So many great old school head units. I loved that really high end Pioneer stuff that ran optical cables straight into the amplifiers, pipedream to own any of it. As far as what I could afford, I liked Eclipse and Alpine for sure.
But my favorite sound always came from the long run of Clarion Pro Audio heads in beginning with the 7770. That was my first head unit purchase at 17 or 18 years old and I was spoiled because of it. I moved on to the heads that had outboard EQ/DSP modules fed by optical cables; the DRX9275L, the DRX9375 & DRX9575RZ. Still have all those complete systems, some BNIB and all with spare new faces and remotes. Running the DXZ945MP on my test bench, lol. I know there were better heads but Clarion was my favorite until I got out of car audio for about 10 years.
Fast forward, I'm currently running the 800PRS and it's wonderful. It doesn't quite match the purity of sound that the DRX heads had with the outboard processors but it sounds extremely good and does offer much more in the way of tuning options and modern amenities. When it gives up the ghost I will grab a 99 if there are any still floating around.
