has the same basic features as any given unit on the market right now, and I expect it to be a precursor to other companies jumping on the .mp3-capable bandwagon. As for mine, you couldn't pry it out of my cold dead hands with a crowbar!

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Nothing really compares to this product, unless you want to buy the Kenwood eXcelon Z919, but this thing is around half the price. I've used several different high-end units, but for fit and functionality, this thing is great.

Mp3 Play. Over 100 songs at 192 kbps on one CD.

If you have multiple albums (seperate directories) you can't have it random play through the albums only through the tracks in 1 album. Steering wheel remote keeps falling off.

Great for the price paid. The stearing wheel remote could have been better designed in the aspect of keeping it on the wheel. Hasn't skipped except for large potholes and real rough terrain. (In other words, driving on a normal street it DOESNT skip!)

I recommend this to a first time car stereo buyer looking to get mp3 audio for a nice price.

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blah

I CANT GET MP3s to play!!! defeat the purpose of this or what? but so far i've only tried on cdrw's, but other ppl have gotten it to work, tho skippy. all i get when i put it in is almost a minute of "NOW READING" and then it gives me a series of beeps and says "NO MP3". is there a specific format i'm supposed to be doin? someone help

great price off ebay for brand new. so far everything works great, sound output isn't too impressive with the bass kind of unclean (ive tried all levels of h-bass). my really old jvc head had better sound and was only 35x4; im usin boston acoustics rally components too. anyways, i like the blinking lights and all that junk. its ok i guess, but still havent gotten mp3's to work!

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All around a good deck

Looks kinda cheasy

I have had no problems at all.. organize your music well... and dont waist your money on cdrw's.. whats the point.. make sure your mp3s dont have any glitches.. and what more could you ask for.. mp3s in your car

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all the other mp3 decks have there weaknesses to.. i recommend this one over any of them.. first stage.. wait a while and technology will overcome these weaknesses