Alpine in not necesarilly "better" than Blaupunkt... there's a lot of ignorance when it comes to consumer electronics and brands. It's all a matter of marketing and advertising, especially here in the U.S.
Blaupunkt is a very well engineered product, but since advertising and popular belief has lead everyone to believe that Alpine is the "best" car deck, that's what masses tend to follow. Funny example is on video products, when you ask anyone who they believe makes the best TVs and VCRs they immediatelly say SONY (yet most people say their car audio sucks)... now ask about brands like JVC, Toshiba, Hitachi, Faroudja Labs, Pioneer, Nakamichi? and they say: it sucks!
I've seen many people ragging on JVC as crap... well my friends, did you know that JVC actually developed the technology that we all know as VCR?. Also, did you know that the choice car deck for cars like Bentley, Rolls Royce and Ferrari is JVC or Sony ES series?.
For a very long time Mercedes Benz and BMW used Blaupunkt / Harman-Kardon audio systems, and some high end models in europe still do.
As for video products, did you know that Toshiba (who you might consider the inexpensive alternative to Sony when shopping for TVs in Best Buy) was the main technology company behid the development of the now famous DVD? I've known of DVD since 1995, way before the technology was actually introduced to the market, thanks to Toshiba. Or lets talk Digital Plasma Screens (flat TVs on the Philips commercial), go to a high-end home theater store and look at demos, I DARE you to find a sharper, crisper picture and better colors than a Fraoudja (which you probably think sucks 'cause you've never heard of it) or a Pioneer.
<img src="http://www.zilvia.net/f/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif" border="0" valign="absmiddle" alt=':)'> This post is getting long, but I just want you guys to read between the "marketing" lines when it comes to technology and brands <img src="http://www.zilvia.net/f/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif" border="0" valign="absmiddle" alt=':)'>
And for whoever posted about Pioneer's "gay colors": dude, that's called an Organic EL Display, FAR more advanced than the primitive LCDs from 20 years ago that most car-deck manufacturers use, Clarion is now selling competition decks using the same Organic EL screen.... I work for one of the only three companys in the world that makes liquid electronic displays (Epson, Fujitsu and NEC) so it's not like I'm making this up.
I could go on and on about this subject... so before you go on and give someone negative advice on a product, just because "YOU" don't think it's good or from what you've heard, think twice.
(Edited by Freak Leash 240 at 9:59 am on Nov. 6, 2001)