ECLIPSE...anyone own this brand/model?

[LynchburgCSI]

I'm looking into getting a ECLIPSE AVN-4430. Anyone have any experience with this brand...or model? Just looking for some opinions. Thanks!

[Exit9]

Eclipse is a brand made by Fujitsu Ten. The Eclipse brand is being withdrawn from the US market and all their equipment is on close-out pricing at several internet stores. Fujitsu Ten makes OEM audio for Toyota and they are going to re-focus on that business.

I bought an Eclipse XA1200 600Watt ICE monoblock class D amp for $129 and a pair of SE6900 4-way 6x9s for about $40 from Amazon. Everything looks good quality. I haven't installed this equipment yet so I can't comment on their sound. One forum poster got a bad XA1200 amp, but three or four others said theirs worked fine.

Eclipse has been around for a good amount of time, and from what I read in the forums, their equipment is consider above average but not close to high end. Others may have more to say on how their equipment rates.

[LynchburgCSI]

Thanks man. Anyone else?

[Exit9]

Also, you might want to use the search function on "Eclipse" and I think there are several threads which you might find useful.

You might also check the DIYMA site the same way:

http://www.diymobileaudio.com/forum/

DIYMA is Do-It-Yourself-Mobile-Audio and they get into car audio as deep as I have seen. (For example, they have a very long technical-philosophical forum on weather you should use rear speakers or not. I think the high-end enthusiasts say you shouldn't, but others have reasons why they still do.)(I still do but my rear speakers only pick up the lower frequencies the fronts can't handle.) It is a busy site and you can ask questions and get really good information pretty quickly.

Here is another car audio site which I read for information. I don't post there because there are a bunch of immature smart-ass fools who are always bickering in the threads and I don't need smart-ass answers or commentary. Aside from reading their crap, the rest of the forum is pretty good and fairly busy.

http://www.caraudioforum.com/

[touringcamry]

I had one of their MP3/CD HUs a few years back and it gave me a lot of trouble. The HU would lock up forcing me to reset it which is more than just power off and on. It resets all the programmed settings like radio presets, speaker timings, LPF/HPF, eq settings, etc. It was very annoying.

The replacement unit did the exact same thing. It was Eclipse CD8454 - near top spec HU.

[SexieWASD]

caraudioforums.com, and don't forget about the random bannings either.

[joeykrim]

i've had the avn-5495 with the backup camera, cost round $2500 installed. its a pretty nice unit. only had one problem, the CD/DVD drive stopped reading discs. Had to take the unit out and mail back to Eclipse. they warranty fixed it, took 2 weeks. other than that, the unit has been fine and working great.

the downside is the map updates for my 2005 unit can only be upgraded by mailing the whole unit to them in CA plus paying $350+. i don't think i'll buy anything from eclipse again though...decent brand but not as high of quality as i had hoped.

[LynchburgCSI]

Thanks everyone. Looks like i may be looking into Pioneer's GPS in-dash units instead. I don't like the idea of them leaving this market and the semi-inconsistent quality issues.