How much difference can a new in-dash receiver make? I found out recently when I had the opportunity to review the Kenwood KDC-122 CD receiver for CrutchfieldAdvisor. Although we bought our Chevy Tracker new in 2000, I've never gotten around to upgrading the sound system. So I jumped at the chance to compare an entry-level aftermarket receiver (the KDC-122 retails for $99) to my factory stereo.
Keep in mind I was still using the four original paper cone 6-3/4" speakers that came with the Tracker: two at the bottom of the front doors and two in the rear side panels. With the lo-fi setup I had, any improvement in sound could be directly attributed to the receiver.
Kenwood KDC-122
My factory-installed Delco Delphi AM/FM CD player was a very basic unit. It had 12 radio presets and some EQ control (bass/treble/fade/balance). None of the buttons were illuminated, and the smallish LCD screen displayed only a minimal amount of information.
Though considered a starter unit, the Kenwood KDC-122 came with a lot of great features that made it an improvement over what I was replacing:
- 22 watts RMS x 4 channels of power
- System Q Sound Control
- CDs, CD-Rs, and CD-RW playback
- CR-2 Advanced Tuner
 The Kenwood KDC-122 |
Installation
Although I'm comfortable hooking up home theater system components sprouting more wires than an old switchboard, the thought of putting something in my car was really daunting. How do I get the dashboard off? How do I thread all those little wires through the car's frame? I had a lot of questions!
The process turned out to be far less complicated than I imagined. Using Crutchfield's Mastersheet™ for the 2000 Tracker as a guide, I located and removed the three screws that held the radio?s plastic facing in place. Once the facing was off, I just had to loosen a few more screws, and out came my old receiver.
Since I was only swapping out receivers, hookup of the Kenwood was equally simple. My speakers all ran off the factory receiver's internal amp, which further simplified the hookup. (The Kenwood receiver includes rear preamp outputs, but I wouldn't need them for my setup.) The cable bundle for the speakers easily plugged into the back of the Kenwood, as did the radio antenna and the power supply. The only difficult part was getting the bundle pushed back through the narrow opening behind the receiver.
 Installation was simple. Remove the faceplate, take out the old unit, plug in the connectors, and remount. |
The Kenwood was about half as tall as my old unit. The provided replacement faceplate covered up the entire opening, with a snap-out panel on the bottom, so I could add an additional component later on. Once the plastic frame was screwed back in, the Kenwood looked like it had been professionally installed. Total time for installation: fifteen minutes!
Key features and impressions
The Kenwood had more features than my out-of-date factory receiver, including an attenuator. If you're speaking on a cell phone, or ordering at a drive-through, with the touch of a button the attenuator immediately lowers the volume without changing your settings. A second push of the button returns the volume to its former level. I have heard systems that immediately jump back to loud, which can be rough on your speakers (and your ears). Kenwood uses smooth volume return to fade back up, saving wear and tear on your gear — and you.
Kenwood's LCD negative display used white backlit characters appearing on a light blue screen. The bigger characters were easy for me to read, but the System Q indicator, and small letters for things such as "Random" and "Track Repeat" weren't. I could tell if they were activated, but they were too small to read from an appreciable distance. On the plus side, the display held up pretty well under a variety of lighting conditions — I never experienced any washout in the daylight.
Smart Q sound control
The KDC-122 gave me a finer degree of control over the sound than my old unit. Instead of just treble and bass, I could adjust treble, bass, and midrange. On my factory receiver, the EQ settings were applied to both the tuner and the CD player. With Kenwood?s Smart Q, I could adjust and save the settings for six different music genres, and apply a setting to each source (CD player or radio). When I switched sources, the appropriate EQ settings were used. The receiver remembered the source (CD player or radio), and when I returned to it, the appropriate EQ settings were used. No more one-size-fits-all listening!
 The System Q sound control display. The layout's a little counter-intuitive, but a very nice feature nonetheless. |
The SQ settings were displayed on a 2x3 grid. I found the positioning a little counter-intuitive, one of my few quibbles with the unit. The first setting was SQ-2 ("rock"), displayed in the upper-left hand position on the grid. The settings followed in order, (SQ-3, SQ-4, etc.). This meant the final setting, SQ-1 ("flat"), was located in the lower right-hand box on the grid. As a result, for a short time I was selecting a setting that was one number off from the one I meant to pick — selecting SQ-3 for SQ-2 and so on.
I was still using my original speakers, but with the KDC-122's speaker setting option, I could get the most out of them. Kenwood let me select the size of the speakers it was outputting to (factory, larger aftermarket, or smaller aftermarket speakers), so that my EQ settings were optimally balanced. I could definitely hear a difference.
After selecting the proper speaker size, I adjusted the fades on the SQ settings to pull the sound up from the floor and center it better. To test it properly, I didn't mess with Kenwood's preset tone curves. I was interested in what System Q Sound Control would do right out of the box.
Listen to the music
To fairly compare my old factory player with the Kenwood, I played three test discs in both units. These three CDs covered a lot of musical ground, and all had moments that tested the limits of my system in different ways.
Hovhaness' "Symphony No. 2, Mysterious Mountain" (Telarc), is a classical piece I've written about before (10 Great Classical Discs). It's got a lot of sonic challenges, including extreme highs and lows as well as some subtle ensemble blends. My old player never reproduced the sound very well, and really muddied the details. On the Kenwood's SQ-1 (flat) setting there was noticeable improvement in the definition. The ensemble didn't sound overbalanced, and had a more natural separation. The lower bass runs in the symphony?s fugato section were discernable. The highs no longer sounded harsh, and overall the sound field seemed bigger.
Grand Funk's self-titled second album (Capitol) presented a whole different set of challenges. The CD reissue is a completely over-the-top remaster that?s not only louder than most other discs (I think they mastered it at "eleven"), but its preternaturally fat bass continually teeters on the brink of distortion. As expected, Grand Funk rocked hardest on SQ-2 (rock). I still had to pull the volume back a little to keep from overdriving the speakers. Mel Schacher's throbbing bass sounded suitably bad (in a good way), and I could hear the runs with a little more clarity than with my old player. Don Brewer's drumming sounded crisper, and Mark Farner's guitar had a better edge to it.
On the other end of the spectrum was Rene Marie's "How Can I Keep from Singing?" (MaxJazz). Her smoky voice and the intimately recorded sessions seemed to benefit the most from the upgrade to the Kenwood. Acoustic instruments tended to sound dull on my factory system. With the Kenwood, the instruments had a more natural sound (even on my less-than-ideal speakers), especially the piano and stand-up bass. I also heard some of the breathiness in Marie?s phrasing that helped give her singing some shape. The recording sounded good in both the SQ-3 (jazz) and SQ-4 (vocal) settings, although SQ-4 pushed the instruments a little more into the background.
Radio days
It was pretty easy to program stations into the tuner, and with the state of radio these days, 18 FM and 6 AM presets were more than enough for my use!
 The KDC-122 at home. Not only was the installation easy, but the Kenwood looked like it came with the vehicle. |
Living at the base of the Appalachians, radio reception for me is sometimes problematic. Stations I can pull in easily at work tend to fade out before I've driven the thirty miles home. The Kenwood's CR-2 Advanced Tuner held the signals further than my old unit, which was an immediate improvement. They also sounded a little better. The tuner used a high-speed multipath control, which adjusted the broadcast stereo coming in for the best sound.
In addition to that, I had the use of the System Q. When I was listening to "Carson Daly Most Requested," I pressed SQ-2 (top-40) and the ultra-compressed sound came through in a crisp, clean fashion. Public radio benefited from the SQ-1 flat setting for classical, and their jazz programming sounded best with SQ-3 ("Jazz").
The tuner also gave me the option of switching to mono. This was handy when I was at the extreme edge of a station's broadcast range — it helped the tuner keep the signal for a greater distance. Although the Kenwood didn't solve all my reception problems (I still had to change stations before arriving home), it made an appreciable difference in both the sound quality of the stations, as well as the length of time I could listen to them while traveling.
Summary
I've seen the light — or rather, heard it. I don't have to put up with what comes with the car. The Kenwood KDC-122 gave me better quality sound with more control than my old factory receiver. Installation was way easier than I had anticipated, and the rewards were great. With source memory, whatever I was listening to was EQ'ed appropriately — I didn?t have to put up with a lot of bad sound compromises as before. Simple to install, simple to use. Now it's time to do something about those factory speakers!