DAB radio

[recurveandy]

Morning all

I'm looking to get me some DAB radio
Initially I was looking at an add on kit, Pure Highway or similar, as I want to keep the stock HU
Now I'm thinking it would be better, and possibly cheaper to use another HU, mounted in the glove box and plumbed into the CD port with an AUX adapter
Is it OK to use the speaker out or pre-amp out through the AUX?
ICE is not high on my list so any info is gratefully received

Cheers
Andy

[URquattroGus]

On a related note, i have a spare and unused Pure Highway that I could let you have for a few notes if it's of use, for say, £30 plus postage. Pm me if it sounds any good.

[Christophski]

Angus, does this plug into the headunit of the car and come out through the car speakers? If so DIBS!

[johne]

Pure Highway's can either modulate an FM output so you can listen directly on an FM radio or for better quality feed in to your head unit using a 3.5mm jack output.

John

[Le S2 Audi]

Dub *** Question - Which I Know I'm Good At - But Will Fitting a DAB Radio Improve my reception on my MK2 Golf ??? Which is totally ***** as stock??

[johne]

Umm, not directly. Fitting a DAB radio will require a new DAB aerial as well. DAB radios can work well with no interference but only if they have a good DAB aerial to match and so in that sense they are more picky than a traditional analogue radio.

John

[recurveandy]

I'm gonna take a punt on the highway
Will be running it though the CD port with a CD/Aux adapter, along with the ipod
And we'll see how I get on with the screen aerial, other wise I may look at a powered dual DAB/FM aerial

[johne]

When I had a Highway in my car it worked really well. I found that one side of the valcro strip supplied with it would "stick" to the roof lining and mounted the unit up on the roof lining between the sunroof and the sunroof control panel. I was able to take power from behind the sunroof control panel, mount the Highway aerial at the top of the screen and because the Highway was near the regular AM/FM aerial on the coupe roof the FM modulator in the Highway worked fine.

Reception using the Highway aerial only dropped out in one or two places around the country.

John

[Greg_S]

Andy,

I fitted a Kenwood DAB radio in mine recently, got it from halfords for about £180 includes USB for IPod or memory stick connection, it has a separate DAB antenna which is mounted on passenger door pillar, was really easy to fit as all you need to do is loosen the two bolts on side of dash and remove glovebox to route the aerial cable and can get the earth plane on the door pillar which improves signal quality too.

I have found that some stations are still low bit rate and actually sound better on analogue than DAB, but really depends on which station you are listening to.

[recurveandy]

Morning all

Got everything plumbed in last weekend and it’s working a treat
The HU is a late Concert plus cassette and the Highway is routed through a dual CD/Aux adapter along with an iPod with Dension icelink.
The Highway antenna is routed up behind the A-pillar trim and reception is very good, a few drop outs in town but perfect on my commute
Initially I couldn’t get the HU to switch between the Highway and iPod, I think due to the permanent live until the key is removed system, so I re-wired the dual adapter so when the radio is turned off, it cuts power and defaults to CD mode, the HU will then select Aux mode through the normal mode select.
I all, very happy with the Highway and would recommend it to anyone looking for DAB radio