Just bought my 9857 today to replace the 9856 and also added a Basslink Sub. This is very cheap stuff compared to the high end set up out there. So please dont flame me for posting cheap equipment. IMO this is very affordable system and sounds great.

9856
]


9857





Infiniti Basslink I



9856 vs 9857

The 9856 is a decent head unit which sounds as good as the 9857. The 9857 has a 3.5mm wire adapter in the back so you can hook up your S2000 Dash controls, the 9856 has an IR only (wired > IR). The 9857 comes with a remote while the 9856 doesnt. The best thing about the 9857 is the DISPLAY! The display is 100X better than the 9856. It displays your Folder and Song Title at the same time. The Text is very easy to read and scrolls smoothly. The graphics is very nice, it displays Animations, calender, and your birthday. The coolest feature is that it displays a graph when you are tuning your Sound and Center Frequency in bass and trebble.
The display in the 9856 really sucks. Its very hard to read especially scrolling through songs on your mp3 data disc and Ipod. Doesnt even hold a candle to the 9857.
Bought my 9857 at Bestbuy for $329.99, crutch field doesnt have it until 17th of april. Theres not much on ebay and ebay sucks, prolly dont come with warranty.
Do not cheap out and get the 9856, GET THE 9857!!! I promise you wont regret the 9857 and if you are waiting for it to come out, WAIT, its worth it.

Infiniti basslink is pretty a good subwoofer with a built in 200w amp. It doesnt hit hard but it gives the S2000 that missing BASS, Which isnt bad at all. I have boston acoutics in the door which gives great mids and highs. Fits in the tool well and doesnt budge at all. I love it Acually, but if your into the Attention whore kinda Bass, then go for higher end stuff. Cost me $175.00 + $21.99 for Shipping on Ubid.com. They usually take 2 weeks to deliver, so complain about that and theyll refund the shipping.

Thats my review, please excuse my english and typos, english is my second language.

PM me if anyone has anymore questions, glad to help out an S2K Brotha.

 

Thanks for the pics. I've been waiting for the 9857 to come out. I'll probably pick one up here soon.

 

So can you change the color of the buttons like on the model it replaces?

 

No, you cannot change the color of the buttons. It does not have the professional EQ and EQ save features. it does not have the glide touch and the face is not motorized.

Color changing features would be cool, but really not needed since I already like Blue. You can only change the Button color only on the older 9855.

I dont need professional EQ settings since my system in pretty simple. Bass, Trebble and SuB is all I need.

The glide touch is somehting i dont like. Its kinda diffficult to use because it requires precise finger tip movement. Bumps on the road cause you to miss scroll on the menu. The S2000's Stickshift also gets in the way of the glidetouch. Buttons are simpler and faster to just press it.

Motorized face is not needed as well, i mean since i have an MP3 player, i rarely eject the disk. It looks cool and eveyrthing, but from my pass expereince, most motorized faces go wrong. Alpine is known for this problem with motorized faces.

 

So the 9857 works with the dash controls right out of the box?

 

No. It still requires a DCI. However, the DCI can be hardwired to the jack in the back, unlike the 9856, which requires IR.

 

How is the screen in direct sunlight?

 

I am forwarding this post to my wife right now.

Thank you SOOOOOOOO much.

How does it work with the iPod?

I listen to a ton of podcasts and the KCA-2000 didn't want to access the podcast section under music.

 

the 2006 Alpines work very well with the ipod (I have a 9857 also. Love it). The fullspeed interface is much improved over the KCA420

 

So it will directly access podcasts? My other deck (Kenwood) worked pretty well with all of the other stuff, but couldn't find the podcast listing. I just want to check before I buy this deck (tonight.)

Thanks,
Rad