Dual XML8150

I have owned this unit for approx. 1 month now and I love it, the only problem I had was with the mic on the bluetooth wold not pickup my side of the conversation without yelling into it very close to my mouth but that has been solved. Just contact dual's tech line and furnish them with a receipt and they will send you for free a module which makes it work perfectly.

I have had this unit for about a month now and I really like it. The bluetooth calling works well, but I did have to reposition my microphone a couple times. This is the perfect iPhone accessory. The sound quality is great with the phone. The dock design allows for docking with the my case still on. Installation was simple with the included kit from Sonic Electronix. My only complaint about the unit would be the display while the iphone is docked. The unit allows for 2 modes of operation. On auto mode, the unit controls the iphone and the song title and info are displayed on the unit. In manual mode, you use the iphone to choose what you are listening to. When in manual mode, the display just says "Manual" and does not even show the time. Kind of hard to see the time on the iphone....so that is my only complaint.

First of all, this is my second unit. I had to return the first for the same reason many other reviews state: it would crash and my entire stereo and iPhone 4 would reset. A few other weird electronic hiccups as well. Sonic Electronix took the unit back and sent me a new one no problem. The second unit works great. Most of the time. About 95% of the time, I love this stereo and the other 5% I want to rip it out of the dash with my bare hands. This unit still suffers from a few quirks, mostly to do with the Bluetooth feature. Every once in a while I'm either using the Bluetooth on a phone call or streaming music the unit will have a stroke. The speakers will screech a terrible sound at maximum volume for a few seconds and then the Bluetooth connection will drop. Warning: you will nearly crap your pants and veer into oncoming traffic the first time this happens. Also, as a few other reviews state, the out of the box mic is not amplified enough and the person on the other end of the phone call cannot hear you unless you shout. If you talk to customer service they will send you an amplifier module that you install between the mic and the head unit that makes it work great. But honestly, if the company already knows this is a problem why not ship the module with every unit? Between the return and the module, I had to tear my dash apart three separate times. Overall, I still love the unit. The sound is great and I love having my iPhone mounted on the dash when I need the GPS. But Dual still has a ways to go on this one. Sonic Electronix was great, cheapest retailer by far and the free install kit was a terrific bonus. Saved me nearly $50 bucks from the next closest competition.

Pros:
-Sounds great, very customizable sound and EQ
-Cool blue illumination looks good at night
-Bluetooth music streaming is awesome. Quality is not quite as good as hard connection but so handy to just get in and hit play with the phone still in your pocket.
-With the module Bluetooth calls sound great (as long as your unit doesn't lose it's mind in the middle of the call)
-Affordable!

Cons:
-Non removable face plate
-In the Manual mode (you control music through iphone, not the unit itself, which would be a pain in the ass) you can't see the clock or the name of the song playing. Same with Bluetooth streaming.
-If the phone is docked and the screen is off, it's basically a giant bouncing mirror reflecting light directly into your cornea
-Buttons feel cheap. Because they are.
-It takes about 8 seconds for the unit to automatically connect to your phone via Bluetooth. If you dock the unit before that time, and start playing music the phone will stop playing music as soon as the Bluetooth connects because it thinks you then want to stream instead.

So overall, great idea, but I wish Sony made it and did it right. And then I also wish I could afford it.

We ordered this and when I received it the iPod connector felt loose but I installed it anyway since I didn't have anything to compare it with to know if this was right or not. The phone kept disconnecting and reconnecting so we tried it with a USB cable and it worked fine, so the dock part was bad, after that we noticed the volume going up by itself, we didn't think much about it until one day we got in the truck and it reset itself completely. I called Dual and they said send it back. We did and the second one had a great dock and worked better. After 1 week, we would get in the truck and it would start scanning the FM frequencies like you hit seek. Called Dual, they said send it back. I didn't want another one.... The stereo looks nice, it worked great with our iPhones (iPhone 4), even mine in an Otterbox Defender case. The dock had no problems on the second one. The bluetooth calling worked well but the bluetooth audio streaming never worked. We were going to get the HD Tuner for it but after the problems I am so glad we waited on that one. Overall, I really can't say I recommend this stereo, but if you order it and anything it wrong with it, call Dual they can help, and surprisingly someone (actual person) always answered the phone. It's a crap shoot with this one, I really wanted the iPhone dock for using the GPS but it had to many other problems. Very disappointed that this had exactly what we where looking for but two decks didn't work.

When I first saw this unit, I said to myself, that's exactly what I've wanted. So I ordered it. Came in fast from Sonic. Installation was easy and operation was ok. But a week later, I've took 2 hour drive and after 1-1/2 hours of use, it turned itself off and back on again but when it did come back on, it lost all it's memory and clock settings. I had to reset everything like i had to when I first installed it. Other than this issue deck had everything that I wanted. Just wish it had better quality.