Kenwood DDX9903S 6.95" eXcelon Double-DIN with Apple CarPlay and Android Auto

This is an amazing head unit,I have this same one in my 94 Turbo Supra and bought the same one for my 95 sc300. So many features,great pricing and awesome quality

Where to start! By Far and Away the best none have touchscreen unit of 2016. Touch Screen Works flawlessly Android auto is the best thing ever everything you need comes in a single box if you want to upgrade your stereo this is the one.

If this item could get zero stars it would. At first it looked like it was really to be good. The apple / android car play interface is handy and the bluetooth also worked fine. I loved to be able to see the maps navigation on the big screen instead of looking at my phone. Alas, it went south very quickly. After only a few days, the stereo started randomly switching input. I would be using car play, the stereo would make a "bip bip" sound and switch to radio, pandora, spotify, you name it. I did not think anything of it at first, but it only got worse. It did it once per trip, then twice, then... all the time. The next thing to give up was bluetooth. Full disclosure - maybe it's a setting that I don't know how to adjust, but it was working at first and then stopped working without me changing anything. With the iphone, the stereo reads "disconnected". However, when I make phone calls, the call does go through the stereo (through blue tooth - even though it says disconnected). Impossible to play music though. I have tried to forget the device on the stereo and the stereo on the device, and re-pair - did not work. Our other phone - an android - connects through blue tooth just fine (when the stereo does not switch input). The next thing that started to malfunction after that was the USB connection. It was also gradual. At first the phone would connect fine and stay connected (with switch of input). Then the phone would connect but after a "bip bip", the "car play" interface would disappear and the menu would only display "mirror", which does not do anything. Initially I would just disconnect and reconnect the USB to the phone. Then, that was not enough, and to reconnect, I had to power the stereo off, then on again. Then, I had to cycle through power off-power on several times before the car play interface pops back up. Now, the connection only lasts for 10 seconds to 2 minutes. I have given up on listening to my music through the radio and wear headphones. I only use the stereo for calls (through "disconnected" blue tooth) and for the rear view camera. My prior stereo was not as sophisticated but at least, it worked. Such a rip off.

I've been tinkering with car audio for 25 years and trust me when I say there's no such thing as a good factory car audio system. The DDX9903S is my 3rd consecutive Kenwood double din head unit. I also appreciate the similar offerings from Pioneer and Alpine as well but I'm already invested in Kenwood peripherals such as their ipod cables, custom AV cables, and satellite radio tuners which is why I've stayed with Kenwood. Now, having said that I'll explain how I ended up with this unit and what pushed me there. Afterall, this is the 2nd Kenwood I've installed in my tahoe in a month. Anyone who knows car audio knows that ipod support with head units has been around for over a decade. So anyone who wanted true mp3 integration needed an ipod or iPhone to get complete control over your digital music through the head unit. That includes me. I'm currently using an iPhone 4S 32GB as an ipod because my ipod touch was stolen and you can get an older iPhone off eBay for very cheap. It works. However, besides an ipod or iPhone, I wanted to connect a number of sources to my head unit. Those are my smartphone which is currently a samsung galaxy S7 edge (no MHL support by the way), a PS3 game console, Sirius XM satellite radio, USB flash drive loaded with movies, and of course the ipod or in my case an iPhone 4S. My first Kenwood double din was a DDX471 which I used for a number of years until recently it started having issues with the disc drive and wouldn't play or eject discs. So about a month ago I purchased a brand new Kenwood DDX773BH. The DDX773BH has only a single USB connection which meant switching back and forth between my iPhone and USB flash drive. I ended not switching from my iPhone because I discovered an issue when trying to watch movies from the flash drive. The DDX773BH I discovered only supports mpeg1 and mpeg2 video codecs which is like 100 years old. Because of this I had lots of issues getting movies on the flash drive to playback. So I checked online and found that the DDX9903S had support for all modern video codecs. Mpeg4, H264, mkv, you name it. Also, the DDX9903S came with an mhl/hdmi connection. Ooohhhhh. I didn't know at this time that my galaxy s7 edge didn't support mhl. Needless to say my new Kenwood DDX9903S arrived and out came the DDX773BH. Now, there are a few things you can't read about in regards to this unit which I will do my best to iterate to you so you can have a good perspective on whether or not this unit will do what you intend. There is 1 rear AV in hookup. You can use this along with a specific Kenwood cable to connect an external video source such as a game console or you can use the input to connect an ipod video cable to play video content from your ipod onto the kenwood display. You can't attach both so you must choose. There are 2 USB cables coming from a single pigtail from the back of the unit. One of the cables is a dedicated device cable and us labeled ipod/iPhone. The other has a typical USB symbol. You cannot connect a USB flash drive to the device cable and you cannot connect a device to the USB side. Which for me means that a USB flash drive will always be connected to one port and I will have to juggle the second USB connection between my ipod or iPhone and my galaxy s7 edge when I want to listen to my mp3 files on my iPhone or switch to my galaxy s7 edge when I want to use the android auto feature. Not ideal by any means but that's the way it is in my case. So, I still have satellite radio, a PS3, and a USB drive full of movies not to mention all my music from my iTunes library and if I want I can switch that to my phone which enables the android auto feature which does control Pandora, Spotify as well as full Google maps navigation integration. The only other issue I have is the software is a bit clunky and doesn't feel finished. Such as the main display allows for one of three choices on the display. The first is the clock, the 2nd is a spectrum analyzer showing your audio output levels dancing up and down, and the 3rd is a compass which shows a vehicle pointing in a specific direction. The issue I have is the vehicle always points north regardless of what direction I'm headed in and sadly there are no settings anywhere to address this. Hopefully a software patch will remedy this in the future as thus model is new for the 2016 calendar year. I also run external amplifiers and aftermarket speakers and this unit sounds fantastic. Due to the inflexible USB ports and somewhat conky software I give this unit 4 stars. Video playback is superb, the sound quality is excellent, and the Android auto feature is fantastic. I haven't been able to try the mhl since my phone doesnt support it. All in all I think you will be wholly satisfied with this unit in your vehicle.

makes me wish I'd kept my AVH4200nex and waited for the update. The interface and features on the pioneer blows this away. You can't use both usbs as u please. I have a iPod that stays in my glovebox that I use as my main source of music. I also have a iPhone that I would like to use for Apple CarPlay. You can't do that. Pick one or the other. Not to mention it doesn't even keep good time

I real like this product. Good job!

Great product, good service