Has anyone heard anything on this stereo ?

Jensen In-Dash CD/DVD/MP3 Receiver w/ 7" LCD Touch Screen
Model No.: VM9311TS

I know you get what you pay for, but I was just curious if anyone has actually used one before.

Gunny

 

It's Jensen. That is enough to tell me to stay clear... way clear...

 

I have the Jensen VM9021TS in my truck (which is the fixed screen, 6.5 inch model instead of the flip-up). I have been overall happy with it. I compared it to several other models at Circuit City, specifically Pioneer AVH-P6800DVD and Eclipse AVN5510BT.

I watched a DVD the store had on all three models. I personally preferred the picture clarity of the Jensen. I know the build quality of Pioneer and Eclipse will be better than Jensen.

Some things I don't like on the Jensen is the fact that the SD card reloads everytime the radio is shut off. So, you don't start at the same place or even the same song as when you turn off the car but rather load at the beginning. I have a buddy with a traditional Pioneer CD player with SD card and his will remember where it was shut off at (like CD's do).

Also, it seems to take forever to start up the CD or SD card playing music. The radio will kick in pretty quickly once there is power to the HU. The touchscreen is sensitive at times. You are supposed to hold a preset for several seconds before it'll save the radio station to that preset. I've had times where I just blipped it to change the station and instead the current station will be preset to that number. It can be slow to seek to a radio station.

It doesn't like to read CD's when the unit is cold (say freezing or below). You have to use the HU for awhile on SD card or radio to warm up the unit before it'll read a CD.

I did an over-ride for watching DVD's while moving. Works pretty slick. The iPod control seems to work well. I don't have an iPod but borrowed a buddy's for a short while. The screen looks just like the iPod controls and you can touch the screen to control the iPod just like the actual iPod itself. Didn't try watching videos from the iPod onto the Jensen.

The aux inputs for audio and video work great. Have used a scan convertor on a laptop to input the video from the laptop to the Jensen. That way the guy in the back seat watched the movie on his laptop and my buddy and I watched the movie up front with the audio going through my system.

Overall, I'm happy with it. There are some quirks as mentioned above. But this unit was significantly cheaper than the others with video that I thought was much better. So bang for the buck, Jensen is a good value.

I know you are considering the flip-up model. I don't have any experience with how stable the screen will be. Otherwise it should function similarly to my experiences.

 

The only Jensen product I ever used was an amp. It fell apart after a couple months of use so I returned it.

I've used Jensen speakers in the past just for cheap sound. They sucked, but they made noise and were cheap, so I guess they worked in a pinch (this was just for my beater/junker cars).

I've been tempted to get one of those Jensen in dash LCD units, but then I remember all the crappy build quality of those things and look elsewhere.

You definately get what you pay for.

 

Do tell. or PM me on how to do this. Was just talking to a friend a mine trying to figure this trick out.

 

Well the Jensen needs a grounded source for the DVD wire. I ran a wire from ground (screw to metal chasis under the dash) to the switch and then out from the switch to the wiring harness on the HU.

When you try to play a DVD, the HU will prompt for you to complete the sequence which is 1 sec ground --> 1 sec ungrounded --> grounded continuously. So I count in my head while flipping the switch to ground, unground, ground. If you do it in correct order and with the right timing, you'll see your DVD. If not, the screen just stays blue. You can just try the sequence again until you get it right.

The Jensen manuals tell you do be safe and hook it directly to the parking brake wire. It'd be interesting to watch someone doing that sequence with the parking brake while moving. Of course, you could do it while stopped and just leave the final grounding one click on the parking brake so that you don't burn up your brakes.

Like mentioned above, you do get what you pay for. This isn't the greatest HU in the world...but it ain't the most expensive either. I have never used other Jensen products before as I didn't think their quality was the best. This unit is working fine (have used it for about 10 months now) for me.

 

Thanks for all the info, I will let everyone know how my experience goes. I suppose I should post some pics also when all is complete.

 

Gunny.... certainly post some pics if you can. Hope my info helped on the override. I also used a second switch (mounted next to the video override) to activate the back-up camera input to the HU. This switch simply tells the HU to show the backup camera (the audio keeps playing normally, just the picture switches).

I believe the Jensen instructions showed to use a Reverse wire to activate the camera. I wanted more freedom to choose when to have the camera. I like being able to look at my hitch while driving down the road should I suspect anything might be amiss back there. Hard to put it in reverse when cruising down the highway.