Saw this kit on Halfords via a email this morning anyone think its a good deal seems to have the right connector to piggyback into the loom. Meant to be all on the radio no wires no extra controls all £149

http://www.halfords.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/product_storeId_10001_catalogId_10151_productId_874533_langId_-1_categoryId_243051

....no controls at all! Apparently it runs off the MFSW controls. Makes it quite an expensive upgrade if you don't have MFSW.

(I like the picture of the headunit though.......cassette!)

It is a very nice idea though.

I saw this one yesterday in Halfords....

http://www.halfords....yId_243051#tab1

Edited 24 March, 201214 yr by RainbowFore

Looks good but it's a shame it wont work with Columbus.

ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh BUGGER!

ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh BUGGER!

I heard that from here!

....no controls at all! Apparently it runs off the MFSW controls. Makes it quite an expensive upgrade if you don't have MFSW.

(I like the picture of the headunit though.......cassette!)

It is a very nice idea though.

I saw this one yesterday in Halfords....

http://www.halfords....yId_243051#tab1

I would love to get one that comes up on radio only and controled via it the stick on ones like that are prob what I will end up with though:( there again I more or less never listen to the radio thats what MDI/SD slot/ hdd are all for im the DJ in my car not some bloke sitting with a mic somewhere 500 miles away.

Here comes Mr.Cynical;

£150 but add to that fitting (some people are hopeless and would need Halfrauds Monkeys to install),

Shame DAB is so carp and takeup is falling of dramatically. The government has scrapped current plans to turn of FM due to the poor response from the public.

DAB was originally designed to offer high quality digital sound but of course the greedy / lazy broadcasters have used the technology to squeeze in more stations at higher compression rates rather than taking the opportunity to offer high fidelity live concerts etc. This means the quality is rubbish 128kbps if you are lucky - 64kbps more often than not and therefore joe public have not bothered. Oh and it appears that coverage is patchy at best which is one of the reason the government has scrapped their plans,

The misinformation and bull*** coming from the largest manufacturer PURE is astonishing. I don't suppose it's due to the large subsidy they are getting from the government? Nah, perish the thought!

BE AWARE - as Keith already pointed out the Columbus isn't listed as compatible which is a bit of a fail

Don't get me wrong - DAB >could< be good and in a car it can work quite well (assuming a decent external antenna is used) but as a a bit of an audiophile it goes against my sensibilities with it's high compression ratios so I hate it!!

Id bet any money it does work with the Columbus. Worth a try as you can always return it.

Let us know how you get on then.........

Let us know how you get on ......

Let us know how you get on then.........

lol, i can think of better things to spend £149 on tbh. Dab is rubbish at home so can imagine how bad it would be in a car.

Hang on a minute - this looks like a a bloody con - if you look at the block diagram there is one dirty great big elephant in the room as detailed in some writing on the schematic; "DAB Audio and Text Station Name sent over FM modulated signal to original head unit"

So basically the quality will be the same as almost every other "add-on" DAB unit I've seen - rubbish! What on Gods green earth are they thinking - they have connectivity via the large block on the rear of the radio but it appears they are only utilising this for CAN and power.

Unless they have messed up with a generic block diagram, there is no audio advantage to be gained because you will still be using the modulator input.

Missed opportunity to use the MDI interface and a half arsed solution if you ask me.