With smartphones becoming more commonplace, you see these devices a jack of all trades. Why not use it for their car stereo? Although this is currently only a Kickstarter project, Dash — The Smartphone Car Stereo is an example of where mobile and auto audio is heading: everywhere.
The concept here is pretty simple: many cars nowadays come with what's known as a double-DIN sized car stereo, which means that it measures 4" x 7". The Dash base unit would mount into your dashboard using whatever mounting equipment is necessary for your particular vehicle, then you would purchase a separate plate specific to your phone model, providing a dock for you iPhone or iPod to charge, play, and be used as a replacement for both radio, DAP, and navigation unit. The Dash is rated at 4 x 50w to power speakers, with 2 preamps running at 2V a front and rear/sub.
As of this writing the project is still $30k away from funding, but with some support, this could be a very cool concept. Check it out!
(Images: Kickstarter)
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I'm really quite surprised that the major car manufacturers haven't made some sort of elegant mobile interface like this standard in their vehicles. It's something they could have done years ago. Instead they give you a USB port and if you buy a luxury vehicle you get a 40g hard drive.
@andy: simple, really.
I sell cars for a living at a Toyota & Nissan dealership, and being the resident 'tech' person I'm responsible for hooking up the bluetooth for customer's phones.
Not that many people have an iPhone, and of those ONE in the last month has had music on it to take advantage of the bluetooth audio.
Imagine if Toyota spent millions on R&D for an iPhone mounting head unit, only for Apple to change the design/size 6 months later? Phones are replaced a lot more often than cars.
I still see a market for this product - but not as an OEM device, but for aftermarket and older cars still rocking a cassette deck!
For half the price of a Pioneer AppRadio? Yes, please, but really, shouldn't this be closer to $100 considering it's just a glorified mounting plate hooked up to your car speakers? Beautiful as it is!
@jason - well, it's not JUST a mounting plate, it still has pre-amps etc... think of it as a speakerdock, without the speakers, but all the hardware to interface with the phone and run the speakers.
I remember seeing a single-DIN car stereo that did more or less the same a while back. At first it seemed appealing but I don't want to be too dependent on my phone - After all they break fairly easily. At least with a normal car stereo, I still have radio should that happen.
Guys at a time when the major car audio deck manufacturers are scrambling to integrate smart phones into their decks, I thought I’d flip the script and integrate the car audio deck into to the smart phone.
Car Audio Deck for iPhone and iPod touch is coming soon.
www.caraudiodeck.com
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