Основная страница по AIWA CDC-MP3

Using the CDC-MP3

The volume knob on the CDC-MP3 is like all the others on the market today; a digital one that can control a variety of options, such as volume, treble, bass, artificial bass level (called H-Bass), fade level, and Aiwa's DSSA (which stands for "Driver Sound Stage Adjustment). Fortunately, Aiwa didn't make this knob a button, which some other manufacturers have started to do. Instead, the knob has a fairly nice, positive feel that grips to each notch quite nicely. When these settings are changed, the entire blue area around the faceplate proceeds to flash, positive feedback for the action you just performed. However, this is somewhat annoying and distracting while driving. We wish Aiwa had made this feature selectable somewhere on the unit, as we'd turn it off in an instant.

The Volume Knob Offers Easy Adjustement For Any Option

The remote that comes with the CDC-MP3 attaches to the inside of your car's steering wheel, as we discussed above. The infrared sensor that reads this controller's signal is the pinkish dot in the picture above (next to the words H-Bass on the bottom right of the face). Unfortunately, the infrared signal is a bit picky, and needs to be on the right side of the steering wheel. Several other sites around the web have also noted this same problem, so hopefully Aiwa takes steps to correct it in their next generation of MP3 head unit.

The Aiwa CDC-MP3 Remote Control

Playing MP3 CD's

Probably the single reason why anyone would opt for this player over the other popular models out there is the MP3 support. While not quite as good as it could be, we feel the performance Aiwa can claim is damn fine for a first effort. MP3's are read off standard issue data CD's, including both CD-R and CD-RW formats (so long as they are in ISO9660 or Joliet format). Songs can be in any bitrate between 32kbps to 320kbps, with file and song names allowed for any length. However, only 32 characters of that name will be displayed, which results in a truncated display name.

Directories (or Albums, as Aiwa calls them) on the CD are treated like separate discs in a CD-changer, which the CDC-MP3 player gives numbers - instead of reading the actual directory label. This is a bit of a hassle, because you can never see the correct directory text - so while browsing a given CD you have to be able to identify directories correctly, or sequence them alphabetically before burning so you know the directory order. Directories can be stored up to eight deep, though we only ever used two levels in the CD's we made. A limitation of the current mp3 head units is that because they used the CD-changer base technology to enable mp3 support, when the device is set for random play it can only access songs within the current directory. So, if you want to listen to a mixed list of mp3 you'll have to dump all the desired files into the same directory, seek to it, and set the CDC-MP3 for random play mode.

One of the major hassles with this first generation of mp3 head units is load times. When you first place a CD into the unit, it takes a good 20-25 seconds for an average disc to spin up, and the first song to begin playing. Also, when changing songs or directories there is also a 2-3 second pause before that file/directory is loaded up. Obviously, the logic that handles this portion of the device will be sped up for the next-generation units, so for now it is merely a slight annoyance.

Once you get past the load times, there is only one other critical annoyance of the unit - specifically related to the Random play function. Whether or not this function is on is displayed in the text area of the LCD, and can be brought up by punching the Disp button. Random play can be turned on/off by pushing the 6th preset button. If random play is currently off and you want to start random play after the song you're currently listening to, don't touch random play until after the song is over.

Once you press the random play button, it automatically switches to a random song, even if you're in the middle of a song at that moment. If random play is on, and you want to listen from the current song onward, and turn random play off, it switches to another song before it kicks off - what a feature. If this wasn't enough of a pain, the seek feature (used to fast forward through portions of mp3 songs) does NOT work while in random play mode. Seeking backward has no effect, while seeking forward tells random play to move on to another song. This is a serious problem that we hope Aiwa addresses in future mp3 products, as random play is such a great feature for MP3 CD's.

The last major issue is how the unit behaves when you power it down, and then turn it back on. It will remember the current mp3 that it is playing, however it will not remember at what point in the file it was at before the unit was powered down. Standard CD-player head units can handle this, but the technology was not scaled to deal with mp3's fully for this product. This is another major hassle, because often times you'll be more than halfway through a song before shutting off your car, and the last thing you want is to listen through the first half again the next time you turn on your car. Again, this is something we fully expect Aiwa (and other car-stereo manufacturers) to have fixed for the second generation of head units.