midiwall

fyi... I just went out to the car to play with this a bit. Not that those with trouble wanted to hear it, but "it works fine for me with CF 1.41".

Things I can think of to check:

• Try with and without buffering disabled
• With buffering enabled, try hitting the PAUSE button on the radio before moving to Media
• Do NOT specify an audio line to be controlled by the radio
• Check the _Windows_ (not CF's mixer) mixer levels. It's possible to have it set such that CF doesn't have control

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:: Mark

vladcarpc

The Brando website announced free shipping to worldwide until 5dec2007:
http://usb.brando.com.hk/news.php?news_id=750

You who already ordered this FM, did you receive it OK? Would you recommend this hardware and vendor?

Thanks

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\/ |_ /\ [)
1995 Civic Sedan EX
CarPC status: [||||||||||||] 100% - Phase 1 Complete!
YouTube video - WorkLog

midiwall

For the price, it's a great find.

I've had mixed results from Brando (see my other messages above), but this was a good experience. 9 days from the UK to the west coast of the US.

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:: Mark

Dan95five0

i'm going to have to add this to my "Parts Needed List"

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95 Mustang 5.0
Custom Case, VIA m10000, 512 MB, 80gig, M2-ATX, Slot Load DVD, 7" LCD Touchscreen

zorin

Nice, they have extended the free shipping to 1. Jan 2oo8, and with the low dollar, this is really cheap! *ordered*

dudeness

Does it works better than the Silabs? Can someone compare both?!

Is it easy to remove the original antenna and get the original car-antenna working? Which adapter?

midiwall

No adapter, you'll be soldering... Check the 2nd post on page two for pics.

http://www.mp3car.com/vbulletin/1128717-post22.html

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stavrosg

No media problems here either.

Note: I did NOT install any software for this thing, plugged it in and just setup centrafuse.

Oh and the antenna sucks!! But it's really inexpensive and works well enough.

kelmk

So I just got mine today so I plugged it in and didn't install any drivers. I downloaded the silabs radio app and it worked right away.
I set Centrafuse to the silabs plugin and sarted up the radio. What I got was all sorts of double audio. So I turned off buffering and now it sounds normal. I played with setting some presets and audio stopped working afer a few minutes. Now windows doesn't recognize the device. I just shows it as unknown device.
Any ideas?

hgreen70

NOTE:I like CF as a whole and this review is meant only to help David and his crew with faster more informed development.

Well I had the pleasure or mis fortunate depending on how you look at it, of traveling 750 miles with CF this week and here is what I have found.

my setup : CF 1.46, intel celeron 215, 512 mb, 80 gig 7" touch screen. mounted in a car pc chassis.

The media player performed flawlessly I played a total of about 20 albums strait about 300 songs. it performed great with no problems at all.

The XM radio continues to a BIG disappointment, I endured continuous looping and fade outs with loss of signals etc. The XM portioned should be rewrote like the music player was written. I personally don't care for the visuals, in that this is XM not a mp3 player. I think some of the problems appear to be centered around cpu cycles!

The NAV portion gets mixed reviews. It tracked very well. When going from state to state the regional maps did not automatically change, I had to change it manually and i did not always know what file the state was located in. I could not program a route from Maryland to Atlanta because it would not find Atlanta(Ga). When I loaded the maps the fast search buttons(gas, food, hotel) would only pull up the main poi window and not the poi closest to your location. This worked perfect while in Maryland.

My biggest complaint is with the volume. I had a hard time controlling volume. My Cadillac has a amp built in. The computer is connected to the amp via a wiring harness
often times the volume doesn't stay in position. it also gets too loud, over driving the factory amp. How to fix this I don't know.

Other problems faced. when coming from hibernation both XM and media would play.
DVD's did not play well. This I believe is do to windvd 8. Windvd 8 video quality is superior to any other player I have found(open to suggestion) and the computer plays dvds very well in the application its self.

This system has come a long way!! with a few fix this can be a very good system.

midiwall

I'm thinking you missed when you picked a thread/forum to post into.

Maybe a new thread up a level at:

http://www.mp3car.com/vbulletin/centrafuse/

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:: Mark

kelmk

Got mine going. It had a bad usb plug on it so I had to solder a new one on. Works great with centrafuse but the reception sucks.

kelmk

Which wire from the stock antenna should I connect? This middle or outside?

midiwall

Middle - middle is signal, the outside is ground. You MAY have to connect the ground as well. If so, then the easiest spot to connect it to would be the outside shield of the USB connector. You can test if the radio reception gets better with just a piece of temp wire from the ground (outside) on the antenna to the metal of the USB connector.

An alternative would be to graft a "Motorola radio socket" connector to the radio. That would be the mate of the stock plug on the antenna, which is this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motorola_connector

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:: Mark

Alfredbra

hi, I bought one of these and installed it today. works fine in centrafuse but reception is quite poor. If I touch the aerial with my hand reception improves significantly and the software shows more reception bars. What the hell? tried grounding it aswell but only made it worse lol. any ideas. Im thinking about hooking it up to stock antenna or buying one of those shark fin fm antennas or something any ideas on what to use? and can someone confirm middle wire is signal on the motorolla lead cable and do you have to ground the outside? thanx