Dance Radio

[Grendel]

Hi

Have had a Fabia Estate since March which we are really pleased with.
Considering a new Fabia as a second car. The brochures suggest that the standard radio / cd across the range is the "Dance 2 Din" unit although some of the photographs of the interior show a different unit.
I'm assuming that the Dance and four speakers are standard across the range - Would be interested to know what people think of this system and is it RDS? None of the images I can find make it clear.

Thanks

[youngsyd]

Dance is the Radio/CD unit in the higher spec Fabias, and the option in the lower spec one.

A good unit, but anything is better than the Symphony in my Vrs....!

[rkenny]

I bought a Fabia 2 70 bhp petrol for my wife 4 weeks ago. One of the best, and most unexpected features is the radio/CD player.

I'll list the features I like:
1 radio reception is clear at all times; 2 bass/treble range is good and the car can handle a bit of bass without trouble; 3 the AM tuning also includes long wave i.e. you can pick up radio 4 LW (198); 4 the CD player (MP3) is awesome. I ripped 10 albums onto a 50 pence CD-R disc and it plays really well. The dsplay on the radio (of the Fabia 2 at any rate) is very informative. It can display track title or artist or album or file name by scrolling through. What you've got in effect is a multi CD player for the cost of a CD-R! You obviously need access to a PC and a CD rewriter to make up the CD.

We got the maxidot display and multifunction steering wheel which interfaces with the radio/CD player really well. Our wee car was only £10000 on the road and it really is an impressive piece of kit.

[des_pd_ tdi]

Originally Posted by youngsyd

Dance is the Radio/CD unit in the higher spec Fabias, and the option in the lower spec one.

A good unit, but anything is better than the Symphony in my Vrs....!

The Dance is standard across the Fabia/Roomster range in the U.K. Here is the base spec:

Level 1
Drivers, passenger and side airbags
Immobilizer
Drink-box for 1,5l in front door panels
Spare wheel (steel rim), full
Ticket holder
ABS
Split rear seat, 60%,40%
Height-adjustable driver´s seat
Height and reach adjustable steering wheel
Central door locking
Electric front windows
Passenger airbag switch-off
Radio Dance 2 DIN with CD+MP3 with 4 speakers
15” Hermes’ Steel wheels
3.5 mm jack input socket


Cheers

Des

[AndyC]

Andy

[youngsyd]

I thought it was an option in Fabia 1.....hmm ill have a look tomorrow, im not doubting you, but i thought the 1 didnt have cd in it....

[Grendel]

Hi all,

Thank you for the replies. The Symphony in the Fabia is adequate - must get around to upgrading the speakers.

I think I should get a proper look at the new Fabia, I think it will replace my Polo quite well.

[mrbrynley]

I'm fairly impressed with the Dance stereo in the furby. I like the whole mp3 cd business and it displays allsorts of info about mp3's. I'd have to disagree with rkenny re: the fm reception, it's not ptc good on mine and poor reception is not something I've had a problem with before. otoh, it may just be where I live!

With the speakers, I thought the 1 only got front speakers, whereas the 2 and 3 got rear speakers too. I noticed that the stereo in the brochure pics was nothing like the dance, only had a 1 line display.

I did see an '07 plate polo t'other day and the stereo looked suspiciously similar, but with silver buttons...

[irfant]

Radio reception is better than Fabia'a 402 Radio, I'm pretty satisfied with the Dance...

[Grendel]

Thanks for all the replies. I decided against a new Fabia at the moment as the dealer had a very nice Fabia Sport he had just taken on PX. Will have to get to grips with the Symphony and multichanger.

[woodenspatulas]

the double din "dance" radio IS standard across the new fabia range. the brochures show the wrong HU.

the level 1 has only front speakers, whereas the level 2 and 3 both have front and rear speakers. All have the aux plug in too.
HTH

[basenji boy]

I have a Dance Radio in my Roomster Scout. The radio reception is awful!!! I live in Scotland where radio reception can sometimes be poor but in all my previous cars I have never had a problem. I seems to be worse after I switch on the engine and when the weather is wet and windy. I enjoy listening to my Ipod in the car but prefer the radio when travelling to and from work. It is driving me mad listening to interference noise all the time. Any Suggestions??

[basenji boy]

I have a Dance Radio in my Roomster Scout and the radio reception is awful!!! It appears to be worse when I switch the engine on and when the weather is wet/windy. It only started happening in Sept 07. I've had the car since May 07. Could there be an electrical problem? I hate listening to interference noise all the time!!

[Grendel]

Originally Posted by basenji boy

I have a Dance Radio in my Roomster Scout and the radio reception is awful!!! It appears to be worse when I switch the engine on and when the weather is wet/windy. It only started happening in Sept 07. I've had the car since May 07. Could there be an electrical problem? I hate listening to interference noise all the time!!

Hi - Does the poor reception occur on both AM and FM or just one band. The fact that problem suddenly happened and wet weather makes it worse could suggest an issue with the aerial installation or an earthing fault. Did you catch the aerial going in to a carpark or hit a low branch? However it could be a sign of a poor connection under the bonnet. HT leads can break down and start to track which could cause interference, this can be made worse in damp weather.

I think you have a case to go back to the dealer unless the aerial has obviously been damaged


Cheeers

[OctaviaT81]

Originally Posted by basenji boy

I have a Dance Radio in my Roomster Scout and the radio reception is awful!!! It appears to be worse when I switch the engine on and when the weather is wet/windy. It only started happening in Sept 07. I've had the car since May 07. Could there be an electrical problem? I hate listening to interference noise all the time!!

Reception in my Scout isn't very good either. I live in Cornwall where the reception is also poor, but my Octy can cope with it. When the reception is good, the sound quality is very good, but annoying when it's not.

[Grendel]

Sounds like the Dance Radio may not be too sensitive. I'm assuming that the Local/DX selection is not set to Local, that could de-sense reception.

[nizetry18]

yeah... if u like dance radio , there is a compilation series you should check out called "Euro Club Hits" --

it's pretty clear that dance music is coming back around the world -- just check the recent big American hip-hop and R&B hits which are clear rip-offs of the european dance style.....

here's the direct iTunes link to the "Euro Club Hits" series.....

http://phobos.apple.com/WebObjects/M...Club+Hits+Vol+

[Decron]

Mine is fantastic. Really pleased with it. the reception is fine everywhere (And I have been a lot of places) except about 500 yards from my house

I have even added an underseat sub to fill the sound out a bit. The new Mike Oldfield album sounds lush!

[Dunsojerin]

Originally Posted by rkenny

I bought a Fabia 2 70 bhp petrol for my wife 4 weeks ago. One of the best, and most unexpected features is the radio/CD player.

I'll list the features I like:
1 radio reception is clear at all times; 2 bass/treble range is good and the car can handle a bit of bass without trouble; 3 the AM tuning also includes long wave i.e. you can pick up radio 4 LW (198); 4 the CD player (MP3) is awesome. I ripped 10 albums onto a 50 pence CD-R disc and it plays really well. The dsplay on the radio (of the Fabia 2 at any rate) is very informative. It can display track title or artist or album or file name by scrolling through. What you've got in effect is a multi CD player for the cost of a CD-R! You obviously need access to a PC and a CD rewriter to make up the CD.

We got the maxidot display and multifunction steering wheel which interfaces with the radio/CD player really well. Our wee car was only £10000 on the road and it really is an impressive piece of kit.

Off topic I know but can someone tell me how to rip multi albums onto a CD?

[Hearny]

Originally Posted by Dunsojerin

Off topic I know but can someone tell me how to rip multi albums onto a CD?

I use Yahoo Music Jukebox and find that I can get about 7-8 albums on a 700mb disk.

[nickcoll]

iTunes works extremely well for this - you just rip all the CDs you want then create a playlist, drag the tracks/albums you want into it, and burn the CD. You choose what format you want the CD to be in preferences ("MP3 CD" is what you want) and it all happens automagically...

[Little Jo]

What's the best MP3 player to use? Is i-pod really the one to go for? Which i-pod? Would the nano version be big enough to hold say 10 cd's worth of music? I'm new to this sort of thing.

Jo

[d96em]

Originally Posted by Little Jo

What's the best MP3 player to use? Is i-pod really the one to go for? Which i-pod? Would the nano version be big enough to hold say 10 cd's worth of music? I'm new to this sort of thing.

Jo

I have the second generation nano, with 8 Gb of memory, and it currently holds well over 100 cd's with room to spare. Here's how you calculate stuff like this (long version):

Ordinary CD's are recorded in stereo, with a 16 bit resolution and a 44.1 kHz sample rate. This means that 44100 times per second, two channels are sampled, each sample being 16 bits long, so in a full second you'll have recorded 44100*2*16 = 1411200 bits of data. 8 bits group into one byte, so that's 176400 bytes per second. Say that your average cd has perhaps 45 minutes of recorded sound, that's 45*60 = 2700 seconds, meaning that the cd holds 176400*2700 = 476280000 bytes of data. This equals 454.22 Mb. If you want to know why you don't just divide by a million, that's because 1 kb is not actually 1000 bytes but 1024 (2^10, the closest power of two to 1000), and similarly, 1 Mb is 1024 kb.
Now, because you don't store the raw data on your ipod or other mp3 player, you can get away with way less. Normal compression algorithms such as mp3 or aac reduce the size of the data to a tenth while keeping audio quality at a level that most people find adequate. So your average 45-minute cd would be reduced to around 45 Mb of data when it hits your ipod.

The short version is indeed shorter: converting a cd into mp3, wma, aac or whatever format you prefer, uses about as many Mb as there are minutes of sound on the record.

My 8 Gb ipod can hold approximately 8000 Mb (ignoring the 1024-factor) of data, or 8000 minutes (133 hours) of music. In reality, no player actually has as much available storage as it says on the box, because some of the memory is occupied by other things and also because manufacturers tend to exaggerate by means of said factor (when they say you've got 1 Gb of data, they advertently miscalculate by saying that the 1 billion bytes form one Gb, when it actually only forms 0.93 Gb).

Anyway, long story short, the days of being able to store only around 10 or so cd's on your player are long gone. Most people probably don't even own as many cd's as would fit on their players, these days.

[Little Jo]

Am I right in thinking that the current Nano uses flash memory rather than hard drive? We basically want to avoid having CDs in the car, particularly when on holiday. I'm thinking of an 8GB Nano to use in my new Fabia as it has the capability. I have looked at the Classic, but it looks like overkill for what I need.

Jo

[JonA]

I'd say go for a classic.. You can never have to much storage space for your music... The classic has a bigger screen, more space and isn't that much more expensive.

Make sure to buy a decent cradle for whatever MP3 player you choose as well. You will not be able to control the iPod/MP3 player from the Dance radio via the "aux" input, so a well placed holder for the music device is a must if you ask me.

I have ditched the Dance radio in favour of a Pioneer avic D3 unit which controls my iPod from a touch screen. It works great, and the sound quality is better as well