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Another vote for Crutchfield. I've had good experience with them, and a purchase gets you into their tech help line as required. Their mounting brackets, wiring plugs and good instructions will save you plenty of time and hassles. They are a big, big outfit - if they say it's in stock - it is. Go to Sony's site and click on mobile audio and they direct you to C'fld. This is Sony Corp saying: "On car stereos, they speak for us."
A guy in a stereo install place once told me: "Count on about one year of trouble-free life for every $100 you spend on a head unit." A bit cynical?
Units that have worked well for me - JVC and Panasonic. People in the business have warned me away from Pioneer, Sony and Alpine. Nice features, maybe, but supposedly, durability has declined in the past couple of years.
I like the lower console location - that's the factory setup on our old 240's and as others are saying, reduces the visibility of the unit to outsiders.
If you get any really cold weather where you are, don't use the CD player until things warm up, or you will have it busted in short order. This means remembering to switch it to AM/FM when you park at night, or it will start up when you turn the key on next (frozen) morning.
Anything above the "WalMart" level seems to come with a remote - can be handy, but I find I rarely use it. The Line-in or Aux-in feature is great, highly recommended! I connect a short RCA patch cord to this input and run the 1/8" stereo plug up into the glovebox through a hole I drill in the back. Just plug the iPod in and you have kilotunes to go, all out of sight in the glovebox.
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Bob (son's 81-244GL B21F, dtr's 83-244DL B23F, 'my' 94-944 B230FD; plus grocery-getter Dodge minivan, hobbycar 77 MGB, and numerous old motorcycles)
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