Anyone interested in an Android car stereo head unit?

Lith1um

2[H]4U
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Aug 3, 2004
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I think a nice Pioneer or Alpine head unit in the double din form factor and running the Android O.S. would be the shit. The custom rom scene would be just crazy.

I can imagine everything customized just the way people like it. Seemless integration of phone, media, navigation, and OBDII capabilities.

I have a 7" lcd head unit in my work truck and I plugged my Samsung Vibrant into the head unit's video input. It was just cool being able to display vehicle parameters using Torque for Android, using google nav and maps, listening to pandora, etc. I was playing around while offroading a bit and I had the android program "Bubble" displaying the vehicle's attitude. I just started laughing at all the possibilities.
 
My Eclipse already integrates into my phone all I need via Bluetooth and removable USB. It's still something I'd like to see. Hardware companies are terrible about setting up their products for anything but Apple shit.
 
I think a nice Pioneer or Alpine head unit in the double din form factor and running the Android O.S. would be the shit. The custom rom scene would be just crazy.

I can imagine everything customized just the way people like it. Seemless integration of phone, media, navigation, and OBDII capabilities.

I have a 7" lcd head unit in my work truck and I plugged my Samsung Vibrant into the head unit's video input. It was just cool being able to display vehicle parameters using Torque for Android, using google nav and maps, listening to pandora, etc. I was playing around while offroading a bit and I had the android program "Bubble" displaying the vehicle's attitude. I just started laughing at all the possibilities.

I Would pay for another line of service on my cell phone for that.. Also stands to reason that you would be able to get awesome reception given that you could easily mount a much larger external antenna then any current phone has.
 
I'm all for this especially seeing so many reviews on in car double din decks having crappy navigation software. That alone would be worthwhile to just use google Nav based navigation on a car deck.
 
You can already do it... $200 archos tablet (or the better $400 archos 101), use a headphone plug->RCA converter cable and plug it into the back of your basic kenwood/sony/etc deck. Or just use bluetooth if you have a bluetooth cd deck.

Or maybe even just use its USB cable and plug it into the headunit USB (if you have a newer USB cd deck).... I wonder if that would work? You could charge/connect the tablet via usb at the same time!
 
Interesting concept. You would have to make a nice skin for android similar to the urchin car dock on the evo. I wonder how the audio quality would be compared two an everage double din unit.
 
Sign me up for one if they make it. That would be great. I travel alot of places for work that my phone does not work very well, if at all. Having the possibility of my truck's antenna could definitely help, let alone the limitless possibilities that your car stereo could do.

Fish :cool:
 
I don't like the idea of a device attached to my car in such a way that it could mess with the way it operates. Imagine what a malicious app could accomplish with access to the car.
 
I would love to see something like that.. It doesn't have to have its own cell service.. Basically make a Android based Sync type thing with good navigation as well as the rest of the perks of android. hell I would pay the extra 25 bucks a month to add a line onto my plan so it even had its own line.
 
How awful are the current DACs in android devices?

A2DP Bluetooth interfacing DACs should be easy to setup outputting to amps. Otherwise, are there any USB interfacing DACs that may be compatible with android devices?




Waiting for some stock on these for my E46:

A headunit that runs on Android, hotness! (Wants to be able to play FLAC, run a ton of awesome Android Apps ;D)

http://www.dynavin.com/android.php

Where is pricing and availability?
 
How awful are the current DACs in android devices?

A2DP Bluetooth interfacing DACs should be easy to setup outputting to amps. Otherwise, are there any USB interfacing DACs that may be compatible with android devices?






Where is pricing and availability?

Received an email from a reseller here in California, who say they may receive limited stock sometime mid to late June since these are early-adopter units to gauge interest in such a product. We should expect to see Dynavin increase production of these Android-based headunits towards the later part of this year.
 
I don't like the idea of a device attached to my car in such a way that it could mess with the way it operates. Imagine what a malicious app could accomplish with access to the car.

LOL because everyone knows that your radio has control over your car.

Give me a break. There's no way your radio could take control of your car; The only connections it has are power, antenna, ground, etc. There's no connection to the car's computer at all.
 
I don't like the idea of a device attached to my car in such a way that it could mess with the way it operates. Imagine what a malicious app could accomplish with access to the car.
There's no way this post is serious.
 
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I don't like the idea of a device attached to my car in such a way that it could mess with the way it operates. Imagine what a malicious app could accomplish with access to the car.

What on earth are you talking about? This is a HEADUNIT.
 
Processor isn't quite fast enough for my liking. Will revisit after 2nd model comes out...
 
Processor isn't quite fast enough for my liking. Will revisit after 2nd model comes out...

Lol, damn.. now head units are going the way of smart phones; "Meh, I'm going to wait until the Tegra2 or dual core head units come out with at least 1 GB RAM and maybe a Super AMOLED + display." It's only a matter of time before carriers start selling head units with 2 year contracts :eek:.
 
LOL because everyone knows that your radio has control over your car.

Give me a break. There's no way your radio could take control of your car; The only connections it has are power, antenna, ground, etc. There's no connection to the car's computer at all.

That's not necessarily true. I had a 2001 Impala that you could reset the oil life and the alarm sounds and other things like that (and clear dashboard lights) through the radio.
 
LOL because everyone knows that your radio has control over your car.

Give me a break. There's no way your radio could take control of your car; The only connections it has are power, antenna, ground, etc. There's no connection to the car's computer at all.

There's no way this post is serious.

What on earth are you talking about? This is a HEADUNIT.

You three obviously know nothing about how modern cars are put together. Just about any car these days will have the radio hooked into the internal CAN or MOST network of the car. From there it can conceivably control any number of internal systems

To give you an idea of what can be done once you have access to this internal network: http://www.engadget.com/2010/05/14/hackers-can-remotely-disable-your-cars-brakes-create-sensation/

So now instead of needing to plug a laptop into the car and run malicious code, you want to give hackers direct access to your vehicle through you downloading a malicious app to your radio. Enjoy that.
 
You three obviously know nothing about how modern cars are put together. Just about any car these days will have the radio hooked into the internal CAN or MOST network of the car. From there it can conceivably control any number of internal systems

To give you an idea of what can be done once you have access to this internal network: http://www.engadget.com/2010/05/14/hackers-can-remotely-disable-your-cars-brakes-create-sensation/

So now instead of needing to plug a laptop into the car and run malicious code, you want to give hackers direct access to your vehicle through you downloading a malicious app to your radio. Enjoy that.

That link is talking about someone using a wireless receiver on the OBD II port on the car. Your head unit most certainly doesn't every interface with the OBD II system, at least on any car that I've had or seen so far. If I ever saw a HU that wanted to be hooked up to my OBD port and it ran an open source OS, then yeah, I would be concerned a bit, but I doubt that will happen.
 
That link is talking about someone using a wireless receiver on the OBD II port on the car. Your head unit most certainly doesn't every interface with the OBD II system, at least on any car that I've had or seen so far. If I ever saw a HU that wanted to be hooked up to my OBD port and it ran an open source OS, then yeah, I would be concerned a bit, but I doubt that will happen.

OBD is basically a port for the CAN bus isn't it? The stock head unit in my '08 WRX is connected to the can bus, so theoretically it can talk to the car's computer and everything else. That's how it knows how fast I'm going to do it's speed dependent volume control.
Also, what os do you think nav head units are running? I'll bet a good number of them are running some version of embedded linux when they aren't running Windows CE.
You know what happens when you assume? The sexy nurses app that you got from the android market starts your car up at 3 in the morning and redlines the throttle. lol.
Sure it's unlikely, but don't think it isn't possible.
 
OBD is basically a port for the CAN bus isn't it? The stock head unit in my '08 WRX is connected to the can bus, so theoretically it can talk to the car's computer and everything else. That's how it knows how fast I'm going to do it's speed dependent volume control.
Also, what os do you think nav head units are running? I'll bet a good number of them are running some version of embedded linux when they aren't running Windows CE.
You know what happens when you assume? The sexy nurses app that you got from the android market starts your car up at 3 in the morning and redlines the throttle. lol.
Sure it's unlikely, but don't think it isn't possible.

Yeah, but the key word you said there was stock, as in the factory head unit. If you can't trust that and whatever (hopefully proprietary) software it's running, then you already have major probs. So I sure as hell wouldn't trust any aftermarket hardware to be connected to that same interface/network, esp. if it's running any popular OS like Android. I meant to bring this argument into my previous post, but figured I'd wait until you called me out on it because I know a lot of newer cars are tying their factory head units into the cars CAN in order to display all sorts of sensor readings. But I wouldn't want to replace those units with an aftermarket one anyways since I would most likely lose that functionality.
 
ipad/Galaxy Tab be damned. I would spend $1000 on a double-din android HU. And I want the Tegra 2, the 8GB storage, and the Super AMOLED+ Display too. :)

BTW, the car phone is BACK! I'm going to mount a huge brick-shaped phone in my center console just like the 80s. lol.
 
Yeah, but the key word you said there was stock, as in the factory head unit. If you can't trust that and whatever (hopefully proprietary) software it's running, then you already have major probs. So I sure as hell wouldn't trust any aftermarket hardware to be connected to that same interface/network, esp. if it's running any popular OS like Android. I meant to bring this argument into my previous post, but figured I'd wait until you called me out on it because I know a lot of newer cars are tying their factory head units into the cars CAN in order to display all sorts of sensor readings. But I wouldn't want to replace those units with an aftermarket one anyways since I would most likely lose that functionality.

Even most older cars (within 10 years) will have their head unit hooked into the CAN network. And hoffstetter was right, the OBDII is just the CAN network (for the most part). OBDII is really just a connector that provides access to the CAN network on the car. So my point stands, do you really want to open up your car to malicious attacks via a bad app?
 
I've got a Superchips for my HEMI Dodge Magnum and I went to their website the other day for a firmware update and what did I see but this:

http://www.superchips.com/Store/VIVID.aspx

It's an Archos tablet running Android which basically runs the Superchips app with a connection that can connect to the OBD II. I imagine it wouldn't be too difficult output audio/video to a head unit too, has HDMI output. Even has GPS.
 
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