I wanted a head unit with a CD player, bluetooth & satellite navigation (to replace my Panasonic Strada CN-GP50N). Sadly, this would prove to be quite expensive if purchasing from well-known brands such as Sony, Kenwood, JVC, Alpine, etc. Instead I chose to purchase a car stereo from a less well known Chinese brand. This included all the features I wanted, and more, but for half the price compared to a head unit of a similar specification from a well-known brand.
Initially I purchased a Pumpkin KD-CO224 from Pumpkin Pumpkin via reseller on eBay during January 2014. I was happy with its specification and performance, however shortly after the purchase, Pumpkin released a head unit I previously failed to source from a reputable distributor. Subsequently, as my head unit was less than 3 weeks old, I made use of Pumpkin's buy-back policy so I would receive a refund, minus re-stocking fee, and replace it with my desired head unit.
On 26/01/2015 I purchased a Pumpkin JY-C0223 for £266.71 with optional HSDPA 3G dongle (TB-Y0014) for £33.51. After a 10% discount on the head unit for being a returning customer, the total cost me £273.55 & £20.00 customs charge payable to DHL. After returning my KD-CO224, as promised, Pumpkin immediately issued me the refund minus £15% re-stocking fee. I much prefer the design of this head unit, it looks better, with no physical buttons being totally controlled by touch screen. There's a column 6 soft buttons on the left-hand side of which their colour can be user defined through the software.
Other than the head unit being half the price of similar specification head units from well-known brands, the other reason I chose it was due to it running the Android operating system. The advantage of this was if I didn't like the supplied satellite navigation software, or even the media player, I could easily uninstall them and replace them with alternatives downloaded from Play Store. If I had purchased a head unit from a well-known brand which didn't use the Android operating system, I would be stuck with whatever software was installed if I liked it or not. Therefore it's more customisable.
The head unit is sold or described as a Pumpkin JY-C0223. However, Pumpkin are merely just resellers, the original manufacturer is Joyous and its proper model number is J-3812-Y. After learning a lot about Android head units on XDA Developers forum, I discovered that Chinese Android head units utilising the Rockchip RK3066 CPU are fundamentally the same. There are a number of manufacturers in China who produce such head units, including Joyous (JY), Kylde (KLD) HuiFei (KGL) & RoadMaster (RM), these are then rebranded and distributed via resellers, such as Pumpkin, Xtrons, Eonon & Erisin. My original Pumpkin KD-CO224 was actually a Klyde (KLD) head unit.
Its specification includes:
- Android 4.4.4 KitKat,
- Rockchip RK3066 Cortex A9 dual-core 1.6 GHz CPU,
- Mali 400MP GPU,
- 1 GB Samsung DDR3 RAM,
- 8 GB internal memory,
- WiFi with support of portable hotspot,
- 3G support (via 3G dongle),
- 6.2 inch digital HD capacitive touch screen (800x480),
- DVD / CD player,
- FM / AM RDS radio,
- GPS navigation,
- Bluetooth,
- 2x MicroSD slots with free 4 GB MicroSD card,
- 2x USB ports.
- Supplied accessories included an infrared remote control, GPS antenna, 4 GB MicroSD card, microphone and a frame / bezel for installation.
- 1999 - 2004 Land Rover Discovery 2 steering wheel remote controller (part number P18111) purchased through eBay for £5.95 + £4.95 P&P on 17/01/2015. I've modified the base by removing the protruding plastic parts so it mounts to a flat surface. I've mounted it on the steering column plastic housing beneath the right hand side windscreen washer stalk, in front of the ignition key socket. The controls can be user defined through the head unit's software.
Samsung 128 GB MicroSDCX UHS-1 card purchased through eBay for £62.95 on 26/03/2015. Pumpkin and other resellers state that the head units support only up to 32 GB MicroSD cards. However, this has been proven to be false as many users, like myself, use larger cards without any problems, formatted to FAT32. I have copied my entire MP3 collection on to it. As of August 2015, this consists of 7569 tracks, totalling nearly 21 days' worth of continuous music at just under 69 GB.
Radio reception was not as good as my previous JVC KD-LX3R. To resolve this, I purchased a 12v universal radio antenna signal booster (TB-Y0015) from Pumpkin which cost me £8.18 on 01/05/2015.
The supplied optional HSDPA 3G dongle (TB-Y0014) proved to be unreliable so I replaced it with an unlocked Huawei E160 3G dongle, originally from T-Mobile. This was purchased through eBay for £9.50 on 28/06/2015. It's being used with a Giffgaff SIM card. Between the head unit and 3G dongle, I've fitted an Olimex USB-CAP USB low ESR surge current filter. The purpose of this was an attempt to fix the previous unreliable HSDPA 3G dongle. The device is a capacitor so if there is ever any dip in power, the capacitor should keep a constant supply of electricity to the 3G dongle therefore not interrupting its operation. The replacement Huawei E160 has proved to be reliable, however I decided to keep the Olimex USB-CAP device as it's not doing any harm. This cost me £4.45 through eBay on 04/05/2015.
iPazzPort KP-810-16 mini wireless keyboard. When using the standard on-screen Android keyboard, it consumes most of the screen and can be a bit awkward to use. To get around this, I purchased a mini wireless keyboard through eBay for £19.95 on 23/07/2015. It's roughly the same shape and size as a typical mobile phone and is easy to use. Its rechargeable batteries are charged via the USB cable. On the underside of the keyboard is a remote control of which its functions can be user defined.
I messed up the fitting of the supplied clear screen protector. Subsequently I purchased 5x clear screen protectors, originally designed for the Nexus 7 tablet. After trial & error with fitting (hence the purchase of 5), I've managed to successfully cut one down to size and tidily apply it to the screen. These cost me £1.49 through eBay on 02/08/2015.
I've also fitted a 3.5mm jack to RCA / phono video cable which allows the image from my BlackVue DR380G-HD dash cam to be displayed on the head unit's screen.
Powered off.
Booting up showing an animated Honda logo (you can choose different logos).
Home screen. Being Android, obviously you can fiddle with the contents.
The radio app.
http://www.autopumpkin.com/car-dvd-play ... tspot.html
