Mobile Video Systems

Baby Sitting Hits the Road

by Ivan Berger

You may never get to watch it, but video for your car is a good investment—at least, compared to the legal expenses for permanently silencing your kids. Children’s attention spans are long enough for listening raptly to six hours of the same, repeated, Barney tape but not for a two-hour scenic drive to Grandma’s. Faced with the prospect of infinite Barney repetitions, “10 Million Bottles of Beer On the Wall,” or 200 miles’ worth of “Ma! He’s looking out my window!” thousands of parents are opting for back-seat video systems. And makers of vans, SUVs, luxury sedans and aftermarket electronics are vying to serve them.

That means you have a broad choice of video sources (broadcast TV, VHS tape or DVD), screen sizes (5.6- to 22-inch) and screen placements (overhead, on the console or in the front-seat headrests). You can even buy systems designed to be switched to your next vehicle at lease-end or trade-in time, or portable systems you can switch from car to car or even use in rental vehicles.

If you’re buying a new van or SUV (or a few super-luxury sedans such as the Volvo S80 Executive Edition, Bentley or Rolls-Royce), you can usually get it delivered with video built in. That’s the simplest option: everything goes on one order form, one monthly payment and (usually) one warranty, and everything’s installed by the time your vehicle is delivered. You don’t even have to bother your head about choosing what goes into the system. You may have a choice or two (such as whether to have the screen flip down from the headliner or up from the console), but that’s it; a lot of the factory-installed systems don’t even include DVD players (that will probably change with the ’02 models). You want more choices, including the chance to add video to your existing vehicle? For that, you need the aftermarket.

You might, for example, consider a portable system such as those offered by Audiovox, Delphi and others. You’ll probably be able to use these in your next van or SUV, can use them in rental cars (if you’re willing to lug them along on the trip) and can leave them home if you need maximum load space or park in an area where thefts are common. These are usually all-in-one systems, typically consoles with flip-up screens.

For permanent installations, all-in-one console systems are just one of many choices. You could, for example, go the other way and scatter components all around the car—a VHS tape player underneath a seat, a DVD changer in the trunk or center console, screens in the front-seat headrests or flipping down from on high, all controlled by a DVD/CD/MP3/AM/FM unit in the dash. Sound can be stereo or full surround; you can even play music or the radio in the front seats while the kids listen to the soothing sound of car chases and atom bombs through headphones in the back. You can start small, with a stereo head unit that’s designed to work with video gear you add later. And if you pick and install your components with care, you may even be able to carry them over to your next vehicle without spoiling the resale value of your present one—consult with your installer about that.

Most in-car video screens measure between 6 and 7 inches on diagonal, but there are notable exceptions, including an 8-inch Pioneer, 10.4-inchers from Rosen Products and Clarion, 15- and 22-inch Panasonic models and 17- and 18-inch Clarions. A flip-down overhead mount will put a single screen where every rear-seat passenger can see it (and where, I suspect, it’s less likely to cause car-sickness), but the image may seem small that far away. Small screens can also be mounted in the front-seat headrests; you’ll need one for every rear-seat passenger who wants to watch, but you could then feed separate signals to each screen so that one child can watch a video while the other plays a video game. You can also get screens that retract into the dash, but you won’t be able to watch video on them unless the car is standing still; the law requires this in most places, and common sense requires it in all. (Front screens can be used for navigational displays, however.)

What signal sources do you need? If you have a DVD player at home, you’ll certainly want one for the car, so you can bring your family’s favorite discs along. But you may also want a VHS player, as there seems to be more kiddy material available in that format, so far. Tuners for off-the-air TV can be added, too, but reception in a moving car is usually awful, and their antennas can tip off thieves.

DVD players take many forms. Some, like mobile VCRs, are stand-alone units that can be tucked under a seat, in a console or in a car trunk; some (including models from Alpine, Audiovox, Pioneer, Sanyo, and Sony) are changers. Others are DIN-sized in-dash players, some separate and others built into headunits that also include FM/AM tuners and, in most cases, amplifiers. Portable DVD players can also be used in a car, if you strap them down securely; even portables with their own screens have output jacks that can be used to feed other video systems.

While back-seat videogames and kiddy movies can keep kids from going bonkers on long trips, parents can be driven bonkers listening to the accompanying soundtracks. Let the kids listen through headphones, though, and the parents can relax in silence, chat or listen to radio or CDs. Alpine, Clarion, Jensen, Kenwood, Panasonic and Santeca are among the companies offering multi-zone audio, but a good installer could probably set other companies’ hardware up that way. Wireless headsets (available from Alpine, Jensen, Panasonic, Rosen, and others and on such OEM systems as the one in Mercedes M-class SUVs) cause less of a tangle in the back seat, but wired headphones are less likely to be taken from the car as the kids bounce out for bathroom breaks or soccer.

Adding video to your vehicle’s entertainment system also gives you a good excuse to go surround. Mobile audio systems already have enough amplifiers and speakers for this (van systems may have enough for 7.1-channel Surround EX) so all you need is a surround decoder. Surround can add a lot to music listening in a car, giving the impression that you’re in a decent-sized performance space. Panasonic believes this so firmly that it even offers a headunit that plays multi-channel DVD-audio discs, but no video at all. And if surround is part of your setup, you begin to get some direct benefit from your rolling theater, even if it’s only the kids in back who get to watch.

Consider, however, keeping the video off some of the time, and actually interacting with your kids as long as you can. That may not be possible when you’re alone with them in heavy traffic on a day when they’re acting up; under those circumstances, video becomes a safety feature, letting you concentrate on the road. But parents I’ve surveyed who raised their families before mobile video report that time spent with children on the road, though sometimes exasperating, left them and their kids with happy memories of shared experiences.

DVD TO GO:

While we joke a lot about the goal of in-car-entertainment being the satisfaction of a quiet rear seat, often times, in-car DVD will deliver the opposite. A rumbling subwoofer and the all-encompassing force of 5.1 cinema are sure to entertain rear-seat passengers, but not necessarily quietly. And since you’ve probably already converted your VHS collection to DVD for your at-home enjoyment, it only makes sense to use that same material in the car. Plus, in-car DVD is just so much cooler.

Your options and the price spectrum for in-car theater are as varied as they are for in-home theater. For the full 5.1 in-car experience, you need the 5.1 speakers. While you probably already have at least the two front and two rear speakers, you’ll have to add a center channel and subwoofer. Additionally, you’ll need the Dolby Digital/DTS processor, which is available from one of several companies, including Panasonic, Alpine, Pioneer, Eclipse and Clarion.

Monitor options are tricky only because state laws prohibit moving video in the front seat of a moving car. While almost every company offers an in-dash monitor, they will only display movies when the parking brake is on. So each company also makes monitors for rear-seat-only viewing that are installed in either an overhead console or in the headrest of the front seats. Screen sizes vary from 5 inches to about 14 inches. Average sizes for rear-seat monitors is 7 and 8 inches.

Alpine and Pioneer both recently introduced six-disc DVD changers for those extra long trips in the car, with their optional Dolby Digital/DTS processors.

Eclipse pairs its DVD source unit, model 55090, with its digital decoder, model 39011, for the car theater experience. Sold separately, the in-dash DVD, which combines an AM/FM tuner, is $1,500.99, and the DTS/Dolby Digital decoder is $799.99. A center-channel speaker and a 7-inch monitor complete the Eclipse home theater experience.

Kenwood’s Z910DVD in-dash DVD costs $1,300 and can be used with the KDS-P900 Dolby Digital and DTS decoder, which will add $550. For the fifth channel of audio, Kenwood offers a center-channel speaker for the car, model KSC-900CTR (another $300). Kenwood displays are available in 7- or 8-inch versions for $850 and $1,300.

Panasonic has four DVD receivers for the car that range in price from $799.99 to $1,999.99. A few models have built-in center-channel speakers. Panasonic’s Dolby Digital/DTS processor is available for $799.

Audiovox has a $750 in-dash DVD player (model DVD-3100) that has optical digital audio output and two channel line out. Audiovox overhead drop-down screens range in size from 5 inches to 13.3 inches and in price from $550 to $1,900.

Blaupunkt’s in-car DVD player is small enough to be tucked under a seat or installed in a console, and it also plays back MP3-encoded CDs. The DVD player, model DVD-ME1, is available for $449.95. A monitor from Blaupunkt will cost approximately $479.95.

The JVC KV-DV7 DVD player ($899.99) installs in the dash, under the seat or in the trunk. It has Dolby Digital/MPEG/Linear PCM audio output and can be controlled through two JVC CD receiver models.

But of course all of these prices are in addition to installation charges. —J.L.