Hey I'm JR, training manager here at Crutchfield, and in this video we're
going to talk about how to choose a car stereo. There's a lot of different radios to choose from.
Some have navigation, some have satellite radio, touchscreens non-touchscreens, knobs, buttons,
so many choices. We're here to help you figure out which radio is the right one for you,
and which one's going to fit your car. First off, why would you want a new radio? Well, these things
do a whole lot. They power your speakers. So if you want bigger, better sound, you can get that
with a little bit more power from a new radio to power your speakers. You can get a lot of really
cool features, like built-in navigation. You can integrate your phone, and make it work better and
safer while you're driving for both listening to music as well as communication. So we know what it
takes to make it work, and we have all of the gear needed to make it work. For example, you might need
an OEM integration adapter so that all of those vehicle features will work with your new radio.
You might need a physical mounting kit to make it fit in the dash, an antenna adapter, a wiring
harness, and various other things. We've got your back on all of that. So enter your car into
crutchfield.com and let us help you get everything you'll need to make the radio fit. Now let's talk
about which radio you want. When it comes to picking out a stereo, you'll want to consider
kind of your end goal for your sound system in your car. Maybe you're just looking for a new
radio to gain some connectivity features that your radio doesn't have now, things like Bluetooth, and
usb, and cd players, things like that, or maybe you're building a bigger system that's going
to sound incredible. In which case, you'll need preamp outputs on your stereo, four separate
amplifiers, and subwoofers and things like that. How much do you like to control the sound in
your car? Some radios have very detailed sound shaping systems, like digital signal processing,
equalization, and more. Or maybe you just want to keep it simple and just have a bass and treble
adjustment, we've got all of that. There's a radio for just about every system out there. One of the
main considerations when picking out a stereo is how well will it integrate with your smartphone.
It's not uncommon for folks to want to use a smartphone while driving, for texting, for calling,
and of course for listening to music, and many radios have software in them designed to make
that a safe thing to do. For example, Apple CarPlay and Android Auto. These are features designed by
Apple and Google to make it so that you can use your phone while you're driving to make
hands-free calls, to speak your texts rather than typing your texts, and to play music, audio books,
satellite radio, all of that stuff. And when you're using Android Auto or CarPlay, you'll see on the
screen that it basically looks like your phone. All the icons and the controls will feel very familiar
if you're used to using your phone. So it makes it nice and easy, and it looks great to make Android
Auto or CarPlay work. Usually you'll want to plug in your phone, that way your radio will keep your
phone charged while you're driving. However, for short trips you may not always want to plug
in your phone, and for that you'll need wireless CarPlay or wireless Android Auto. Some radios even
have that. If you're not looking for that level of integration with your smartphone, that's okay,
almost every radio we sell still has Bluetooth, so you can get it connected for hands-free calling
and music streaming. If you like listening to local radio, don't worry, these radios all have AM and FM
receivers built in so that you can still listen to local radio stations, and many of them are Sirius
XM ready, which means you can get a separate tuner that plugs into the back of the radio and allows
you to listen to your subscription to SiriusXM. And while we don't have radios that play cassette
tapes any more, we do still have radios that play CDs, and if it has a screen it might even play DVDs.
This is important to know. If you want a radio that will play a disc, you need to look for that feature
specifically. Many radios, called digital media receivers or digital multimedia receivers, do not
play CDs or have any moving parts inside. This is pretty cool since most of us really aren't playing
CDs all that much any more, you can save a lot of space if you don't need the CD player in the radio,
which means the radios can be shallower, smaller, they can fit into tighter places and in vehicles
where you couldn't fit a radio before. A large touchscreen makes it much easier to control and
navigate the features of the radio and the phone, with larger icons, colorful pictures, you can even
usually set background images, neat things like that. So it's a more customizable experience with
a nice large touchscreen, and there's different kinds of touchscreens. There's resistive and
capacitive. A capacitive screen is kind of like the one on your smartphone, where it's sort of a glossy
finish and you can usually use two fingers to pinch and zoom and things like that. Those screens
look better and feel better, and usually cost a little bit more. And of course, a big reason to
have a radio with a large screen on it is so that you can integrate a backup camera. A backup camera
is nice because it will save you from running over your kids' bikes or backing into another car in a
parking lot. Generally speaking, a really good idea, and most new cars come with them. However, if your
car doesn't have one, a touchscreen radio with a backup camera can be added. If you're really into
making your car sound amazing, it usually starts with a new radio, and many new radios have lots
and lots of control over that sound. Digital signal processing allows you to adjust the timing of the
sound coming out of your speakers so that you can make sure the driver's seat where you're sitting
has the best sound in the car. You can also use equalization, parametric EQs, crossovers, and all of
that stuff right from the radio, controlled usually on a nice, large touchscreen. That level of control
will cost a little bit more, and if you know how to use it you can really fine-tune your system.
Usually when you're doing that you'll use separate amplifiers and new speakers, because you really
want to take your system to the next level. There are basically two sizes of radios. For many years,
single-DIN was kind of the norm. These radios are about seven inches wide and about two inches tall.
And then there's double-DIN, which are literally twice the size of a single-DIN radio, so they're
seven inches wide and four inches tall. You may be looking at the hole in your dash thinking,
"I don't think a large, double-DIN touchscreen radio is going to fit there," and you may be
right. Many cars for many years didn't have radio openings large enough for those radios. That's okay,
several companies are now making radios that have floating screens and a single-DIN chassis. That
single-DIN chassis will fit many cars going back many years. The chassis is only about two inches
tall instead of four inches tall, and on the front is a floating screen that usually is much larger
than these double-DIN radios. Eight, nine, 10-inch screens will look amazing as they sit there on
your dash, so that you have total control of your sound, your phone, and your driving experience. Once
you have a new stereo in your car you kind of want that experience in all of the vehicles you drive.
Maybe it's a motorcycle, or an RV, or a boat, or a four-wheeler or a side by side, or a golf cart. Yeah,
we've got stereos for all of those vehicles. Many of these radios are purpose-built for the vehicles
they'll be going into. They might fit non-standard openings, they might be more rugged to handle life
on the road, whether it's on a motorcycle or in an 18-wheeler, lots of features to make them work in
vehicles that are not your normal car. And lastly, let's talk about installation. Who's going to be
installing this radio, will it be you? Will it be a professional? We think you can do it most of the
time. And we're here to help. At Crutchfield, this is one of the reasons we do all of the vehicle
research and product research that we do, it's why we have all of the kits and the harnesses and the
brackets and the instructions you'll need to put these radios into the dash of your car.
You should let us help. Put your car into crutchfield.com or give Crutchfield a call and
talk to an advisor. They are all specially trained to help you pick out not only the right stereo for
the features that you want, but the right stereo that will fit into your car. And if you're going
to be installing it, we have lots of things to help you with that as well. Tech support for life.
So if you need any help with the installation, you call us, we've got experts here to help you.
If you'd like us to help you with the wiring, we offer a ReadyHarness service where we'll take
the harness that comes with your new radio and connect it to the harness that is specifically
for your vehicle. That'll save you about an hour of work right there, so let us help you. If you have
any questions, you can put them in the comments here on the video, we will look at and respond
to your questions there. And while you're at it, like and subscribe, and thanks for watching.