Alpine CDA-9815 or Eclipse CD8443?

[Geraldo1432 10+ year member]

The eclipse will probably sound good and so will the alpine. Both will die. My Eclipse has broken twice in 5 months with 7 weeks of service time. I have alse has 3 alpines that all had internal amp problems. I would go with either a nakamichi or an eclpise just because they usally work great. Mine may just be a fluke. The slot load is what has malfunctioned. NO Alipne bad internal amps.

 

[Aurorav8 10+ year member]

Originally posted by Geraldo1432 The eclipse will probably sound good and so will the alpine. Both will die. My Eclipse has broken twice in 5 months with 7 weeks of service time. I have alse has 3 alpines that all had internal amp problems. I would go with either a nakamichi or an eclpise just because they usally work great. Mine may just be a fluke. The slot load is what has malfunctioned. NO Alipne bad internal amps.

I had an Alpine HU for 6 years without a single problem, nothing at all went wrong with it in 6 years of use...unless the QC really went down hill at Alpine, I doubt they will have too many problems.

 

[JLCivic 10+ year member]

Originally posted by Geraldo1432 The eclipse will probably sound good and so will the alpine. Both will die. My Eclipse has broken twice in 5 months with 7 weeks of service time. I have alse has 3 alpines that all had internal amp problems. I would go with either a nakamichi or an eclpise just because they usally work great. Mine may just be a fluke. The slot load is what has malfunctioned. NO Alipne bad internal amps.

What model eclipse? Eclipse has been VERY reliable for the local shop. I ran eclipse decks for 9 years with zero problems(they sound great too :O) That being said, I currently run a clarion 835mp, and I am very pleased with it.

 

[Bavarian3 10+ year member]

thats weird some of u had said they had problems with alpines......ive had my cdm-7854 for like 3 years now i think it is which is even the lowest line of alpine HU's and ive had no problems with it and its great. I really dont see how u could go wrong with either the alpine or the eclipse as long as u do a good INSTALL

 

[Randy Savage 5,000+ posts]

I've had Alpine for about 3 years, no problems whatsoever. Have a 7856 as my backup lying around in perfect condition //content.invisioncic.com/y282845/emoticons/smile.gif.1ebc41e1811405b213edfc4622c41e27.gif

 

[bri487 5,000+ posts]

I am heavily considering both of these head units, and for a while i wanted to go with the Eclipse but ever since seeing this Alpine, i have just been at a loss for words. I have also heard that the Eclipse Head units have been known to go bad after about a year. What do you guys think? Please some one tell me what they think is the better head unit.

what did you do to that poor deck. i have used eclipse for the past five years and never had a single problem. the only reason that i buy new ones is to stay current with the looks and "new items". i have one that i bought two years ago in my boat and it has been seriously abused. the whole face has been flooded with water and after it dried out in a day or two, it worked absolutly perfect again. Never had an eclipse break, ever

 

[Geraldo1432 10+ year member]

I had Installed a 3421 with a eclipse 7 band eq in my car. I did fiberglass for the eq install. It was a great sounding unit with no problems for a year then I put a cd in and the mecanism just started going back and forth. The install is not the problem. As with the alpines the have cooling problems and were going into protection mode on just normal days. that was a CDA5857. twice in for the same problem. I upgraded to a CDA 7893 and it developed massive distortion problems and was destroying my speakers slowly (twice blown) with harmonic distortion. That install was done properly also. I upgraded the power cable right just as hifi buys told me too. you must do this on all alpies 50x4 and above. just not up to my standards of what a good headunit should be for the alpines. the Eclipse however is easy to use and when matched with the propper EQ and the such is far supperior in tonal ballance and imaging. I use alpine tweeters and have had alpine subs they worked flawlessly, they just do not make dependable head units. I have a loaner 3412 and It works wonderful except for the non fader out. The 3421 had a frequency responce for the non fader(sub) output wich without will drastically change the frequency response and boost level of the higher frequencies of the sub bass range. any more Questions?

 

[wolfey 10+ year member]

Harmonic distortion slowly blowing your speakers?? i think thats called "clipping". I could get a little amp that has 100 percent harmonic distortion at 10wrms and it wont blow a pair of 50 watt rms speakers if i run it all day.. Try getting an amp if you want pleanty of power for speakers.. that might also be some of your overheating problems.. my alpine seems to get real hot also but its never gone into protect mode or anything.. and never noticed any abnormal distortion.. it puts out a hell of a lot of power though for a headunit, so i havent bothered installing an external amp in my new car.. The only thing i dont like about my headunit are the weak preouts.. i'm kinda disgusted to be honest.. i have them set to 15, my gains half way up, and i have to lower the crossover -5 db up front and - 6 in the rear for the bass to mix well.. and theres nothing wrong with my sub or amp (revo and brahma running at 4ohms)..

 

[-DZ- 10+ year member]

Originally posted by wolfey The only thing i dont like about my headunit are the weak preouts.. i'm kinda disgusted to be honest.. i have them set to 15, my gains half way up, and i have to lower the crossover -5 db up front and - 6 in the rear for the bass to mix well.. and theres nothing wrong with my sub or amp (revo and brahma running at 4ohms)..

Doesn't sound like weak preouts to me. If you have to turn it down, then I'd say they are strong enough.

It could also be the fact that you have one of the best subwoofers available, but you are combining it with speakers that are ran off of the head unit. IMO, you are expecting too much out of the head unit. Get some decent components and amp them, and I doubt you will be complaining about that. You can't spend a bunch of money on a great subwoofer and amplifier, spend nothing on mids/highs and expect it to sound good.

Just my opinion of course.....

 

[Geraldo1432 10+ year member]

clipping is not distortion it is the threashold of usable amplifier power. gain is a voltage setting and not a volume even though it affects volume. I hav amps, kenwood excelons on boston pros and they aren't the problem, If they were they would begone. MyEQ has a line driver so preout weakness insnt a problem, the problem is the output signal in the cd player itself with the alpines I have used. Harmonic distortion can blow speakers thats why when you do not use an external amp and put nice speakers in they blow ,harmonic distortion levels. alpines are just crappy headunits. I also have XLN monster every where and a 0 gauge split into 2 4 gauge for moy wiring, and I use a 1farad cap, and all correct fuses. so do NOT try to say it is a wiring or install problem with the alpines with my system!!.

 

[wolfey 10+ year member]

Doesn't sound like weak preouts to me. If you have to turn it down, then I'd say they are strong enough.

i said i have the front and rear (as in rearfill and fronstage speakers) turned down on the internal crossover in the headunit, to -5 and -6 respectively. I have the sub crossed to 80 hz low pass and 0 db gain.. thats +5 and +6 compared to the speakers in the car.. all that and i have the sub out set to +15 out of 15 total.. the amps gain is close to half way.. running a similar setup in my old car (which was about the same size) i had a jvc headunit with 4v preouts, and i had the gain set to about 1/4, there was no internal crossover but i only had to put the sub out to about 6/12 to get similar output of my sub.. i know you'll say theres all kinds of other factors, and i know, but the preouts are weak, its quite obvious, people have tested them to only be like 1.8 volts.. theres a bunch of info on it in another topic.. I'm not expecting my system to sound wonderful as a whole, it just seemed odd to me i have to set everything so much higher on my sub.. i realize there are other factors that may be contributing to that though, such as stock speakers (probably very efficient but cheap) and being run of the head unit (not sure why that would make them louder though) but yeah i would agree amping a nice set of components would yield much better results..

As far as harmonic distortion blowing speakers, thats the first time i've ever heard of such a thing.. it wouldnt surprise me if its not "good" for the speakers but i have a hard time beleiving its all that bad for them.. if so you'd be blowing all kinds of speakers with a lack of power since harmonic distortion increases with power output.. cheap systems would never hold up cus there would be too much harmonic distortion for the speakers in all cases.. just doesnt make any sense to me.. maybe if you can show me a good article or something explaining how that works i'll believe it.

 

[-DZ- 10+ year member]

Originally posted by wolfey i know you'll say theres all kinds of other factors, and i know, but the preouts are weak, its quite obvious, people have tested them to only be like 1.8 volts.. theres a bunch of info on it in another topic..

Funny. I have tested the preout voltage on my CDA-9815, EQ set flat, Crossover set flat, SUB-W control set at +9 (I forgot to set it at +15) and I got 3.1V out of the subwoofer preouts.

Check it out:

http://www.caraudioforum.com/vbb2/showthread.php?threadid=142546&perpage=15&pagenumber=6

A. There are a lot of other factors involved.

B. Some people may not have been testing the preouts properly. Using different test tones and tones recorded at different reference levels will produce different results.

C. If you can drive your amplifier into clipping, the preouts are strong enough. Any noise that will be introduced into the system at the subwoofer level will be inaudible. If you can hear it, you have other problems besides weak preouts.

 

[wolfey 10+ year member]

well i have not tested them myself, the people who tested them seemed fairly intelligent as far as what they were doing.. it was in another eclipse vs alpine topic.. I believe a car audio shop tested them.. (they probably sold eclipse though), so who knows.. just seems like from my personal experience they are weak. none the less, my system sounds decent as is, it just seemed really odd to me the way i have to set it up.. i kinda hoped at first i did something wrong but i have yet to find anything..

 

[packerfan 10+ year member]

Eclipse all the way, Alpines have weak out puts....

 

[burtonsnow83 10+ year member]

good testing, this has convinced me that it will be safe to get the CDA-9815.