Sunday, December 16, 2007

Alpine KCA-420i works with the iPhone and iPhone 3G


This is blatant attempt to grab some web hits...

Confirmed: the Alpine KCA-420i works with the first gen iPhone. Update - it does work with the iPhone 3G, but it does not charge it.

Tested my in-car Alpine iPod connection with iPhone, and it works perfectly. Upon connecting, the iPhone asks if you want to turn Airplane Mode on (your choice here, although I have not had any speaker interference). All iPhone features remain active, except the iPod feature which now displays "Accessory Connected". Using the Alpine head unit you can search using normal commands through Artists, Playlists, Podcasts, etc.

Here's the cool part - if someone calls you, the music pauses and you hear the ringtone through the car speakers. Hit your BlueTooth to answer, or simply hit "answer" on the phone and tap the speaker-phone feature and talk away. When the call ends the iPod resumes.

It also charges the first gen iPhone, but it does not charge the iPhone 3G.

My Setup - Alpine CDA-9833, Alpine KCA-420i, Alpine MRD-M301, Alpine KCE-510M, Alpine Alpine SWE-1042 (x2)

10 comments:

kevin said...

your blog would be soo much cooler if 87% of the comments didn't come from the same person...

Anonymous said...

Perfect, that's what I wanted to hear. Do you think there is a way to have the incomming call come out of your speakers?
Greets Simonj

tchmanz28 said...

It mutes the audio output via the dock when you answer the call - the only way to get the call to go over your speakers would be to have a BlueTooth adapter hooked to the car radio.

Anonymous said...

Oh I c. How about charging, does it charge your Iphone? Oh I can't wait to get this phone and test it my self :)

tchmanz28 said...

Good questions! I need to update the blog entry. So the Alpine documentation says that the KCA-420i "trickle charges" the iPod, meaning that it keeps the battery from loosing power, but does not add charge. With my iPod Photo, it would always keep the same charge of 3/4 battery. BUT I've watched my iPhone battery meter actually rise while on the dock for more than 30 minutes. My bet is that the iPhone is less of a drain on the battery (with the screen off) compared to the iPod Video due to the new solid state hard-drive.

Anonymous said...

Found you via google thank you for having an answer to my question!

Anonymous said...

Sorry to leave 2 comments but what dock are you using for your Iphone to keep the plug available?

tchmanz28 said...

I mounted the brain in the glove box, and ran the cable behind the dash and out the ash tray, the iphone slips right into the ash tray, laying flat...will post a pic....

Unknown said...

With this set-up you have to have the 'brain' as you call it AND the cable? Ive been looking into just having the cable ran from the back of my Alpine head unit (KCA-9853) to my iphone. Im assuming this wont work though. Any feedback? Thanks in advance.

Judd Bonham said...

To ED: Are you looking to do something like pre-out to iPhone connector? I don't know if those are available but worth a search. If you are thinking about an AI-net cable from the back of the Alpine head unit directly to the iPhone, then I would think that would only be possible if the unit itself had all the processing hardware for the iPod/iPhone in the 1/2 din unit. I hope that makes sense.