Alpine CD Player MP3 CDW AAC WMA USB - CDA117

by Alpine

Product Details

• Shipping Weight: 6 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• ASIN: B003BF2H7U
• Item model number: CDA-117
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (28 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #28,751 in Electronics (See Top 100 in Electronics)

Product Description

ALPINE CD PLAYER MP3 CDW AAC WMA USB - CDA117

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

24 of 29 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Audiophile-Quality Head Unit, July 5, 2010

By 

JTee - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Alpine CD Player MP3 CDW AAC WMA USB - CDA117 (Electronics)

Anyone who has owned an aftermarket Head Unit(HU) can tell you that there is a definitive amount of quality between lower price and upper price HU's.
Being an audiophile, i have heard and owned many, many HU's. My last HU was a Pioneer DEH-P8600MP. Pioneer's top quality HU next to the 9600 at the time it came out. After purchasing this Alpine CDA-117, i had very high expectations with which i was going to compare this HU to. First of all they both use 24bit Burr-Brown Digital-to-Analong Converters (24bit DACs) so you get the most information from the CD player, or ipod to the speakers as possible.

Secondly, a feature i wish my Pioneer HU had, is the ability to defeat, or cancel, the CDA-117's internal MOSFET Amplifiers, and send the signal directly from the CD or ipod to the external amplifier (if your using one) and then to the speakers. This allows you to crank the volume considerably with less signal distortion on the beaten path(from the source to the speakers).

This HU also has a very intuitive User-interface(menu system) and the scroll wheel is second to none in terms of usability and control. The HU has a very bright display, and it is also recessed(sunk in under the plastic casing) so that when the sunlight hits the display, you can still see the words very clear. I have no complaints for this HU except that the tuning options are a little less than my previous model HU, but Pioneer decks can be a little overkill with tuning options, and sometimes they are better left alone if you aren't familiar with what they achieve. All in all, this is an audiophile-quality deck, with more than enough features for the most experienced tuners. I believe this unit is the successor to the Alpine CDA-9886, and that unit is revered in the audio community. If nothing else, go to your local best buy and see if they have one of these on display, you will not be unimpressed!

Thanks for your time.
Josh

12 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Sounds great! Terrible User Interface!, May 11, 2011

By 

T. Detert - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Alpine CD Player MP3 CDW AAC WMA USB - CDA117 (Electronics)

First, the bad, because I found a lot.

I'm finding my purchase of this head unit CDA-117 to be a fairly disappointing experience. It sounds great, but it's the most frustratingly difficult and distracting interface I can imagine possible. How Alpine came to develop this to be so insanely counter-intuitive escapes me. There are many serious flaws with this player, in terms of safety and distraction during driving. Do not even attempt searching for a song while driving. It's impossible. Then on top of that, the previous/next buttons are the same shape and size as half the other buttons. If I see the phrase "BANKING" while it's scanning USB one more time, I'm gonna flip out. seriously, why can't you just navigate folder directory!?!?!?!

As a software developer and user experience consultant, I'm absolutely amazed at how terrible this experience has been.

1). Volume/Mute completely unavailable when "BANKING" appears, forcing you to escape the operation to change volume.
2). What is the relevance of BANK1, BANK2? What is that supposed to tell me? It seems like an arbitrarily selected random collection.
3). Larger than 1000 song collections: UNUSABLE.
4). Scrolling is terrible. ONE item per turn? Have you even attempted to search for anything whatsoever with this thing?
5). Volume press is FAR too sensitive, bringing up search function instead of volume control at least 90% of the time.
6). BIGGEST FLAW: previous/next buttons
7). Display is completely annoying. I don't need an ipod icon, i need meta information. Without this stupid icon the display would not need to annoyingly scroll the artist, album, track info. STUPID!!!!!

Now the Good:

This player sounds absolutely phenomenal, and the audio controls are excellent. Clearly this is where Alpine spends it's time in development and not the user interface.

Ipod connects with no issues, as did usb powered external hard drive. Don't bother with a large collection though.

Overally, I'm happy with it, but those annoying things at the beginning will force me to reconsider Alpine in the future.

Here's a tip Alpine: instead of constantly churning out new units all the time with a myriad of differences, how about you actually perfect a single product before releasing it?

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent sound quality and hard to beat in performance and price, March 13, 2011

By 

motoxdreaming - See all my reviews

This review is from: Alpine CD Player MP3 CDW AAC WMA USB - CDA117 (Electronics)

This HU is about the best you can buy especially given the price range. It has the Brown-Burr decoder which is the cats meow in terms of reading information and sending the right signals to the amp/speakers so they can reproduce them. It will pull details out of CD's that you probably never heard before AND you will hear beats and sounds in pristine detail. I was coming from an old Eclipse deck (before they sold out) which had a brown burr decoder and 8volt preouts. It was my favorite of all time deck but this Alpine is better. Granted the preouts are not as hefty but I feel that 4volts can get the job done if you are connecting an external amp. What is awesome about the Alpine is the immediate interface to connect your IPOD and control it from the scrolling main knob. Most of your tasks can be accomplished by simply scrolling the one center knob and pushing it as a button. Very cool in traffic and what not to whizz through your playlists. The BIO lite display is actually really cool looking and very easy to read- it seems that glare does not interfere with its glow. Its a soft but very solid and easily read display. It has a tuners delight with time alignment, cross overs and two methods of equalizing the bands to dial in your preferences. With a good amp and speakers you really shouldn't have to stray too far from 0 but it does in fact tune with very nice precision. Time alignment is a huge bonus as you can adjust your sound stage for all your speakers to hit your ears at the same time. This is a very nice feature and definitely worth looking for in a HU. There's a mathematical formula to set the time alignment-you can use it or just wing it by your ears. It makes a big difference. Ive read complaints about the slowness of the IPOD interface but have experienced no problems and rate it very highly in terms of speed reading and ability to read MP3's with the most detail. It also has a media expander which sounds like a gimmick but no sir, not from Alpine. Ive noticed that it really can richen up the detail in music with three varying levels of expansion on the tuner, MP3 and CD sources. Its awesome. The internal 18rms amplifier can provide mediocre power until you get an amp but consider the simple KTP 445 in addition to this deck. Simple plug and play and trust me, with the right component speakers and insulation, you can call it a true sound system. Bumps it up to 45rms and its a powerful, clean signal that is comparable to high end, high power, bigger amplifers. I am amazed every time I get in my truck that an amp that small can produce that much detail in music. Its truely respectable. Ive spent 4 thousands dollars on old systems but this time around wanted to stay within reason. This deck, the KTP 445, some sweet components, rear full range for fill and your choice of boom in the back. Alpine makes some great stuff and these days, its nice to have quality sound at very affordable prices. I have a lot of respect for Alpine. They make really good stuff.