nuxx.net
Making, baking, and (un-)breaking things in Southeast Michigan.

Category: automotive

Contacting Apple re: Honda Music Link

Well, let’s see what this gets me. The people it’s addressed to are Jaime Schopflin and Tom Neumayr, Apple’s PR contacts for ‘iPod’ and ‘Manager, iTunes & iPod’, respectively.

From: "Steve Vigneau"
Subject: Honda Music Link iPod Adapter Review
Date: Mon, January 9, 2006 9:20 am
To: jaimes@apple.com,tneumayr@apple.com

Hello,

I have recently come into possession of one of the Honda Music Link iPod
Adapters which was announced in an Apple press release on September 7th,
2005 (http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2005/sep/07ipod_auto.html).

Due to my extreme dissatisfaction with this product I have been
maintaining an ongoing log / review of my experiences with it at the
following URL:

http://www.nuxx.net/hondamusiclink.html

Due to the apparent disparity between Apple's hopeful-sounding
announcement with regards to this product and my actual experiences with
it I wanted to make Apple aware of this information. I am also interested
in any comments which you may have with regards to my experiences with the
product.

Thank you,

Steve Vigneau
admin@nuxx.net

acquired thingsautomotivemoved from livejournal

Car Audio Tuning Help?

If anyone who reads this and knows a bit about audio stuffs (and maybe car audio stuffs) can offer some help with this, I’d greatly appreciate it:

As I mentioned here, I installed two new speakers and an amp / crossover which are part of the Honda accessory known as the Bass System Kit. The instructions for installation stated that one should set both the cut and gain settings to ‘the nine-o’clock position’ for my model car. I’ve found that the gain setting seems a bit high, and turning that down seems to have evened out the bass, but I can’t help but think the cut (crossover) setting just isn’t quite right. It almost seems as if too much mid-range audio is still going to those particular speakers.

What I’m asking is if anyone can give me some tips as to setting the cut (crossover) and gain settings for the amp. Currently I’m going with listening to different things while driving around, listening for any distortion or points which simply sound like they have too much bass then adjusting audio. This is kinda inefficient, though.

Without acquiring a scope, high quality mic, and signal generator (or test CD), how can I best set this up? Tuning car audio is one thing I have very little experience doing, and Google results seem to explain the settings more than explain how to do a good job tuning them.

Thanks!

automotivemoved from livejournal

Car Stuffs


Honda Bass System Kit — Installed
(Click for more…)

Well, despite not having found any reviews about it, I ordered the Honda Bass System Kit back on the 25th when I found out that my new car was about in. Well, I have to say, it is a bit of a pain to install, but worth it. I still need to do a bit more tweaking, but it seems to fill out the bottom end nicely, making the factory audio system quite acceptable.

The only problem I had was that I thoroughly screwed up a gasket-like part and stuck it on the wrong side of the amp. I pulled it off cleanly, but I (stupidly) allowed it to fold over on itself, making a mess of the padding when I stuck it back on. I had some spare self-adheasive foam left (a spare EPT sealer) so I used that to fill the gap.

Other than that, the install went pretty well, including replacing the factory Honda speakers in the rear deck. All in all, I’m pretty happy with this kit. Now I just have to wait for the iPod connection kit to come out and (hopefully) things will be all set.

In addition to the Honda Bass System Kit I also ordered a touch-up paint pen, all-season floor mats, and splash guards. I’m hoping that the splash guards will help cut down the frequency of road tar and such getting thrown up on the body, and hopefully the all-season floor mats will keep the interior a bit nicer. I also got those installed today. The splash guards were a bit of a pain to install due to how close I had to work to the tire, but they came out pretty well. Although I am being a bit silly and worrying about how they’ll affect the aerodynamics of the vehicle on the whole.

The floor mats were literally a drop-in replacement for the carpeted ones. Even the plastic hooks which I was supposed to install on the driver’s side to keep the mat from sliding up under the pedals wasn’t needed, as there was already a pair there used to retain the normal floor mats. They even match the inside of the vehicle pretty well and give it a nice grounded feel.

There was one casualty of the work today, though: My Haujobb t-shirt. I should have known better than to wear it while working on a car, but I guess it is getting pretty old already. See, part of installing the splash guards requires one to use a paste wax behind where the parts will be installed. Well, I got some paste wax, and due to a poorly designed package, I ended up opening the main part of the container and subsequently dropping it against my shirt when I was just simply trying to remove the top cover. (The wax container is of this design and I was trying to remove the yellow part, but the whole thing opened.)

Along with the H and A Accessories order I received three large Dell boxes containing a computer which I let someone have delivered to my house. (I won’t say who it is for, because the recipient could be reading this. Maybe it’s you!) I tested out this computer and it works out great. There will likely be a post about it tomorrow, because it is the first BTX (Balanced Technology Extended) (Warning: PDF) machine I have been able to poke around. I must say, I’m pretty impressed. It’s nice and quiet, and the layout inside makes for much better airflow. More on that later.

Also, right as I was finishing everything up, and his girlfriend Angie (photo here) stopped by to hang out. It was really nice to see them again and sit around and talk and visit and whatnot.

Well, now I think I’ll look into going to bed. I had today off of work (acquired an extra day for coming into work the day after Thanksgiving) but tomorrow is back to normal. Goodnight. :)

Oh, I forgot one other thing… Today I received my electrical bill (DTE Energy) for the month of November and it was only $29.55. That’s really low, in my opinion. I don’t know if it was the two weeks I was gone or the new fridge, but I’m really happy about that. I guess next month I’ll find out what made the difference. I’d expect a $50 – $60 bill, and if it’s any less, I’ll be really happy. $10/less per month will really make the new fridge worth it. Woo!

acquired thingsautomotivemoved from livejournal

Dell 2005FPW


Click for more…

On Friday I came home from work and rather unexpectedly found the box containing my new monitor, a Dell 2005FPW, sitting on the front porch. This wasn’t supposed to be delivered until Monday, and it had a light dusting of snow on it, so I brought it inside to warm up. I let the monitor sit until today (well, Saturday) and after getting home from visiting and in Ann Arbor I decided to go set things up. So, the photo you see up above is the result of tonight’s efforts to get a new monitor set up on my desk. I have to say it went pretty well… The area remains nice and clean, and with the removal of the keyboard drawer and pushing everything back towards the wall, I can type a lot more comfortably, too It’s quite similar to my desk setup at work. I like it lots.

Today while out and about I also purchased my first tank of gas for the new car and got a first car wash. I’ll get a better handle on this number after a few more tanks and a bit more mixed driving, too. I also grabbed some photos of the car outdoors and in the daylight (photo gallery retired), both in an unwashed state and after getting it all cleaned up.

Oh, one last thing? Those two monitors that I want to sell? They can be seen in this photo and are a pair of IBM P260 displays with perfectly flat (vertically and horizontally) Sony tubes. They are really, really nice, and after doing a bit of research into market price, I’m going to ask for US$200 for the pair. So, if you want them, let me know and I can bring them to you or whatever. They work quite well. Also, please note that the color is off in the photo I linked to because I figured the white balance based on the room and the lights currently in there, not on the displays. So they will naturally look a bit off. But, yeah. $200. Not bad at all.

Hrm, now I think I’ll go start thinking about bed. It’s getting late.

acquired thingsautomotivecomputersmoved from livejournal

New Car Troubles

Both last night and this morning I ran into an interesting problem with my new car: I couldn’t get the key out of the ignition. Whatever part of the ignition causes the key to lock into place was preventing it from being turned back to position 0, or off. Both times I had to start the car, put it into gear, then back out before I could get it out again.

Hrm. :\

I need to keep my eye on this in case it happens again.

automotivemoved from livejournal

Whee!


Click for more…

Yes, this is a bit of bragging: I finally got the new car today. And, thus far, I rather like it. The in-dash navigation system / audio / whatever thing is quite nice to use. I don’t understand all the voice commands yet, but it seems good thus far. I just need to finish reading the manuals.

It is raining tonight so I was only able to grab a few photos in the garage (along with a few of the documentation for archival purposes). All of those are available here (photo gallery retired).

I think they are all decent to glance at, but some of the better ones are here:
· 2006 Civic EX Engine Compartment.
· 2006 Civic EX w/ Nav Dashboard as seen from the back seat.
· The wiper blades are really long and move in an interesting pattern.
· The speedometer sits a long ways back from the rest of the instrument cluster.
· 30 / 40 MPG!
· The Honda Navigation System comes with DVDs for both Canada and the US.
· My iPod is already kinda connected. (There is a stuff holder space in the front of the dash which almost perfectly holds the iPod adapter I made and is located directly below the power and aux in connectors.)

So, yeah. This seems pretty nifty thus far. :)

acquired thingsautomotivemoved from livejournal