Introduction

The Indian car market places almost as much importance on its in-car entertainment systems as it does on space and fuel efficiency. We would too, considering how much time we spend standing still in traffic rather than moving quickly to our destination. And car audio being part of the electronics sphere, it is evolving rapidly – we have an example of this evolution in a full system that the nice folks at Blaupunkt India have handed to us for a review. In a series of articles, we will examine each component individually, and how well they work together.

The list of components we’ve got from Blaupunkt is as follows:

•Blaupunkt Costa Mesa 900 head unit This head unit is a mid-range product from Blaupunkt’s ‘Symphony’ series. It has a 6.75-inch capacitive touchscreen, is Android-powered and has the features you want - it will mirror your phone screen, whether you’re running Apple or Android – and it has Bluetooth connectivity, of course. It also has SD card and USB connectivity, and satellite navigation via maps loaded from a memory card. Rs 30,990 without maps, click here for more.

•Rockford Fosgate Prime R165-S These component speakers are from the entry-level ‘Prime’ series of speakers from Rockford Fosgate. They were installed at the front of our test car, so that the sound stage was elevated closer to the passengers’ ear level. Rs 8990, click here to purchase

•Rockford Fosgate Prime R675 These are three-way full range speakers that we have installed in the rear doors. They complement the front component speakers quite well. Both the speaker sets are designed to be primarily stock replacement speaker sets. Rs 4590, click here to purchase. We drove them with the…

•Rockford Fosgate R400-4D amplifier An amplifier is important, as a head unit doesn’t have a strong enough amplifier to drive the speakers efficiently. Besides, one look at this Class-D full-range 4-channel amplifier and the many options it provided us gave us the feeling that we chose well. Rs 27,890, click here to purchase

• Blaupunkt XLf 8A Finally, rounding things off was the compact powered subwoofer from Blaupunkt. This prioritises being compact over making you feel the thump in your chest, and it is just what the doctor ordered for a hatchback that doesn’t have much boot space to spare. Rs 18,990, click here for more.

In our next article, we’ll have a look at the installation of the various components and how well they integrate into the car.

Photos: Kaustubh Gandhi