Review of an inexpensive touch screen Carplay and Android compatible head for a air cooled 911

 

AWESAFE CLP4A US

Summary:

• Fit of the unit in the dash is good for an older pre-1998 Porsche 911
• Audio quality is poor for music, even taking into account the noisy cabin in a 911 call
• The touchscreen interface is difficult to use due to icon sizes on the screen, low dash placement in a pre-1998 Porsche 911 and slow, inconsistent responsiveness to touch
• No connections for a rear amplifier or speakers, most cars are equipped with.

Installation impressions:
(1) The CLP4A head is always live when the ignition is on; it has no on/off switch.
(2) The screen is too small and too low to use as an alternative to the phone's map display when the phone is in a cradle near the clock.
(3) I can't seem to disable the map display function separately from the music/streaming app function.
For this reason, it can't be connected to my phone for streaming music when I want to use Google Maps on my phone's display. 
(4) I did purchase a fader control for the rear speakers.
(5) I used an aftermarket adapter between my old Alpine 16-pin plug connections to the 8-pin connector for the new unit. All the wiring colors and many of the point-to-point wiring on the adapter are wrong, so check the actual pin-to-pin connections and so I had to cut and resolder the adapter wires to map the pins correctly.
(6) I attached the antenna amplifier to the ignition switch plus wire in addition to the radio, so both are powered when the ignition is on.
(7) I attached the switched 12-volt antenna wire on the new unit to the power control wire going to the power amp, so the amp powers up when the unit is powered.
(8) The new unit has one left and one right speaker output on a 2nd 8-pin connector. I did not use these features. The outputs to the speakers are relatively low power, so I can't be sure the quality of the sound using the unit's internal power amps will be satisfactory.

AWESAFE CLP4A installed in the dash

Final Review:
The result is disappointing, and the performance is inadequate.

• Fit in the dash is good.
• Sound quality is not nearly as good as the previous Alpine head. Distortion is high enough to cause hearing fatigue at medium volumes, very disappointing. This alone is reason enough to not recommend the unit.
• Has a non-parametric equalizer but seems to have a fixed low-frequency cutoff, so DSP enhancement of the bass response is not possible.
• Touch screen sensitivity and reaction speed are not ideal, barely adequate, and annoying to use.
• When transferring display and input functions from my Android phone, I can't selectively decide what applications to access through the head vs the phone; the phone goes dark when the radio head display is live.
• This makes the use of Google Maps not feasible on the unit due to the location and size of the display. The only workaround is to decouple the phone from the head entirely. This precludes streaming audio or using the head's hands-free phone function at the same time as Google Maps on the phone display.

Future plans:

Alpine UTE-73BT

• I will be replacing the head with the latest Alpine UTE-73BT single-DIN radio head.
• https://www.alpine-usa.com/product/ute-73bt
• Where all controls remain on the phone, and the hands-free calls and audio are played through the radio head using a Bluetooth connection to the phone.

Andy