blaupunkt

Is the Tokyo Motor Show kaput? The President's new high tech Cadillac; VW will bring a new mini car to the U.S.; Alpine gets in bed with GM, BMW, and Mercedes.

• Tokyo Motor Show on hiatus in 2009?

• The President's new Cadillac

• Alpine supplies car tech to three biggies

• Blaupunkt about to pull the trigger on in-car streaming

• VW Polo coming to U.S.

Our heads are still spinning a bit from the onslaught that was the in-car electronics hall of CES 2009. From every direction, there were speakers the size of extralarge pizzas and flashy video displays vying for your attention. Amidst the cacophony, our (ahem) skilled Car Tech editors were able to spot a few gems and a few diamonds in the rough.

As evidenced by our Car Tech category Best of CES finalists, we predict that the next big thing in in-car entertainment is connectivity. Our winner, Gracenote CarStars, puts a star's avatar in your reasonably priced car by pairing … Read more

CES is all about convergence, and one of the more interesting examples is Internet radio station aggregator miRoamer and car stereo maker Blaupunkt. The result of this union is two stereo head units from Blaupunkt that receive and play Internet radio, giving you over 16,000 choices for streamed music while you drive. The first hurdle with a system like this is getting the Internet stream to the car. The Blaupunkt miRoamer system uses the data connection for a paired Bluetooth phone, connecting to the miRoamer server. Obviously you will need a phone with a data plan, preferably unlimited.

Blauplunkt … Read more

Two new Blaupunkt navigation systems, the TravelPilot 500 and 700, will feature interactive voice controls, Bluetooth, and, in the case of the 700, Internet access. A lot of GPS devices offer these features, but the TravelPilot units have a few tricks we've never seen before: real-time video navigation and traffic sign recognition. We've got video of the system in action below.

Using an integrated video camera on the back of the device, the TravelPilot units capture live footage of the road ahead. At first, we thought this was a bit redundant, showing the driver what's clearly visible … Read more

With the Brisbane SD48, Blaupunkt is proving that it can make car stereos for the digital age. As a testament to the migration of mobile music from CDs to digital files, the system features an SD-card slot, a USB port, an auxiliary input jack, but no disc player.

Check out our full review right here.

One solid way to improve in-car audio quality is to install an amplifier, but many people don't want their cars heavily modified. Blaupunkt's THA 555 is a plug-and-play amplifier that can be installed by anyone who's handy with tools and doesn't mind getting a little dirty. The THA 555 is a digital amplifier putting out 55 watts through each of its four channels, with an extra subwoofer channel pumping 200 watts. But the beauty of this amp is that, with one of Blaupunkt's model-specific wiring harnesses, you can fit it into a car with very … Read more

At this year's CES, the Car Tech editorial staff members not only cover the show, we are part of it. Along with looking at new and innovative automotive gadgets around the show floor, we are running the Car Tech Testing Lab. We've invited major car stereo manufacturers, such as Eclipse, Alpine, Pioneer, and Blaupunkt, to stop by our Lab and install their latest car stereos in our test car, a 2008 Scion xD, so we can check out the products in a standard environment.

We first got a sense of our new responsibilities as we waited in line … Read more

As a powered subwoofer for your car, the Blaupunkt Velocity 2Go installs easily and delivers a reasonably powerful bass thump. But this sub gives you more bang for your buck in that it works as a semiportable speaker system for an iPod or other MP3 player. In the latter incarnation, it adds pairs of 6 1/2-inch woofers and 1-inch tweeters to its subwoofer output.

Read the review

It was bound to happen eventually and, in fact, it's surprising that we haven't seen this sooner.

Blaupunkt's "Melbourne SD27" is the first car stereo that shuns CDs, according to SCI FI Tech, instead playing MP3 and WMA files with a front-loading SD card. To make things even easier, there's an optional adapter that can be used for an iPod, mobile phone or GPS device.

The writing was already on the wall for car stereos to go this route, but the kicker that could accelerate the trend even faster is this gadget's price … Read more